How The Number of Reps, Sets, Rest & TUT Can Affect Your Results
What Most Trainers Don’t Even Know…
Most women fail to see results because of lack of intensity in their workouts.
So I’m going to show you how to tweak your workouts in order to maximize fat loss and muscle gain so you can get leaner!
By the way, before I give you all these WORKOUT TIPS, I just want to give you some NUTRITION/DIET tips that will help you with your weight loss and fitness goals because no matter how much you exercise, if you are not eating the “right way”, you will not lose weight, you will not get results.
Because it’s not just about the workouts even though it’s a big part of it.
DIET TIPS for Weight Loss
I have found that a lot of people are “STUCK” with their weight loss because they are eating some of the wrong foods.
So I have to make sure you are not eating one or more of foods on this list. Because if you are, it can be completely SABOTAGING your results. Yes, it can totally be true that you can be working your butt off at the gym 6 days a week, eating super healthy (as you think), but if you are eating one or more of these foods, you will NOT BE ABLE TO LOSE WEIGHT. The reason is because these foods though some may think are healthy or not so bad, are actually very inflammatory.
Inflammation in the digestive track makes it incredibly hard if not impossible to burn fat. So in order to be able to burn fat so you can lose weight effectively, its crucial that you take these foods out of your diet.
This is so important and makes such a huge impact on your results that I decided to compile these foods into a PDF for you. So go to the following link where you can download this information for free. I also added a list of 5 Foods that are NECESSARY for you to include in your diet if you want to LOSE WEIGHT and GET TONED. Foods that you should eat daily!
I also took the liberty to share with you a short video of my favorite 5 ABS EXERCISES. The ones that have gotten me ABS after having 2 kids (daughter is 15 months) and I never had them before. Here is the link so you can download the PDF and get the VIDEO. Start applying it right now. Take those 5 foods out of your KITCHEN immediately! LINK TO PDF & VIDEO
Here are some ways you can change your workouts to make them more effective and more fun and challenging.
I wrote another great post on more details that can help you make your workouts more effective, so you can burn more fat and build more lean muscle, check it out here.
I also post daily exercise videos, workouts and recipes on My Facebook Page, so make sure to go there now and LIKE the page so that you can have easy access to them all. It will give you motivation and inspiration to try new things.
Ways To Change Your Workouts
• Increasing/decreasing time under tension (how slow or fast a movement is performed)
• Increasing/decreasing rest interval
• Changing # sets
• Changing # repetitions
Time Under Tension
- 211 is an example of time under tension. This means each rep should take 4 seconds…. 2+1+1=4. The first number is the eccentric phase or the opposite of the contraction. In a squat it would be the “going down” phase. So in this 211 example, you would take 2 seconds to go down. The middle number is the pause in the middle of the exercise, in a squat it would be at 90 degrees. So in this example, you would pause for 1 second at 90 degrees. The last number is the concentric phase or the contraction. In this example, it would be the “going up” phase, so in the squat you would take 1 second to go up.
- Commit to a time under tension for each exercise to help you control movements and be safer and also to ensure you have enough time under tension per movement or else there will be no muscle growth.
- The higher the reps, the lower the time under tension, the lower the reps, slow down the tempo. For example, 20 repetitions may have a 201 tempo, this would give you a total of 60 seconds for the set. If it is 10 reps, you can do 411 tempo and end up with 60 seconds of time under tension per set.
TUT per SET
1-20 seconds TUT = Speed & Strength
20-40 seconds TUT = Strength & Hypertrophy (muscle growth)
40-70 seconds TUT = Hypertrophy (muscle growth and muscle endurance)
Rest Intervals
- For strength and hypertrophy (muscle growth)…….TONE: 30 seconds to 2 minutes.
- For maximal hypertrophy (muscle growth): 2-3 minutes
- For maximal strength and power: more than 3 minutes (and this is most likely not you). So you will probably not rest for 3 minutes unless you are SLACKING
- To step it up even more, instead of just sitting around for 30-60 seconds, perform a core movement for the duration of the rest. You can find tons of my workout and exercise videos with tons of different core and abs exercises on My YouTube Channel so go there for some inspiration……. Then we will be talking INTENSITY!
Number Of Sets
If you want to get LEANER, that means you want to gain some lean and toned muscle. Which means you need a high volume of exercises per workout or high number of set per workout (15-24). So if you want to gain muscle, you wouldn’t just do 1-2 exercises per muscle in a workout. You could try 3-5 exercises per muscle.
If you want to gain some muscle, maybe full body workouts wouldn’t be your best bet since you need a high volume of sets per workout and per muscle. I mean, you can’t expect to have your shoulder more toned and defined (which means more muscle), if you do 3 exercise for shoulder per week (1 in each of your 3 workouts for the week). A better idea would be dedicating a workout to say maybe arms and doing 3 exercises for shoulders and do 4 sets, now that is 12 sets per week versus 3 sets per week. You get the point?
I’m always floored when people say they want more defined arms (biceps and triceps) and more rounded and toned shoulders, and a toned high butt, which basically means MORE MUSCLE.
But then people just do 3 -6 sets total for each muscle per week.
How can you gain muscle like that?
How can you get more definition like that?
I’m not saying you’re not burning calories and the burning of calories will help you LOSE WEIGHT. But if what you want is also definition and more tone, than girlfriend, you need MORE SETS per workout and per muscle.
Number of Repetitions
Certain number of reps cause certain results. So its important to know what those are so you can adjust your workouts.
It’s also good to train all rep levels except maybe 1-5 unless you are a strength and power lifter but for the general population, using that much weight to fatigue at 1-5 reps is a lot of load (Weight).
Now when I say a certain number of reps, I mean, REACH MOMENTARY MUSCLE FAILURE at that desired number. So if a program says 12 reps, it means you absolutely can’t get 13-14 reps, if you can, you are not working at the right intensity and you have to increase the weight. In each set you should be dying at 1-3 reps to your desired rep outcome. So if it is 12, then you should barley be making it around 10 reps but making it to 12. Adjust your weight accordingly.
Most people do this wrong, and most people don’t train at the right intensities so they don’t get good results.
Here is a guideline for you!
1-5 Reps = Strength & Power
6-8 = Strength & some Hypertrophy (muscle growth)
9-12 = Hypertrophy (muscle growth)
13-20+ = Muscle Endurance and some Hypertrophy (muscle growth).
This will help you work different muscle fibers that are recruited when you do a certain amount of reps.
You can’t do 20 repetitions all the time and expect to get results….. to get leaner. You can do 4 weeks of 20 reps and then another 4 weeks of 12-15 reps and then another 4 weeks of 8-10 reps. Now that would be effective.
Remember to adjust the number of sets according to the number of reps and rest, etc. I told you……. Creating an effective workout program is a science!
Here is a sample workout for you to try. Its kind of like what is in my MMF Monthly Workouts, the program where I send out MMF Fat Burning & Leaning Workouts every single month.
These are the workouts that my clients pay $100 per hour for. And now I have them available online for people all over the world and crazy affordable. It has been so amazing to see the results that people are getting when they actually follow a program that is designed with a lot of consideration…. considering the amount of sets, reps, rest and TUT that is necessary for the desired goal.
It really is a science to make workout programs. Which is why most people workout and workout and workout and don’t see any results.
Its also crucial to change the workouts every few weeks and if you don’t, you will not see results. So make sure you are changing up your workouts and taking into consideration everything we just mentioned above.
Following effective workouts taking many things into consideration has gotten me in the best shape of my life.
Do this workout once a week only, this is more of a fat loss workout, few sets per muscle and working the whole body in one workout.
And make sure you are following me on PINTEREST because I post tons of workouts, exercise videos and even tons and tons of healthy recipes and weight loss tips. They are all organized in boards for you to find what you need easily. So go there now and hit FOLLOW ALL so you don’t miss anything.
Sample Workout Routine for Women
- Perform 2 sets of each circuit.
- DB stands for dumbbell.
Circuit 1
20 DB squats
20 DB reverse lunges
45 seconds of reverse crunches
Circuit 2
20 Incline DB presses
20 push-ups
45 seconds stability ball crunches
Circuit 3
20 Stability ball leg curls
20 Stability ball hip extensions
45 seconds holding a plank
Circuit 4
20 Lat pulldowns
20 DB rows
45 seconds stability ball reverse extensions.
This is only 1 day of workout that you can do once per week. You must do 2 more workouts that are effective like the one above in order to get results.
If you are super confused and you have been doing it wrong all this time, don’t stress, you can try my MMF Monthly Workouts and get amazing results while learning how to put effective workouts together taking into consideration everything I just mentioned. And you won’t have to waste time anymore or try to learn what has taken me years and years of education to learn.