How do you lift for size?

[HH110]

i just read something about hypertrophy and lifting for size and lifting for strength but it doesnt tell you how.

how do you lift for size?

i didnt even know there was a difference.

 

[pkington]

First, I would say, why would you want to lift for size as opposed to strenth? It seems silly. That being said, the way most bodybuilders lift for size is to isolate a muscle group and completely exhaust it. A good way to do this is with compound sets. Compound sets are when you pick two exercises that work the same muscle group and then do them together. So for your arms and back, you could do something like 5 pullups, 5 chinups, rest 2 minutes, repeat. Do this for 3-4 sets. For legs, you could do squats and lunges in a similar fashion. Another thing a lot of bodybuilders do is to do isolation exercies. So instead of squats for legs, you would do leg extensions that isolate just the quads. Again though, this is pretty against my philosophy of training for actual usable strength. While this might make you look big, it isn't going to help you gain functional strength nearly as fast as you could be if you were training multiplanar, functional movements. Hope that helps. Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

 

[Excder]

two words, GO HEAVY!

Size is pretty much high weight and relatively low reps(5-8). Compounds lift will help you get bigger than doing isolation stuff

 

[Nobody]

Size and strength aren't the same thing.

If you want to get big, stay consistent, and eat big. There is a lot of variety as far as lifting goes, but in general its all in the 6-10 rep range.

Good luck.

 

[limestix]

two words, GO HEAVY!

Size is pretty much high weight and relatively low reps(5-8). Compounds lift will help you get bigger than doing isolation stuff

The common notion of building muscles goes against low rep

High weight low rep tends to build dense strong muscles. High density works against size.

For size the typical recommendation is moderate weight at 10-12 reps, making sure to really exhaust your muscles.

 

[JTM]

6-8 reps is generally the rule of thumb.

The biggest factor however will be your diet. If you don't eat enough you wont grow, no matter what training regime you follow.