Thursday evening during my “personalized workout” session with the trainer at the gym I’ve joined, he talked about the “volume of weight” being the key. In my case I want to lose weight (and size) and tone up my muscles. The way to assist that process with resistance training is to lift less weight more times. If you want to get bigger you lift more weight fewer times.
It is the accumulation of weight over time, the volume, that makes this work. The math is pretty simple, and the numbers get big fast. I’m setup to use between 25 and 125 pounds of weight across eleven machines. On each machine the goal is to complete 12 - 15 repetitions at that weight. Once you complete the circuit once, you turn around and run through it again.
I did it for the first time this morning and just for grins I put together a simple spreadsheet to see how much total weight I moved in the course of a thirty minute workout. Would you believe just over 16,500 pounds? Four and a quarter tons. If I manage to complete the workout three times a week as I hope, that will be roughly 50,000 pounds a week moved. By me.
Twenty-five tons.
Hubba.