Lift "Heavy"

What does that mean and how do you do it?

I recently wrote about "toning" and how it's just code for lifting weights, but marketed to girls and women with the underlying meaning that they shouldn't lift "heavy" because they might get too "manly." [Read the full post here.]

That raised the question: What, exactly, is lifting "heavy"?

The answer is basically the same answer I give for every fitness or nutrition related question...
It depends.

What is "heavy" for one person might be light for another, depending on factors like overall body size and how long someone has been training.

For example: My 6'3" boyfriend who does barbell back squats fairly regularly can squat 400 lbs. I'm 5'3" and I don't do them very much, so somewhere around 100 lbs would be heavy for me. There are people about my size who train them often and intentionally who can pretty easily do double that, but for someone brand new to lifting or who doesn't squat much, the 45-lb bar on its own might be too heavy.

"Lifting heavy" really means using a challenging weight for you, depending on the exercise you're performing.

Why does it matter?

Strength training has numerous benefits including building new muscle tissue and improving metabolic health. It also increase bone density, which naturally begins to decrease around age 30.

To achieve those benefits, though, the muscle tissue needs to be challenged. Muscle fibers require a certain amount of stress, from load (weight) and overall training volume, to adapt and continue to improve fitness. That's called progressive overload.

That doesn't mean doing 20 to 50 repetitions of bodyweight exercises to "feel the burn." That kind of burn is due to muscular endurance, not muscular strength. Loading the muscles with a heavier weight for fewer repetitions will have greater benefits for strength and overall fitness than doing dozens of reps with bodyweight or light weight.

Plus, building strength will ultimately help improve endurance. When we start to lift heavier and we get stronger, we'll able to lift those lighter weights for more repetitions and it will feel easier.

Lifting heavier weights also makes bodyweight exercises feel much more doable. As a group fitness instructor, strength training on my own is crucial to doing my job well. For awhile, I was solely focused on getting more certifications in cardio and HIIT classes, but when I got back to strength training, my pushups in GRIT felt so much easier, and my knees were much healthier and happier during all the jumps in BODYATTACK.

Some people are hesitant to lift weights because they don't want to get hurt, but strength training can actually help injury-proof your body. If you do any kind of impact sports or classes, strengthening your muscles will take some of the load off your joints, and a well-rounded program can make you less likely to get random injuries from daily activities. If you're worried about doing something incorrectly, that's totally normal! Consider hiring a personal trainer to check your form before you venture out on your own.

So what exactly is "heavy"?

Ideally, you should lift heavy enough to build enough strength for the things you want and need to do in life.

So what do you want to do? Carry all your groceries into the house in one trip? Be able to pick up your kids or grandkids? Hike or bike up mountains? Lift your dog in and out of the car? To prepare for them, you have to train accordingly by choosing similar weights and exercises that will carry over.

In practical terms, "heavy" means you have a couple extra reps left in the tank but you really couldn't do more than another 2 or 3. If you set your weights down and feel like you could easily get another 5 or 10 or more, load it up!

The goal is to make the muscle fibers work hard by exerting considerable effort. If you're able to do dozens of reps, you're training endurance rather than strength.

That being said, you don't need to increase your weight every single session, nor should you! Variations in load and volume across a training program are key to continuing to progress safely. It's not about going all out every single set or every single workout but about continually challenging the muscles and increasing strength over time.

Want to try it for yourself?

Check out this example from my personal favorite personal trainer, John Gaeta (@jg_training1):

Let's say you want to train chest presses to help you get stronger at pushups.

Start with a weight you can press 6 times (reps) for 3 sets.
The next week -- because your muscles need time to recover between lifts -- use the same weight and add a rep.
Continue adding until you get to 10 reps.
Then increase the weight by 5-10 lbs and go back to 6 reps.
Work your way up again, only increasing the weight once you hit 10 reps again.