Repetition Range

As promised last time, today we'll take a look at what the recommended repetition range is based on.

When performing an exercise for the first time, Treeceps recommends a repetition range in which you should aim to reach exhaustion. But how do these values come about?

How many repetitions you should perform in each set depends on the goal you are pursuing. The range you focus your training on will also be the range where you improve the most.

For example, athletes who are training for a powerlifting competition typically train a lot in the range of 1-4 repetitions, because this sport is about lifting a maximum weight for one repetition.

For such a low repetition range, you should be very confident in your technique and know exactly what you are doing. Otherwise there is a high risk of injury.

When training your muscle endurance to improve your performance in a certain sport, it sometimes makes sense to train in a high repetition range of, e.g., 20-50 repetitions.

However, doing close to as many reps as you can in a high repetition range is often painful. - You "feel the burn" in your muscles. In addition, your muscles will typically be very sore the next days which can limit your recovery.

Of course, there's nothing wrong with pursuing these goals and you can record your training for these goals in this app! However, Treeceps focuses on training that increases your muscle mass as efficiently as possible.

For this it has proven to be most practical to train in a medium repetition range of 5-15 repetitions.

According to the current state of science, there are many indications that it is important for muscle growth to go close to your own performance limit for your exercise sets.

This is particularly efficient in a medium repetition range. - You don't have a high risk of injury, you don't need to a lot of time to do enough repetitions and do not suffer from too much muscle soreness.

For some exercises it is more advantageous to do more repetitions, as the exercises are difficult to do with good form and heavy weight. Other exercises are particularly suitable for lower repetition ranges.

The recommended repititon range is not carved in stone. As long as your effort on most sets is 8/10 or 9/10, you're on the right track! But it can be a helpful to know what to aim for if you goal is to gain muscle!