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Weight Training

# I will be starting the 4-Day Get Lean Program and had a quick question. I…

The question

I will be starting the 4-Day Get Lean Program and had a quick question. I know the weights for the sets are calculated from our strength tests, but are we supposed to basically reach failure by the end of each set. For example, if it says 15@25lbs. should I barely be able to do 25, and if it seems easy, do I increase the weight or the number of reps?

Dan's answer

Dan Wirth, MA, CSCS

Great question. Very simply, you should be able to get all your reps. If you do a set and you could have easily done 2 or 3 more repetitions than you should increase the weight. Don't actually do more reps or add another set. However, if you can not perform all the repetitions then you should decrease the weight on that particular exercise. As you progress through your program your body will be changing and this is exactly why we let our members change the weight but not add sets or reps\! If you change the sets and reps you would be changing the volume parameters of your program. This can dramatically effect the overall focus of the program. For example, if a program calls for doing 10 reps and the member decides to do 15 reps this would change the focus of the program from hypertrophy to muscular endurance\!

I hope this helps a little.

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