How much weight do I add to the bar to get stronger?

“I want to go to the gym but I don’t know what to do or where to start”

This is an all too familiar comment we receive from many prospects and clients. I’m sure most of you were in a similar situation when you first started.

I won’t spend too much time on exercise selection. But in a nutshell we want to cover the following STRENGTH movements at least once per week to grow a strong balanced body.

Double Leg (DL) Knee dominant – Squats

DL Hip Dominant – Deadlifts, Romanian Deadlifts, Kettlebell Swings

Single Leg (SL) Knee Dominant – Split Squats, Lunges, Bulgarian Split Squats, Single Leg Squats, Side Lunges

SL Hip Dominant – SL Romanian Deadlifts, SL Bridges

Vertical Push – Overhead Press

Vertical Pull – Chin Ups, Pull Ups

Horizontal Push – Push Ups, Bench Press

Horizontal Pull – One Arm Rows, Barbell Rows

I didn’t include our core, athletic movements and conditioning as this is just about strength.

You can use any equipment available to do the exercises above. Feel free to break it up any way you’d like, so long as everything gets covered at least once per week. Some programs do upper/lower body on alternate days. Some do whole body 2-3 days per week. Whatever suits your fancy.

Now that we covered the exercises lets cover how to progress and grow stronger.

We follow the concept of progressive overload. This means in order to build muscle, we need to continually ask our muscles to do more work. This could be in the form of adding weight, repetitions, sets, or manipulating HOW we do each rep. At Full Plate we cover all 4.

Beginners:

At Full Plate everybody starts off with body weight for up to 4 weeks, gradually adding repetitions (8,10,12,15) every week as the athlete works on technique and developing the habits of exercise.

If you can do the exercise with better technique, under control, then you are getting stronger!

Then we start adding weight (if we haven’t already). Each week/session we will add weight according to these guidelines:

• Lower Body
  • Hexbar/Barbell: 5-10lbs
  • Dumbbells: 5-10 lbs
• Upper Body
  • Barbell: 5-10lbs
  • Dumbbells: 2.5-5lbs

This is generally how we start building strength. This may feel easy to some, and difficult for others.

If it feels easy, focus on the technique and building the right habits. The strength will come, but we cannot risk learning improper technique.

Now for those who may find this too rapid of a pace (think younger female athletes or ladies) we follow the same protocol, but instead of adding weight weekly, we add weight monthly.

Every week you add one rep to your exercises (5,6,7,8), then add weight and start over again. Sometimes we will go heavier for more strength (3,4,5,6) or lighter for more endurance (9,10,11,12).

Some girls/ladies will use the first system just fine; some will need the second system. The same goes for some gentlemen. The important part is that we are improving in some way!

The process of getting strong takes time, if we expect it to happen overnight then we are asking for failure. Be consistent, build the habits, and this process will carry you far!

Another way we get stronger is by adding sets. Sometimes we can’t lift a heavy weight for more reps, so we can add a set. For example instead of doing 3 sets of 5, we can do 4 or 5 sets of 5. If we can do more sets, then we are getting stronger!

Lastly, we will add tempo to our repetitions. This can mean any combination of the following: going down slow, pausing, or coming back up slow. This increases the time that the muscle is under tension, this means more work. If we can lift the same weight for more time, then we are getting stronger. So we don’t just need to add weight or reps for strength, HOW we lift the weight also matters.

Advanced:

There will come a time when we lose our “beginner gains” and can no longer add weight every week (or every month on the second system). Now this is where the more advanced programs come in.

More advanced programs are tailored to get you stronger every other week or every month or even every three months. As we get stronger, we need more specific programs to build our strength.

This is where we start using percentages of our 1RM and following a specific plan to reach our strength goals. At Full Plate, we have 3 month cycles which we use to grow stronger.

Talk to a coach about your advanced level programming! Remember Consistency and technique are #1. Don’t expect to get strong if you can’t be bothered to train consistently with perfect technique. Yes, we may be able to lift a heavier weight in the beginning with poor technique, but then we will be forced to take time off when we get injured. Be smart!