You’re Not Training Hard Enough To Build Muscle (Here’s What You Can Do About It)

Egis R.
3 min readJun 11, 2022
Image by the author

For muscle growth to occur, your workouts have to be sufficiently challenging. Doing most, if not all, working sets within 5 reps in reserve is probably your best bet to promote muscle growth (reps in reserve — how many reps you have left before you can no longer physically move the weight):

Relationship Between Effective Reps and Muscle Growth
Image by the author

Therein lies the problem — since training close to failure is not as much fun as, say, being Ryan Gosling, most people don’t go anywhere close to those last few reps that make their faces contort.

For example, here’s the IG reel I did about what training to failure actually looks like. I mean, look at the redness of my face at the end of the set (click the picture to play):

Image by the author

And if you are all…

yeah, yeah, Egis, but I’m pretty accurate at interpreting my intensity. ​​I have a master’s degree in it. My mom paid for it.
Image by the author

--

--

Egis R.
Egis R.

Written by Egis R.

I’m Egis, an online weight loss coach who has heightened BS sensors for fitness & nutrition. Only evidence-based & sustainable fat loss. www.absscience.com

Responses (3)