How hard should your lifts *feel*? (RPE & Tips to understand it)
How intense should your lifts feel?
Short answer: Pretty dang tough, but not impossible.
Long answer: Keep reading!
When we workout we’re stressing the body. That stress stimulates the body & says, “hey, we need to get better at this task.”
Depending on the details of your workout, lifting weights can stimulate your body in a multitude of ways. The stressor might encourage your body to increase muscle cross-sectional area (AKA build muscle), increase force production (AKA get stronger) or improve rate of force production (AKA increase power) just to name a few.
What we’re doing in the workout matters because it tells the body we want it to adapt a certain way.
But simply having that stressor present isn’t enough. The stressor also needs to be strong enough that it reaches a threshold point & tells your body to pay attention to it.
Which is just another way of saying that if the work we’re doing isn’t hard enough, our body may not adapt to it because it doesn’t think it’s necessary.
The best way to ensure we’re reaching this threshold is to work at near-maximal efforts most of the time.
How do we know
if we’re working at
near-maximal efforts?
Understanding your intensity level can be thought of as a skill (better understanding our body through trails, time & repetition) but can also determined by different testing protocols & training methods.
One option is to determine your max effort with something like a 3, 5 or 10 rep max test. Then you (or your coach) could create a program using percentages based on your results. Retesting down the line is likely needed to continue making progress.
If you’re new to lifting, not into max effort testing, or just aren’t comfortable doing these types of tests, you could use Ratings of Perceived Exertion (which is my preference). Ratings of Perceived Exertion (RPE) is a research-backed scale of 6-20 or 1-10 that you use to label how difficult a lift is.
My clients & I collectively prefer to use the scale of 1-10 so that’s what I’ll be referencing in this post.
On a scale of 1-10, 1 is the easiest & 10 is when your muscles fail you and you literally cannot complete another rep. We want most sets to *generally* feel like they’re an RPE 8.
If you’re new to RPE, remember that it is a skill & can feel confusing at first.
Here are a couple of approaches that may help you find your RPE 8 without doing formal rep-max testing:
Pick up a load you think will feel very hard by the last rep of your set. Once you hit the final rep, try to do 2-3 more reps. If you can only do 1-2 more, great job! You picked a weight to get you to RPE 8. If you can do 3+ more reps, try a slightly heavier load in your next set.
Work in rep ranges (3-5, 6-8, 10-12, etc.). If you’re able to hit the top end of your rep range consistently with a load, increase load for your next set or workout.
To summarize:
The stressor we’re placing on the body tells it what type of adaptation we’re looking for. Follow a workout regimen that caters specifically to the adaptation you desire.
The intensity of the stressor plays a role regardless of what adaptation we want. If a stressor isn’t intense enough, our body won’t try to adapt.
Use tools like the RPE scale to see that you’re working hard enough. Consider rep-max testing or another approach laid out above to better understand RPE.
For adaptation (progress) to take place, our body needs enough of a stressor, repeated consistently over a period of time. Stay with the same workout plan for 6-8 weeks before making any changes.
Have questions about workout intensity, understanding & implement RPE? Email me!
HEY, I’M KIRSI!
Certified Personal Trainer & online fitness coach
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