Sets and Reps

I am 5 2", 162, 23 years old. I'm pretty strong and have a good amount of muscle on me, but i want to lose weight and lean down.

Usually when I workout I try to target the following groups (not all in one day, of course):

Bi's/Tri's
Chest and Shoulders
Abs and lower back
Legs and Glutes

Amy idea on how many sets/reps are okay for my goal? Usually I do 4 sets of 20 reps or 5 sets of 15. It varies. I go with light-med heavy. (8 lbs for bi's curls and shoulder presses) and the rest varies.

Is this okay? Any suggestions?

Fri. Jul 6, 7:34pm

Check this out

http://www.skwigg.com/blog/

Sounds like you are looking to lose fat. I'd say more cardio, definitely interval cardio and do some circuit strength training as well to up the burn.

You might want to intersperse cardio bursts in your lifting -
You might try doing a front/back split instead of the 4-day one you're doing now - front muscles one day, back the next - so that you can take advantage of peripheral heart action (body shunting blood from lower parts to upper parts )

If you do cardio in the morning and weights in the evening, you might increase your afterburn instead of doing it all in the same block of time.

At your age, diet isn't probably a huge deal factor, but you might try cleaning it up anyway because you are what you eat, and 23 doesn't last forever, LOL!

Hope this helps!

Friday, July 6, 2007, 9:12 PM

I would definitely clean up your diet and I would also suggest you lift heavier than 8lbs...you won't get anywhere lifting that....and keep doing cardio and if you can do 4 sets of 20 then you're lifting too light....I would shoot for 4 sets of 12-15 or you can do 3 sets of 15 vary it up a little bit to keep your body guessing

Friday, July 6, 2007, 10:13 PM

I'm also 23 and a little bit overweight. I used to be a gymnast and you know when you stop all the working out...

Anyway, with weight training, it's best to do 3 sets or even 2. Try to do the sets till failure. For example, once I can do 10 curls at 12 pounds for 3 reps, I bump up to 15 pounds. I can then only do 10 curls, the second rep maybe I get to 9 and the third rep maybe I get to 6.

I've been lifting since I was 12 and haven't bulked up, so don't worry about having huge muscles.

It's really good that you realized the importance of weight training--muscle burns more calories than fat does, so you increase your resting metabolism by lifting.

You're on the right track!
Good luck!

Sunday, July 8, 2007, 9:11 PM

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