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Rep Targeting

Reps Targeting Bodybuilding Workouts

If you have been training with weights to gain muscle for more than a year then you are more than likely very familiar with the dreaded training plateau that most bodybuilders have to deal with at some time in their lifting career. There are countless ways of dealing with these "sticking points" where you cannot increase the weight that you are lifting.

From drop sets to partial reps and supersets there is a very effective way of dealing with the psyche of breaking through a training plateau called rep targeting. We are going to illustrate the use of rep targeting by using a movement that we often find difficult to complete and that is chin-us or pull-ups.

If you are able to only complete 5 good pull-ups or chin-ups before you fail then rep targeting might help. It relies on your attitude to your training so that you can select a target like 50 reps of good form pull-ups. You start off your first movement with pull-ups and start with the 5 reps that you can do.

After completing the 5 reps that you can do you then rest for a minute or two and continue to count and complete as many pull-ups as you can. Let's say that you can do another 5 reps which means that after a quick rest you still need to complete another 40 pull-ups to reach the reps that you were targeting.

The idea is that you will force your muscles to adapt so that you continue to push on and complete the targeted 50 reps resting as little or as much as you like because the objective that you are desperately trying to reach is 50 reps. Even if you take a lot of rests between sets of doing pull-ups you will be able to eventually complete 50 reps.

You will then be able to know how long or how many times or how long it took you to finally get to 50 reps. This means that you have a point of reference so that when you next train using pull-ups you will know how long it takes you to complete 50 reps and how many times you tried.

This creates a yardstick to measure your progress as a few days later when you attack the pull-up bar again you will target 50 reps again and have a good idea on how to get there. The same can be done with any compound or isolated movement that you do with weights.

If you are able to bench-press with 100kg for 10 reps and you want to do 110kg for 10 reps you would do the same. Increase the weight by 10kg and then try to push out 10 reps. When you reach the point of failure you then rest until you have enough strength to complete the targeted reps that you were shooting for.

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