How much weight should you lift I How To Know How Much Weight To Lift
In this instructional video, Eric Roberts addresses the common question of how much weight to lift during workouts. He explains that the appropriate load depends on the type of exercise—compound, accessory, or isolation—and the associated rep range. Compound movements (e.g., squats, deadlifts, bench press) are performed for 3–8 reps with the heaviest weights, accessory movements (e.g., rows, lunges) for 6–10 reps with moderately heavy loads, and isolation movements (e.g., bicep curls, tricep extensions) for 8–15 reps with lighter weights. Across all exercise categories, the single universal cue for determining if a weight is heavy enough is proximity to muscular failure: the final reps of a set should noticeably slow down, indicating the set is taken close to failure. Roberts distinguishes between warm‑up/feeder sets (which are not counted as working sets) and true working sets, which must be performed near failure for the prescribed rep range. He demonstrates these principles with real‑world gym footage, showing large weight differences between compound and isolation exercises while maintaining the failure cue. The video emphasizes that “heavy” is relative to the exercise, the individual’s current strength, and the specific goal (strength, hypertrophy, body‑composition changes). All working sets should be taken close to failure, while warm‑up sets are used only to prepare for the working load.
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YouTube, welcome back to the channel. Welcome to this video. In this video— God, we gotta— I got a good video for you today. I didn't like that, I'm gonna start over. YouTube, welcome back to the channel. Welcome to the video. In this video, I got a really good video for you today. This video, just first and foremost, is gonna be jam-packed with information. You are going to learn a ton if you watch this video the entire way through. So if you want to learn a ton, you're in the right place. If you don't want to learn a ton, you're You're not in the right place. Just make sure to know that upfront. But what we're going to be talking about is simply how much weight should you be lifting in your workouts? As somebody who's been a coach for over 6 years now, this is one of the most common questions I get asked on a daily basis. And it's always something, you know, there's different iterations of this where it's like, should I do heavy weight for low reps or low reps for high weight? And we'll cover all that stuff as well. Should you be lifting to failure? Should you not be lifting to failure? Should you do lightweight to tone the muscle? All of these questions, right? And so I'm going to— this, this This video should be the last video you should ever need in order to know how much weight you should be lifting when you do your workouts. And really quickly, the answer I'm going to give to you here with all of this is going to be if you have the goal and the intention of getting stronger, building muscle, changing your body composition, you know, getting more defined, getting more toned, whatever you want to call it. That is the question I am going to answer. If that is your goal. If your goal is not that, then the answer might be different. But if your goal is to change your body, get stronger, build muscle, This video is going to be for you. So first and foremost, what we're going to cover, and again, as you can see, we're going to cover a few things. We're going to cover it. It depends on the types of movements and the types of reps. And I'll touch on that here in a second. I'm going to give you examples of yours truly going over exactly, you know, what these movements look like actually working out in the gym, because you're going to see you'll lift different weight for different reps and different exercises and it all won't be the same. And we'll cover more of that in a second. I'm going to tell you how to exactly know If you are lifting heavy enough weight, because it's going to be different for me or for you or for anybody else. And then last but not least, again, I'm going to answer that question of like, if all the stuff we talk about here today is just for— if it's for every single set that you do in the gym, is it just for the last set? Is it just for the first set? I'm going to cover that question as well. All right. First and foremost, the question of how heavy should you be lifting is it depends on the type of exercise and it depends on the reps that you are doing. But typically the reps you are doing will be predicated and dictated upon what exercises you're doing. And there's 3 main forms of exercises that we're going to cover here in this video. The first form of exercise, which is typically done at the beginning of your workouts, is going to be your compound exercises. These are just exercises like squats, deadlifts, bench press, pushup, chin-up, overhead press— movements that are bigger multi-joint movements. It's not like just a bicep curl or just a tricep extension. Take a squat, for example. In a squat, your quads are working, your glutes are working, your upper back is working to keep you in place, your hips are moving, your knees are moving, your core has to be braced to keep you upright. Pretty much your entire body is working in a squat or a deadlift, same thing, or a bench press. Your shoulders are working, your chest is working, your triceps are working. There's multiple joints like your shoulder and your elbow are working in a bench press, right? Multiple joints working in multiple muscles that are getting worked. And typically speaking, again, these are going to be the movements where You'll lift the heaviest weight because the reps you normally do for this particular style of exercise is normally going to be a little bit on the lower side. And so I put 3 to 8 reps here. Typically speaking, your compounds are going to be 3 to like maybe 6 reps, but they can go up to 8 reps sometimes. So just for the sake of this conversation, let's just say it's going to 3 to 8 reps. But for example, let's just say you're doing 5 reps. Well, if you're doing 5 reps of something, don't you think inherently you are going to lift heavier weight than if you were doing, say, 12 reps of something? Because if you only have to do 5 reps versus 12 reps, you can probably lift heavier because you don't need to go as long. So when you're doing any kind of compound exercise, which again, I'm going to show you examples of what that might look like in the weight differences of what we're going to talk about here, you're typically going to lift heavier weight for a bit less reps. But there's something in common with all of these that I'm going to touch on later in the video. So please stick around. The next style of exercise is going to be your accessory exercises. And these are exercises like rows, lat pulldowns, reverse lunges, step-ups, maybe some sort of single leg Romanian deadlift or a regular Romanian deadlift. They're not necessarily your biggest compound movement, but they're not the next one we're going to talk about, which is— spoiler alert— which is more of like, again, just one joint movement. A reverse lunge, for example. You still have to work multiple joints. You still have to work multiple muscles, but it's not as compound as say a barbell back squat would be, for example. So with these style of movements, you're typically going to fall in the 6 to 10 rep range. And again, you might be like, Eric, well, you put 3 to 8 reps up here. What do you mean 6 to 10? Again, typically speaking for your compounds, you'll go like 3 to 6, but sometimes you will go 8. It just depends on the program. But in your accessory movements, these are more like 6 to 10 reps. So let's just say again, for example, let's say you were doing 5 reps of a barbell back squat. Then you went to 8 reps of a Romanian deadlift. Again, inherently, because you are doing more reps with the RDL, you're typically going to have to have a little bit less weight because you're doing more reps. And it's not a very big compound movement. Like maybe say a barbell back squat would be, it's still a pretty good movement. And again, even a Romanian deadlift, for example, That could technically be a compound movement based on your particular program. I'm not going to go super in-depth on how to create a program right here because I've already done that on this channel. But again, to keep things simple, if you're doing 8 reps of an RDL versus 5 reps of a squat, you are probably going to lift more weight in the squat than you would in the RDL. So for the very simple answer of how much weight should you lift, you'll probably lift more for your compound movements. But again, please stick with me for the course of the entire video because all of these exercises have one thing in common. There's only one real way to know if you're lifting heavy enough for these exercises. And really quickly, the last style of exercise, which we've already touched on a bit, is going to be your isolation exercises. And again, these are things like bicep curls, tricep extensions, leg curls, uh, side lateral shoulder raises, things that just basically isolate one exact muscle. And for these style of exercises, you are typically going to perform anywhere between 8 to 15 reps. So now we can really see— let's take a barbell back squat that you are doing for 5 reps, where it's a very big compound movement. Again, you're doing glutes, you're doing quads, you're working core, you're working upper back. It's a multi-joint movement. It's a big movement where you can move a lot of weight. Let's say you lift 200 pounds for that movement. When you go and do a bicep curl, your bicep is only but so big, and you're only working Your bicep. And that's the thing too. Usually these compound movements are working bigger muscle groups, but when you're working your quads, for example, or your glutes, that is just actually a bigger muscle on your body than what your bicep would be. Your bicep muscle is smaller than your glute muscle. And if not, there's probably something else going on, but your side laterals, your, your, your side delt right here is smaller than your hamstring. So because it's a smaller muscle, you won't lift as much weight as you would with you doing a squat or you doing a bench press or a deadlift. Because not only are they going to be higher in the reps, which means you have to do more reps, which means you can— you have to automatically back off the weight, but they're also isolation, single joint isolation, smaller muscle groups. If you're squatting the same weight as your side lateral shoulder raising, that's probably not a good thing. Because either you got to get stronger at squats or you're really fucking up your form doing a side lateral raise with hundreds of pounds. So for all of these reasons, you might be lifting heavier, you know, the more compound or accessory versus isolation, which is a good thing to know because like when you're doing these like side lateral raises, so many people are like, oh my God, I can only lift 5 pounds. Well, 5 pounds for that movement is actually really heavy because it's an isolation exercise. You're doing more reps. And your side, your side delt is not that big of a muscle. So you shouldn't be lifting tons and tons and tons of weight for a side lateral or a bicep curl or stuff like that. Now knowing all of this, I want to give you some examples of me going through some of these movements to show you something. Number one, I'm going to show you the discrepancy in weight. You're going to see me do more weight, less weight, all that kind of stuff. But there's also going to be some things that are in common with all of these movements. And I want you to pay close attention and see if you can guess what is in common with all of these exercises. 'Cause I'm going to tell you after I show you the examples. So let's see how close attention you pay. Let's see how smart you are going into showing you these examples. All right, what's going on? So let's cover, uh, this is going to be, I'm going to show you an example of one of my compound exercises for my workouts and what it looks like to lift heavy enough weight for a compound exercise in the lower rep range. I actually think I got like, I think I was supposed to get like 5 or 6, but I think I ended up getting like, it was either 6 or 7 or something like that because I was feeling pretty good. But let's just like watch what it's going to look like in order to lift heavy enough weight. Forgive me for the, uh, I'm getting myself hyped up a bit here. So as you can see, uh, which you may want to do. So, all right. First rep. I want you to notice the speed of the reps on the way up. Just take mental note of See how it's starting to slow down a little bit? Don't mind my faces either. Watch this rep. After that rep, that's where most people would have quit. Ah! Ah! So that is a set going very close to fa— that's a set to failure, right? And this is where When you're doing your compound exercises, again, we're going to talk more about this in the video, but you want to be lifting closer to failure. On this, on this machine, there's 3 45s on each side and a 5. I think that's like 280 pounds. So for a bigger compound exercise, I might be using a bit more weight like this, right? But watch as we keep going in different exercises here. All right, so now let's cover my, uh, I'm doing a leg press here, right? And I think on the leg press right now I have 9 45-pound plates on each side, which is I believe 840 pounds or something like that, right? But again, this is a bigger compound movement where I'm using, you know, I'm using my hips, using my knees, all that kind of stuff, and I'm able to move more weight because it's a bigger compound movement. I think I tried to get 6 reps right here, and again, excuse the faces and veins popping and stuff. I tried to get 6 reps. I think I actually went for 7 because I think I got 6. I want to go for one more. But again, so like let's just like walk through What, like, how would I know if I'm lifting heavy enough weights? Well, let's check. So rep 1, right? I had some trouble kind of like getting myself set up here, but that was rep 1. That was rep 2. Again, I want you to notice the speed at which it moves up. Notice how quickly that rep right there just moved up. So that's rep 3. So I think I do 7 reps total. Keep Keep watching these last couple reps and like I'm trying to get myself centered here. So again, that was rep 4. Notice the speed. Watch the speed. Watch the speed on the way up. And again, this is a bigger compound movement I'm lifting more weight with. You notice the speed. There's one more rep I'm going to do here. I really want you to watch the speed of this last rep on the way up. 5. That was the longest rep, right? Like that was the longest rep out of all the reps I did. Like on the way up, like compared to this very first rep, I want you to compare this first rep to this last rep on the way up. You see how it took longer than the last rep? Just keep that in mind. But again, another example of going close to failure and lifting heavy enough weight for a compound exercise. All right, so now I want to take you through some accessory movements, right? Because we said accessory movements are, um, they're going to be a higher rep and I want you to see what that looks like for the higher reps, right? So in this particular video, I'm going to be doing a, uh, a bent over row with essentially a chest support, right? And again, don't mind my faces and random noises, although I will say the random noises are important. Um, but again, so look at the first rep here and, you know, continue to look at as the reps go on. speed at which I'm pulling up. I want you to understand and notice that because that's going to be something we talk about later in this video. But again, notice how on the way up, besides me making these funny noises and funny sounds, um, see how it's starting to get like— it's starting to get pretty hard, right? I'm like, ah, this is not fun. But pushing, pushing, right? Like, how do you know if you're lifting heavy enough? Remember that last rep. I want you to remember that last rep. This rep right here. Remember that rep. So that, I think I did what I did. I think I did like 10 reps right there. Right? So that is an accessory movement where I'm doing a little bit, a little bit higher reps. So I might not lift 800 pounds like I would on a leg press, or I might not lift 300 pounds like I would on a chest press or whatever the case may be. But it's like you're still lifting heavy, in which again we're going to talk about it a bit later in the video, but we're doing more reps. All right, so with the isolation movements again, so remember we have compound, accessory, isolation. Isolation movements are like single joint movements where you're working one muscle. For this right here, remember how I was doing— I think I did like 850 pounds on leg press, like 300 pounds on the chest press. I was doing 100 pounds in each hand on the rows. This is, uh, and again I was doing like— I think I did 6 reps for the compound I did 8 to 10 reps for the accessory. And now we're going to go to isolation where we're doing like 10 to 12-ish reps, right? For this, I'm doing, I'm going to do a tricep extension as you can see right here, right? Which by the way, if you've never done this variation, it's very, very good. It's like my favorite exercise. Um, this is 17.5 pounds, 17.5 pounds, but I want you to watch something. It's 17.5 pounds. You're like, well, what the hell? That's, that's really, really lightweight. But remember for this particular exercise, I want you to watch how this particular exercise, That weight for the amount of reps that I am doing, this is actually heavy, even though it's not heavy compared to, you know, leg pressing 900 pounds or chest pressing 100 pounds, 200 pounds, 300 pounds for this isolation movement, because I'm just working my triceps, nothing else. I'm not incorporating shoulders or chest or anything else. I'm just working triceps. So for this particular movement, look at these last couple of reps right there. Watch, watch this last rep. Oh. See, it's heavy. Like, this weight is heavy even though it's only 17 pounds. It's heavy for that exercise. And again, I want you to take note of that. Watch the last couple of reps of this exercise again. This is 17.5 pounds. I was just doing like 300 pounds or whatever it was on that chest press, right? But for this movement, this is actually heavy. So there's going to be some weight discrepancy Within the weight you're actually using for the exercises, and that's normal. I also want to show you this one right here. So I'm doing a— now I'm doing like a side lateral variation, right? So like working your side delt muscles right here. Again, I have 17 pounds on this thing, which like— and I'm trying to do like 10 to 12 reps, so on the higher end of the rep range, right? But again, I want you to notice how even though— let me rewind it. That was a picture of my butt. Let me get to the beginning. I want you to notice how— just watch the whole set. And this weight for this exercise is heavy for me, even though it's not heavy relative to what I was doing earlier on some of my other movements. It's heavy for this exercise and for the amount of reps that I have to do. Cause I think I did 12 reps right here. But again, notice the last couple of reps here. Notice how the last couple of reps are starting to slow down. They're not coming up as fast, right? Notice that right here. Watch again. Watch again. I think I actually might have failed. Yeah, I don't think I can get up. So, okay, I want you to watch like when I first start. Watch the rep speed. Notice how fast this rep goes up. Notice how fast the next rep goes up. Now go to the end of the set. Watch this. You see how much slower it is? And I get to the point where it's really slow right there, right? I think I don't even get this one up. So again, what did I say? So I couldn't even get, I couldn't get past 12 reps. I literally went to failure. That was so heavy for that particular movement. And I really want you to understand that because again, when you're doing different movements, the weight will be different, but there's some common denominators that we'll touch on right now. All right. So what did all of those exercises have in common besides the ugly faces I was making? And the random noises that I was making. Besides those 2 things, they had basically one thing in common. 1/2. No matter the weight and no matter the reps, because those 2 things differed. You saw I was doing hundreds of pounds on the compound exercises, but on the tricep extensions, I was doing like 15 pounds, 17 pounds. And the reps were different because I was doing less reps or more reps. But one thing stayed the same. No matter the weight or the reps, Or the exercise. I was taking that exercise close to failure, if not to failure, for that specific exercise, that specific amount of reps, that specific amount of weight. Yes, I was lifting hundreds of pounds for the chest press, but I took that close to failure. Yes, I was lifting 17 pounds for the side lateral raise. That was taken close to failure. That was heavy for that exercise in that rep range. And that's what you have to understand. You want to be taking those sets close to failure and the weight that you lift should be heavy for that exercise in that rep range, no matter if you're doing a compound, an accessory, or an isolation. Yes, again, technically you might lift heavier weight with a squat or a deadlift, but that doesn't mean that you aren't going to lift heavy weight for an isolation movement like a tricep extension. It just might be less weight, but it's heavy for that movement in that rep range. And you saw that because every single set that I just showed you was either taken to failure or very close to failure. And you saw that because again, besides from me making faces and noises, I'm going to show you this one more time. Look at the last couple of reps of my sets. Hmm. Hmm. So whether I was doing a set of six reps, eight reps, ten reps, or twelve reps, look at the last couple of reps. Do you notice how all of the reps were slowing down as I got closer to the end of the set? So again, if I was doing Doing a set of 10 reps, do you see how by rep 8, rep 9, rep 10, the speed at which I was doing the reps— let's say I was doing a chest press, for example, or let's say I was doing a tricep extension. If I'm doing a chest press, the speed at which the weight came up was involuntarily slowing down. What that means is I'm not trying to slow down on the way up. I just can't move it as fast because my muscles are getting closer to failure. And again, I was doing that for the leg press. I was doing that for The chest press. I was doing that for the side lateral raises. I was doing it for the tricep extension. No matter what exercise or what rep range or what the weight was, I was taking that set very close to failure. And those 2 things are the, are the 2 common denominators of what you should be doing no matter what. That's how you know if you are lifting heavy enough weight. If your last couple of reps are looking like what I just showed you, if you are getting done your set and you are taking that set very close to failure. If your sets aren't looking like that, you need to lift heavier weight because you're not taking your sets close enough to failure, which means you won't build muscle or build strength. You won't change your physique like how you want to do. Again, if you don't want to change your physique, then you might not have to do that. But if you want to change the way you look and get stronger, you have to make sure you're pushing yourself very close to failure like I was showing you in those videos, no matter the weight you actually use or the reps, because Heavy is going to be relative for the exercise, but it's also going to be relative from person to person. A world-class powerlifter might be lifting very heavier weights than I would, or maybe I might lift heavier than you, but that doesn't mean my heavy is different than your heavy. They're both heavy. It's just relative to where we are currently at and what your current strength levels are. So please make sure you understand that. And the last question I'm going to answer is, you know, I just told you, you know, the sets should be taken close to failure. Should that be for every set or just the last set or just the first set? Let me explain something to you. Every working set should be taken very close to failure. And what that means is this. I'm going to put right here like a sample of what, you know, a workout in my program inside of the clubhouse might look like. So, let's say we're saying, you know, you have to do 3 sets of 6 to 8 reps. When you're doing those 3 sets, those are 3 Working sets. That means all 3 of those sets, if you are counting it as a working set, you need to take that set close to failure like I showed you. Now there's a difference between warmup sets and working sets. So for example, remember how I showed you I was lifting like hundreds of pounds? Like I think it was 100 pounds. I didn't go from like just walking into the gym and then going into that exercise and just doing 100 pounds. I went from, I think I did like Uh, 50 pounds for like 4 reps, and then I did 85 pounds for like 3 reps. And I used like— they're called feeder sets to work up to my working set. I didn't just go from 0 to 100. I slowly worked my way up. But those 2 previous sets of me doing 50 pounds and 85 pounds, those did not count towards my working sets. So that 3 sets of 6 to 8, those 2 sets did not count because unless you took cook that set to failure or very close to failure, it doesn't count as part of your set in your program. If it says 3 sets of 6 to 8, those are 3 working sets, 3 times where you take that set very close to failure. So every single working set should be taken close to failure, yes. And again, this will depend on what program you are specifically on. I don't know exactly what it is unless I program them for you, which I do program workouts inside of my clubhouse, which you can check out here below in the description of this video. But hopefully this video helped you. I told you it's gonna be jam-packed with information. I hope you learned a ton. If you have any questions, feel free to drop them below. Let me know if you enjoyed the video, if this helped you, and thank you for watching. We will chat soon.
