How to Lift Correctly

Always warm up with a quick routine before you lift. It's important to oxygenate your bloodstream, loosening up your muscles, warming them up, and getting them ready for heavy lifting. If you want to build muscles and avoid injuries, warming up is essential.

• Start with some basic push ups and sit ups, a few sets of each with a brief rest period between. Do a few sets, gradually increasing the number of reps in each set. You might start with 10 of each and work up to 50.

Stretch your muscles with dynamic stretches before a workout. It is important that you dynamic stretches and not static stretches. Dynamic stretches are moving stretches, whereas static stretches you hold a stretch in place. Studies have shown dynamic stretches to improve strength for workouts and reduce susceptibility to injury, while static stretches before a workout have been shown to weaken the muscles. An example of a dynamic stretch is arm swings. Swinging your arms up and down the full range of movement stretches the deltoids (shoulders), this would be ideal to do before say, shoulder press.

Choose the right amount of weight. Ideally, you want to lift the most amount of weight you can manage for the amount reps that you intend to do. It is important to prioritize achieving the required rep count rather than sacrificing more than 3 reps so you can show off lifting heavier weights. This is known in gym culture as leaving the ego at the door. Having the discipline to resist going too heavy is a skill, and if you resist and stick to doing as much weight as you can for the amount of reps you need, you will make progress faster, because the number of reps you do determines how your muscles adapt.

• Trial a moderate amount of weight and make sure you have the form/movement correct. If you feel you can do more for the amount of reps you are aiming to do, go heavier. Once you find the maximum amount you can manage for the amount of reps, stick with that. Next workout try adding a bit more weight.
• Lifting weights that are too heavy to achieve the rep range you need is a bad idea, and you will look silly and like you trying hard to impress to any experienced lifters in the gym, so don't bother. Ideally you should not attempt weights that are too heavy for you to finish the reps by yourself/without a spotter. If you need a spotter to help with a couple of reps, it means you picked a weight which is too heavy for you to finish the reps, and you need to lower it until a time where you are strong enough to manage the higher weight without assistance. Lifting weights that are too heavy is also one of the most common causes of injury in the gym, and there's plenty of compilations videos on the internet to give you an idea. Lifting weights that are too heavy can also serious strain and even damage your joints/cartilage. Joint/cartilage take longer to build/strengthen/adapt to training than muscles.

Determine what rep range you need to hit, and stick within that range. Different goals demand different amounts of reps.

• For strength, you should be aiming for 4-6 repetitions.
• For muscle hypertrophy (building bigger muscles) you should aim for 8-12 reps.
• For muscle endurance you should aim for 15-20 repetitions.
• Different rep ranges also changes the energy system the body uses to supply the muscles. Lower rep sets use the adenosine triphosphate/phosphocreatine (ATP/PC) system. Higher reps use the aerobic energy system.
• Performing a One Rep Max, or lifting the max amount of weight you can for a single repetition, can be invigorating and fun to show off, but should be used only as a point of measurement. In weightlifting, weights are often noted as a percentage of your 1RM (One Rep Maximum). For example if you could perform 100kg as your maximum for one repetition of bench press, then you lifted 75kg for 8-12 reps, you would be lifting 75% of your 1RM.

Complete the movement all the way just before you lockout the joint(s) being used. The proper lifting technique for each exercise differs slightly--you wouldn't use the same form for a bench press as you would for a dead lift--but what each lift has in common is that you need to extend and complete the motion all the way before you lockout. A bench press needs to come all the way down to your chest, and needs to extend to just before your elbows lockout.

• Do not lockout in any exercise. Firstly because, depending on the exercise, locking out can severely damage the joint(s) being used, especially with heavier weights, because it shifts the weight from the muscles the joint(s) For example with leg press, leg press will use one of the biggest amounts of weight of any exercise. If you full extend and lockout your knees, all the weight is shifting from the muscles to the knee joint. So you can see how that is damaging. Secondly, when you lockout you are taking the the strain off the muscles and putting it onto the joint, meaning your muscles are getting rest and making easier to do the exercise. Resisting from locking out will result in the exercise working the muscles much better. For example in a standing bicep curl, do not bring you hands all the way down, bring almost all the way then go back up, this prevent your biceps from getting unnecessary rest between reps.

Consider your rep tempo. Determine how much time your reps should take for your goals. Different amounts of time for reps are used for different aims. For strength, the concentric phase (muscle contraction) should be explosive and push up in 1 second, and the eccentric phase (muscle lengthening) should be slow, about 3 seconds. For muscle hypertrophy (growing bigger muscles) It should be 3 seconds concentric and 3 seconds eccentric. More time under tension breaks more muscle fibers, which is what you want if you are trying to gain muscle size. For muscle endurance, obvious a faster rater is used, about 1 second concentric and 1 second eccentric.

• To clarify what is meant by concentric and eccentric, this is the two phases of lift, where muscles contract/short, then lengthen. For example in a bicep curl, the concentric phase is when you lift up and shorten the bicep. In a tricep rope pull down, the concentric phase is when you pull down and shorten the tricep.
  • Strength: 1 second explosive contraction - 3 seconds eccentric
  • Muscle Hypertrophy: 3 seconds concentric - 3 seconds eccentric
  • Muscle endurance: 1 second concentric - 1 second eccentric.
  • Do not pause during a set, keep the tension on the muscles and don't lockout the joint being used.

Breathe. You need to supply your muscles with oxygen just like you would if you were going running. For any weightlifting, you should breathe out on the concentric phase, and breathe in on the eccentric phase. So for example in a bench press, you would breathe out as you push the weight up, then breathe in as you lowered the weight back down. In a barbell row, you would breathe out as you pulled the weight up, and breathe out as you lowered it back down. Breathing properly is extra important with heavier lifts and with lifts that use the legs (because the leg muscles demand a lot of oxygen) For example in deadlifts and in squats, proper breathing is essential, not doing so can lead to lightheadedness, palpitations, dizziness, and even fainting. ^[1]

Rest between sets and between exercises. Different goals also require different rest times:

• Strength: rest 2-4 minutes between sets
• Hypertrophy: rest 1-2 minutes between sets
• Endurance: rest 30-60 seconds between sets
• Between exercises where you are using the same muscle(s), rest at least 3 minutes. 2 minutes rest is sufficient if moving to an exercise using different muscles. More rest may be needed for the more demanding lifts like squats and deadlifts in order to allow your Central Nervous System to recuperate. If you find you are starting to get dizzy/palpitations/lightheaded progressively after sets of squats or deadlifts, try resting a bit longer, for at least 2 minutes.

Always lift with a spotter when doing exercises that are dangerous. If you don't have a friend to help re-rack the weight at the end of a set, for example benchpress, you may struggle to push up and re-rack the weight. If you don't have a spotter there then you'll be in trouble, it will be dangerous and embarrassing. Never exercise alone in general, if you run into complications you need to have someone around to help/get help if needed. If you come to an empty gym, either don't train, or be extra safe during your workout and don't push too hard, and use assisted racks for exercises like bench press and squats so you can easily re-rack the weights without help.

Do static stretches after a workout to cool down. As a cool down, you might have a specific activity or exercise that you like to do. Doing some static stretches and letting your body finish exercise slowly will make it much less likely that you'll be sore the next day, decreasing the possibility of injury or pulled muscles.