what is the difference between many reps of a lesser weight as opposed to fewer reps with more weight?

Question

I have been doing chin up and push ups at home and the resistance my body wieght provides is no longer much of a challenge so I compensate by doing more and more reps. I am wondering if I should by a weight set or if doing more reps is just as effective

Answer 1

You need to keep your body guessing, if you always do the same amount of reps your body will get used to it. Also less reps and more weight helps for power where less weight more reps is for endurance and tone. Whatever you do keep your body guessing....switch it up.

Answer 2

light weights do not induce trauma to skeletal muscle so they are not broken down, there will be no growth. doing more reps once it becomes easy will only increase your endurance in that particular exercise.

your training program needs to reflect your short and long term goals. if you want to continually increase strength and increase muscle size then you must use progressive resistance along with a hypocaloric diet (high calorie). which means you need to add weights to your training program.

Answer 3

You simply increase reps for endurance... However, if you want to increase strength, you can keep the same reps but increase the weight... Personally, I have been lifting weights for over 20 years and I would suggest endurance for a number of reasons over strength, because it will be more beneficial in your later years.

Lifting for strength will bring problems for you later, especially when you plateau. You will want more and more and cause physical injury, however, endurance has no limitations... You can run longer and longer and more and more, the longer you exercise. Plus strength trainers usually turn to steroids after a while because they want that extra boost. All of the steroids users that I know started in the late 80's and now are either dead, can't walk, have cancer, multiple sclerosis or some other physical malady, while my other friends who didn't take steroids are as healthy as ever....

Answer 4

More reps less weight is going to take the existing muscle and tighten them up. You are going for the "ripped" look that way.

More weight and less reps you are going for the "bulk" look.

I like to switch them up.

Answer 5

less weight more reps=toned

more weight less reps=ripped