Dr. Peter Attia

And two, if the pursuit of that at such an extreme level produces risk of injury.

And two, if the pursuit of that at such an extreme level produces risk of injury.

So in other words, could I be stronger than I am today? Yes. I'll give you an example. We know that in resistance training, the sweet spot for pure strength is one to five reps. When your goal is to maximize strength, you need to be pushing one, two, three, four, five reps. Once you start thinking about hypertrophy, muscle size, we're starting to think about seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12 reps.

So in other words, could I be stronger than I am today? Yes. I'll give you an example. We know that in resistance training, the sweet spot for pure strength is one to five reps. When your goal is to maximize strength, you need to be pushing one, two, three, four, five reps. Once you start thinking about hypertrophy, muscle size, we're starting to think about seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12 reps.

Once we start thinking about muscular endurance, we start thinking about north of 15, right? Those are the general patterns of resistance training.

Once we start thinking about muscular endurance, we start thinking about north of 15, right? Those are the general patterns of resistance training.

Okay. Lower weight. Yep.

Okay. Lower weight. Yep.

So, again, we could go into much more detail around that. But just to finish the point here, why do I not do much training at one to five reps? In fact, these days I don't do any training at one to five reps anymore. Why? Because to train at one to five reps comes at a risk, especially for heavy compound movements.

So, again, we could go into much more detail around that. But just to finish the point here, why do I not do much training at one to five reps? In fact, these days I don't do any training at one to five reps anymore. Why? Because to train at one to five reps comes at a risk, especially for heavy compound movements.

So I'm OK getting a little bit less of a strength benefit while still, of course, getting stronger, but training at a higher rep load. So I'm targeting eight to 12 reps with one to two reps in reserve. is basically how I'm doing my resistance training. That means every set I'm doing, I would expect to get to within about one rep of failure somewhere.

So I'm OK getting a little bit less of a strength benefit while still, of course, getting stronger, but training at a higher rep load. So I'm targeting eight to 12 reps with one to two reps in reserve. is basically how I'm doing my resistance training. That means every set I'm doing, I would expect to get to within about one rep of failure somewhere.

So today when I lifted, I don't think I did less than seven. I didn't do more than 12. And the weight was always titrated so that I was either failing, almost failing, or one rep away from failing somewhere in there. And I was adjusting the weight constantly on every exercise to get there, with the exception of one exercise. I did push-ups was one of the things I did.

So today when I lifted, I don't think I did less than seven. I didn't do more than 12. And the weight was always titrated so that I was either failing, almost failing, or one rep away from failing somewhere in there. And I was adjusting the weight constantly on every exercise to get there, with the exception of one exercise. I did push-ups was one of the things I did.

Push-ups are kind of more in the muscle endurance. Obviously, I'm doing more reps when I was doing push-ups. But pretty much everything else was in that range. So again, I'm not fully maximizing strength anymore because the cost of it might be a little bit high in terms of injury risk.

Push-ups are kind of more in the muscle endurance. Obviously, I'm doing more reps when I was doing push-ups. But pretty much everything else was in that range. So again, I'm not fully maximizing strength anymore because the cost of it might be a little bit high in terms of injury risk.

Similarly, I'm not strength training 24-7 because I need to make time to do my endurance training and other types of training.

Similarly, I'm not strength training 24-7 because I need to make time to do my endurance training and other types of training.

I resistance train three times a week.

I resistance train three times a week.