Weight Training and How to Measure Your Results

When trying to improve your muscle tone by weight training, how do you know how much you're achieving? Here are some simple measures you can use to keep track of your progress, whether you're a serious bodybuilder or an average Jane, Joe or Jamie trying to keep fit.

Maximum resistance. When a muscle gets stronger, the maximum weight you can lift when exercising this muscle increases. The disadvantage to this method is that different machines and exercises use different combinations of muscles, and use those muscles in different ways. For example, when I could lift 90 lbs on the chest press machine, I could only bench 65. Both exercises were focused on the pectorals, but they utilize small muscles differently.

As a rule, weight machines will rely on the large muscle more and the surrounding small muscles less than manual lifting exercises with free weights. This is why many bodybuilders and lifters find free weights and free-motion exercises superior to machines, but when you're just starting out, the control provided by the machine can give you a boost.

Number of repetitions. Generally, your maximum lifting power will only hold out for a few repetitions. It's fairly common knowledge that high weights at low reps - for example, six to eight repetitions - will cause faster muscle gain, but a larger number of repetitions may help you maintain muscle. Sometimes, after an exhausting session in which I push my limits with a particular muscle group, I'll exercise the same muscle group one or two days later but with a much lower resistance and many repetitions.

I'm inclined to believe, from my experience, that this also helps to tone and improve small muscles, and when the small muscles "keep up", the large muscles can reach a higher limit later on.

Number of sets. This is a useful strategy for trying to increase the endurance of a particular muscle group: increase the number of sets. Workouts with more than 3 or 4 sets are best used as targeted workouts: exercising only one muscle group to exhaustion is a good building strategy. You can simultaneously increase resistance or repetitions, if necessary. Someone who can perform six sets of twelve lifts in an exercise might improve their muscle tone and endurance more than someone who's simply increasing weight and building size.

Weight and body fat percentage. There are various measures of body fat percentage: calipers, special scales and electronic measures, and the simple home tape measure test. At this website, you can find a tape measure test which is often fairly accurate. If your body fat percentage goes down and your weight stays the same or goes up, you've gained muscle.