{"id":536511,"date":"2026-07-06T23:08:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T23:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536511\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T23:08:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T23:08:09","slug":"why-heavier-weights-arent-always-better-for-strength-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/536511\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Heavier Weights Aren\u2019t Always Better for Strength Training"},"content":{"rendered":"<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee mt-8 focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">Then there\u2019s muscular endurance. \u201cPerforming one-repetition maximums doesn&#8217;t translate to better performance particularly well for marathon runners or triathletes,\u201d McKendry says. Thanks to that principle of specificity, a better bet for these folks, he says, is to aim for lots of reps with lighter weights to train the muscles to keep contracting repeatedly over time.<\/p>\n<p>When lighter works better\u00a0<\/p>\n<p data-testid=\"paragraph-element\" class=\"rich-text mb-6 font-graphik text-body-large text-black-coffee mt-8 focus-visible:outline focus-visible:outline-black-coffee focus-visible:outline-2 focus-visible:outline-offset-2 focus-visible:shadow-focus-color text-left\">Fitness goals aside, there are plenty of people for whom heavy weights simply aren&#8217;t as appropriate. Maybe they\u2019ve never stepped in a weight room before and need to learn good form first. Maybe they have joint issues or osteoarthritis or an injury that would make a heavy weight inadvisable. \u201cI&#8217;m never going to get my mom in her 60s started lifting at 90% of her one-rep max,\u201d Reed says. \u201cInstead, I&#8217;d start with a lower load to build technique and the neuromuscular connection, improve confidence, and then progress up to a more moderate load and keep her close to that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Then there\u2019s muscular endurance. \u201cPerforming one-repetition maximums doesn&#8217;t translate to better performance particularly well for marathon runners or&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":536512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[777,984,499,985,103,61,60],"class_list":["post-536511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fitness","tag-evergreen","tag-exercise-fitness","tag-fitness","tag-freelance","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=536511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/536511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/536512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=536511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=536511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=536511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}