HOW TO: UNDERSTAND GYM TERMINOLOGY
You hear and read these terms all the time but likely are unsure of what they actually stand for and their definition. Well, here is a list of the most common (and some uncommon) terms you’ll encounter in the fitness industry.
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Reps - Repetitions: The amount of times you move a weight from point A to point B and back to point A in an exercise.
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Sets: The amount of times you perform an exercise for any amount of reps.
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1RM – One Rep Max: The maximum weight load, with proper form, that an individual can perform with any exercise for one complete repetition before muscle fatigue.
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Macros/Micros – Macronutrients/Micronutrients: The name given to nutrients from foods. (Click here for more details)
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TUT – Time Under Tension: The amount of time a muscle or muscle group is under stress from weight.
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ROM – Range of Motion: The complete movement of a joint from position A to position B in an exercise.
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DOMS – Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness: The name given to the aches felt within a muscle normally 24hrs following a workout or exercise.
HiiT – High Intensity Interval Training: By alternating bursts of light and intense activity, this popular training method helps maximize fat-burning potential while boosting metabolism and cardiovascular fitness levels.
Crossfit: Includes tens to hundreds of repetitions of high intensity functional movements, including pull-ups, box jumps, burpees, running,
Olympic lifts, and squats. Weight and intensity are both scalable, depending on fitness level.
Muscle Stress/Damage: Sounds scary but it’s what happens when you perform any exercise that puts your muscles under tension, this is how your muscles adapt and grow bigger and stronger by recovering from muscle damage.
Compound Exercise: An exercise that targets more than one muscle group.
Isolation Exercise: An exercise that targets one specific muscle group.
Progressive Overload: Normally used to describe increasing weight resistance each time an exercise is performed but can include anything from increasing repetitions, or number of sets in a workout to decreasing rest time for cardiovascular training. Tracking progression over time in the gym and on the track is a great way to gauge improvement and see what might need some extra work.
Plateau: When your muscles and body have adapted to routines, weights or number of repetitions, this is called
Split – A Split Routine: This involves dividing up the muscle groups into different training days (i.e. “Monday is leg day in my 5-day split” or “I do a Push, Pull, Legs split”
Circuit – Circuit Training: Unlike standard work out routines of completing all the sets and repetitions of an exercise and then moving onto the next one, A circuit goes through completing 1 set of repetitions for all the exercises back to back with little to no rest until the end, then repeating the entire circuit for 3 to 4 sets. Great for cardiovascular boosting which can reall burn off that stubborn fat!
Spotter: A gym partner that watches you while you perform exercises, usually heavy compound lifts, and is ready to help correct form and help with engaging and disengaging the weight for an exercise.
Going to Failure: Completion of a set without a number of repetitions but purely continuing until you cannot lift the weight for that set anymore.
Plyo – Plyometrics: These are movements like broad jumps, vertical jumps, and even explosive skipping designed to increase speed and explosiveness while strengthening joints and muscles.
Forced Reps: With the help of a ‘Spotter’, forced reps are performed at the end of a set when fatigue has taken its toll on the muscle group. The spotter can help lift the weight on the exercise while you lower the weight for additional muscle stress.
Negatives – Eccentric Contraction: This is the act of lowering the weight slowly under tension to the start position. Why get negative? Performing negative reps can help stress (and therefore strengthen) muscles in a different manner than simply lifting and lowering, helping the body break through existing strength plateaus.
Dropset: A last set of an exercise whereby upon completing the necessary repetitions to failure, instead of finishing, you ‘drop’ the weight down by picking a lighter one and continuing the exercise to failure yet again.
Superset: A combination of two exercises that are performed back to back to complete one working set with little to no rest in between.
Triset: Like a superset only with an additional exercise in the set to make it 3 back to back exercises.
Giantset: Like above but with up to 4 back to back exercises in a set.
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