Weight Training Terminology

Don’t be intimidated or confused by the terms used in fitness. A couple minutes here and you’ll be nearly fluent.

Stuff You HAVE to Know:

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Repetitions (Reps)	Raising and lowering a weight one time.
Sets	A bunch of reps done one after the other, done until the muscle is tired.
Frequency	This refers to the number of times you work out in a week.
Progressive Overload	Once they have begun to adapt to the weights you’re lifting, your muscles have to be subject to harder work. In other words, you have to gradually (progressively) increase the work that makes the muscle tire out (become overloaded).
Aerobic Exercise	Exercise that uses oxygen. Oxygen is needed to burn fat. Nuff said.
Anaerobic Exercise	Short, powerful bursts of exercise that doesn’t use oxygen and relies on carbohydrates for energy. Weight training is said to fall here, but I say if you keep your heart rate up weight training can easily become aerobic too.
Compound Exercise	Any exercise that uses more than one muscle. Stick with these, you get the biggest bang for your buck.
Isolation Exercise	Any exercise with works an individual muscle in isolation of others. These have their place, but try not to make them a big part of your workout.

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Interval Training	The best way to describe this is by example: Run really hard for one minute, then jog for a minute to catch your breath. Repeat this process a bunch of times. This is interval training in a nutshell.
Super Sets	2 sets done quickly one after the other, typically using opposing muscles. (chest and back)
Giant Sets	3 or more sets done quickly, one after the other.
Plateaus	When your body and muscles adapt and the gains you once had are no longer, you’ve hit a plateau. Time to mix things up.
Hypertrophy	Muscle growth.
Atrophy	Muscle loss.