Sudhakar Jha
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Written By: Sudhakar Jha | Published : September 19, 2018 7:25 PM IST
It was found that those who performed just one set of each exercise benefited as much as those who did it five times © Shuterstock
While we all like to do less work and maximum benefits, it s often said that the more you work out, the more benefits you get. And to actually check on how much time and effort you have to put in to get the benefits of a workout session, a team of researchers put 34 fit men on one of three fitness routines for a study.
For the study, published in the journal, Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, all the groups had to do the same seven exercises of 8-12 reps for three times a week for eight weeks. The first group did just one set of each move while the second did the same routine three times per session. And the third completed the entire workout five times during each gym visit.
The length of each workout varied between each group. The single-set group spent just 13 minutes working out, while second three-set group took 40 minutes to perform its exercises, and the third group did the five-times exercises for 70 minutes.
At the end of the eight-week study, researchers found that there was very little variation in the strength that the groups gained. It was found that those who performed just one set of each exercise benefited as much as those who did it five times.
The team noted that the only difference between the groups was the muscle mass. Those who did more than one set of each exercise got bigger.
That said, you'll need to strain the muscles to limp exhaustion, meaning that by the end of each set, you should feel like you can't possibly perform one more rep without taking a break, reportedly said study's lead author, Brad Schoenfeld, director of the Lehman College's human performance program.
Although more research is needed to confirm the implications of these findings for women, it looks like 13 minutes in the gym can lead to significant improvements in strength, Schoenfeld concluded in the study.
