Strength Training: How Much and How Often

Strength Training: How Often?

Evidence suggests that strength training two days per week can improve overall health, which includes strength gains and positive impact on bone mineral density, for post menopausal women.  To that end, we send workout reminders two days per week, defaulting to Sunday and Wednesday.  Change these reminders to days of the week that work for you (or turn them off completely) within your dashboard under My Account. 

If you want to strength training more than 2 days per week, we make it easy for you to repeat any workout you have completed.  Our experience, which aligns with the evidence, suggest that bodies, especially aging ones, require at least 48 hours to recover between strength sessions.  We personally like 3 days, especially when one is new to resistance training. Giving yourself enough recovery time between strength sessions will allow your body to adapt more quickly and you will see quicker improvements in overall strength.

Effort vs. Gain Explained

Our program focuses on multi joint - full body exercises that support muscle performance for daily living activities (filling the dog food bin or placing objects of high shelves, for example) and fun activities, like walking, hiking, biking, court sports, and skiing. 

If you are new to strength training, we recommend starting with very low resistance or weights.  For the first week or so, performing a new exercise with no weight and just focusing on form and range of motion might be perfect for your needs. After you feel comfortable with the exercise and consistently have good form, aim to build up to 60 - 70% of total effort for the first 12 weeks. 

If you have recent experience with an exercise and have been strength training for over 12 weeks, we still want you to dial in your form.  We recommend working up to 80% of total effort, as you will continue to see strength gains.  Working harder that 80% of total effort is unnecessary for strength and bone density gains, and can introduce risk.  

You might be asking yourself, what is 60 - 80% of total effort?  Think about total effort this way - if we prescribe 3 sets of 10 repetitions of an exercise, you'll want to target ending the 10th repetition with gas in the tank.  Meaning you want to be able to do more.  If you are targeting 60% effort, then work to where you feel like you could do 3 - 4 more repetitions after your 10th repetition.  If you are working at 80%, then work to where you feel like you can do at least 1 if not 2 more repetitions.  Your muscles should have that nice fatigued feeling, but not to complete failure.  It is not necessary to go to failure to get functional strength and bone density gains.

Reference: Islam J, Dixon CR, O'Rourke M, Räisänen AM. Characteristics of Resistance Training Programs Targeting Improvements in Health Outcomes in Postmenopausal Women: A Scoping Review. J Strength Cond Res. 2025 May 16;39(7):815-822. doi: 10.1519/JSC.0000000000005147. PMID: 40440557.