1 Hour Weight Lifting Workout Necessary?

How many seconds does it take you to do 10 reps of a deadlift, clean, or squat?

How many minutes do you rest, wait for a partner, chat, or add weight?

I highly doubt anyone actually perform lifts for 30mins.

see edit

depends on load

up to 2 minutes, train alone, 20 sec at most to add weight

rest is there in programs for a reasonā€¦

You know what? I might just try this for a month. That would be about 12 sessions total. I was able to knock out the 20,000lb deadlift challenge in 17 minutes with about 5 minutes warmup, that session looked like this:
Lacrosse ball rolling
135x10
225x10
225x10
315x5 for 10 sets

For squats i would do something like this:
Front squat 95x10
135x5
225x2
Switch to back squats here
285x5 for 10 sets
Minimal rest between sets, like 30 seconds or so.
Bench and ohp would be a similar setup.
I think Iā€™ll give it a go and see if I can do these in 20 minutes and still make progress.

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You just proved yourself it doesnā€™t take an hour. Unless you take 10min breaks or get chatty in the gym. Nothing wrong with that. But my point is how did it get ingrained that we should be in the gym ā€˜liftingā€™ for an hour?

Are you implying that when lifting with a trainer there is:

Includingā€¦

Iā€™m not sure you have ever had a trainer have youā€¦?

I havenā€™t really heard of this that often thoughā€¦

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I believe trainers are valuable.

But when you venture out on your own to lift, does it really take you an hour? Again, not counting cardio, lifts only.

Rename thread: The 20 minute workout challenge (vid or it didnā€™t happen)

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You have your answer from multiple people.

I donā€™t even umderstand what you are getting at. Is 1 hour appropriate for all training in a gym setting, for all goals, all ages, genders, physical ability, etc?

The answer should be obvious. The standard 1 hour balances all interests, you know, like it does in just about every single other commercial scenario.

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Itā€™s just going to be one of those threads that everyone gives a logical answer while the OP ignores everybody and repeats themselves over and over in a slightly different way each time.

outta-here

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I think OP has a valid observation and point. The standard, assumed time for a lifting session is one hour (Iā€™ve had that perception, too), but where does the idea come from?

Research has shown that lifting gains dramatically decrease after an hour of lifting, but is that the basis of the duration perception? Or is OPā€™s personal trainer postulate correct? Or maybe experienced lifters intuitively observe this? The idea certainly started somewhere.

For instance, when I was in high school, many gym bros had an unattributed belief that 3 sets of 10 reps was the optimal loading for a lift. My peers didnā€™t know where it came from, other than vague assertions like ā€œI think someone researched it sometime.ā€

It turns out, an Army researcher in the 1950s had groups of men exercise, some doing random numbers of sets and reps while others did 3 x 10. The latter group made more significant gains, so the researcher published the data and he/the Army/someone out there believed and propagated the idea that 3 x 10 is the superior set/rep scheme.

Similar to that situation, Iā€™ll bet thereā€™s a cause for OPā€™s observed phenomenon. Whether his postulate is correct is for the dedicated Iron Researchers here to learn!

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wasnā€™t this proven false?..
(correct me if Iā€™m wrong)

Good question. I shouldā€™ve written "around an hour, " because the number I most recall is around 75 minutes. Itā€™s been years since I last read about this, so maybe newer research has found info I donā€™t have.

Anecdotally, my natural energy stores are depleted after 65-ish minutes when Iā€™m lifting intensely and not consuming calories.

Weekend - 1.5 hours

Week mornings before work - 40 mins

Kind of a moot argument imo.
Personal trainers are not all the same, as trainees are not all the same. Thereā€™s people, actually a lot of people out there, who need to be told how to walk, sit and breathe and Iā€™d take a shot in the dark by saying they make up a good chunk of generic gym goers - the hardcore gym enthusiasts and meatheads are the minority of overall gym goers, letā€™s keep it in mind.
So telling/showing them how to warm up, how much to rest and so on is still a personal trainerā€™s job, itā€™s still time he spends with the trainee and, by extension, itā€™s still time that has to be paid. If a person spends one hour of his time following your workout - be it warmup, cardio, resting time and all the stuff other than the actual lifting - I donā€™t think itā€™s right to tell them ā€œyeah but the actual lifting time I did is 20 minutes, so Iā€™ll pay you one third of your hourly feeā€ lol.

Other than that, there is no exact amount of time needed for a proper workout. Thereā€™s just too many factors to it. At my current (shitty) level Iā€™ve had workouts as long as 1.5 hours a couple months ago and as short as 35 minutes a pair of weeks ago.

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I would say if your goal is purely to build strength you can easily get in a highly productive work-out in under 1hrā€¦if your goal is to bodybuild, assuming you are not a total newby a certain degree of volume and variety will be needed to progress optimally which will likely mean at least a 45 min wo.

My work-outs almost always last under an hour, though Iā€™m not really trying to gain mass any more.

So @cakez, I see that you tossed my post a like, are you with me on this? We could do this Dan John ā€œone lift a dayā€ style, you in? Iā€™m willing to give this a try, are you? Stop asking questions, theorizing, postulating, or anything else that means thinking instead of lifting and put your muscle where your mouth is.
So whatā€™s it gonna to be boy? WHATā€™S IT GONNA BE? YES or No?

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I heard the Army scientist dude was specifically trying to put muscle mass back on injured soldiers.

So the experiment wasnā€™t about ā€œgains,ā€ but more like specific rehabilitation, focused on regaining muscle mass. Earnest Hemmingway wrote a story about this process one time. Just like the young internet dudes of today, the soldiers who were being treated didnā€™t believe in their ā€œcoaches,ā€ who were doctors, or their silly exercises.

Meanwhile, Russian dudes were working on how to use the weight room to get better sports results.

To this day, USA loves big muscles and nobody knows any Russian body builders.

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Probably not too far from the truth. Training is a customer service industry and rates of pay are universally considered to be on an hourly basis. Itā€™s definitely not uncommon for trainers to offer half-hour rates as well as hourly packages.

Some experts (Alwyn Cosgrove comes to mind) have talked about alternative billing methods like semi-privates instead of one-on-one or billing for programming separate from live training.

Really? Youā€™re comfortable with that blanket statement regardless of goal, clientā€™s pre-existing conditions, or any other variables? Please do lay out what everyoneā€™s 20-minute workout should be.

Depends on my goal at the time. Anywhere from 15 minutes to 75ish. Currently about a half-hour.

I will say though, as a general rule for trainers, if you donā€™t at least know how to program for a given goal in minimum time, you need to work on your programming skills. Like, gun to your head, if a client says ā€œI can only train for 20 minutes per sessionā€, you need to know what to do, otherwise hit the books and study up.

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I just figured that this was such a valid point that we should all read it twiceā€¦

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