My Max and 1RM Calculators

Everytime I use a one rep max calculator it always says my 1RM is a lot less than it is. I know it’s not the final answer to anything, but I was just wondering what I could attribute it to.

It seems as I get closer to one 1RM my reps go down tremendously and it takes singles to get there. I normally train 80-85% 5-8 reps as this seems to be working well for me. If I had to guess would this be concerning something with the CNS system since I don’t train consistently with 90%+?

Don’t use calculators in the first place. Keep lifting heavy and eating big. Don’t worry about the little bullshit.

[quote]daltron wrote:
It seems as I get closer to one 1RM my reps go down tremendously and it takes singles to get there. [/quote]

Exactly. That’s what makes it a 1 rep maximum lift.

Define “working well”.

Correct. Read Tony Gentilcore’s new article on incorporating 90%+ lifts in your routine.

[quote]Doug Adams wrote:
daltron wrote:
It seems as I get closer to one 1RM my reps go down tremendously and it takes singles to get there.

Exactly. That’s what makes it a 1 rep maximum lift.

I normally train 80-85% 5-8 reps as this seems to be working well for me.

Define “working well”.

If I had to guess would this be concerning something with the CNS system since I don’t train consistently with 90%+?

Correct. Read Tony Gentilcore’s new article on incorporating 90%+ lifts in your routine.

[/quote]

When I started in September of '05, I could do 185 for 5 reps. Around winter '05 I took off somewhere between a month and 6 weeks from bench because I was stupid wanted to focus on other lifts (ones I won’t mention for fear of being laughed at lol). I took another 6 weeks off this september to october and yesterday I hit 355 touch and go.

I’m a big guy who who ate a lot so I was pretty much “bulking” the whole time. I know it’s a weak ass weight for my size but I try to judge my lifting by my progression. It’s annoying as hell when I keep being told I should be doing 4 or 5 plates as if most people (not from this forum) seem to forget it’s takes training to get strong in the first place.

I’m not obsessing over the calculator, I just found it odd that as I got over around 85-90% I could no longer do multiple reps.

Thanks for the article, I’ll look into it now.

Your body will adapt to the reps you use. If you only do sets of 8 reps then trying to do some set of different reps will be hard. If you try to do a set of 15 reps it will be vary hard. Same thing for a set of 3 reps. Your body has to adapt the different type of loading.

The 1 rep max formulas are “in theory” and should only be used as a reference guide.