Hypertrophy vs Strength Training: Which Do You Need?
When it comes to hypertrophy vs strength training there are some fundamental things you (or your trainer) should know about the differences. They each will demand a different approach to your workouts, and they each have different end-goals.
In this post I’ll break down the major differences in hypertrophy vs strength training (with a little about training for a power adaptation, too). You can also read about and download my exclusive Rule of 60 Workout Plan if you are ready to get serious about your hypertrophy training!
Hypertrophy vs strength training: different performance adaptations
Before we highlight the differences, let’s just take note of the fact that hypertrophy and strength are both performance adaptations. Adaptations are just effects or end-results you hope to achieve from your workouts, training, and nutrition choices.
There are four major performance adaptations: hypertrophy, strength, power, and muscle endurance. Today, let’s just focus on hypertrophy vs strength training and how training for power fits into the mix.
What are the four major performance adaptations?
There are four main performance adaptations: hypertrophy, strength, power, and muscle endurance. Here are some real simple ways to understand the differences between them.
Hypertrophy is about muscle size.
Strength is how we display force in a relatively slow movement.
Power is force in action.
Muscle endurance is the how well and how long we can display strength and power.
Since I spend most of this post talking about hypertrophy and strength, let me quickly mention more about the power adaptation.
What does power look like? If we're talking barbell movements, these are Olympic-type movements like your clean and snatch. Or in other sports this would be plyometrics or some type of plyometric-based movement, which includes sprinting, jumping, etc. Think of it as strength on display in the way you move.
Hypertrophy vs strength training differences
Hypertrophy
Hypertrophy is actually growing the cross-sectional area of the muscle. Muscle is not just one wall of mass. When I’m trying to explain hypertrophy to my strength and conditioning clients, I tell them to think of a chicken breast or a piece of beef, like a like a backstrap, where you can see the actual tissue fibers. Now let's say you want a big chicken breast or you want it to plump up. You can soak it in water and those fibers will expand. And it looks like it's plumper. So, the ability for it to expand more would be like growing the cross-sectional area of that muscle.
Strength
With strength, you may not necessarily see growth in the muscle size. How big it will be depends, in part on the muscle group. As trainers often say: “You got to have an ass to run fast.” If you look at sprint athletes like Olympic-level sprinters, their posterior chain development as far as the glutes is crazy. Sometimes people I’m training with tell me “I want an ass like a sprinter.” And I say, “All right. Well, go sprint!”
The sprinter’s musculature development example just highlights the ratio of mass to actual strength or power. Let's say you have a sprint-type athlete who has some room for improvement. Their mechanics are good, their power output is measuring pretty solid, but they want to get their times down. You can just work to get them stronger.
One way you gauge that progress would be a strength test. But if they have room for a mass gain, you could roll into a hypertrophy program rather than a strength program, depending on how much stress you want to put on the athlete, due to load. So, on that hypertrophy vs strength training continuum, what do you want to happen?
Hypertrophy adaptation for bodybuilders and other athletes
Think about bodybuilders and take the glutes, for an example. To get them ready for competition, we could do glute bridges and comparable movements at a high volume on the front end to have that hypertrophy effect. With a bodybuilder, the performance is the show — so we can work you to failure or exhaustion.
But with other athletes, due to the nature of their athletic competition, high volume, and other stressors, we need a different training approach. With the athletic population, if I work you to failure or exhaustion prior to a practice or competition, you're more susceptible to injury, which means you can't train, which means you can't perform. That downtime is a loss, so we're kind of limited in how far we can push volume and intensity for hypertrophy adaptations.
If you want a more in-depth look at this, check out my post on differences in bodybuilding vs strength training, with tips how to get started as a new bodybuilding athlete.
How does hypertrophy work with strength training?
So, you know, in the short term, hypertrophy looks like a puzzle, this growth in the cross-sectional area. And so over time, maybe a it 2-3 week window, if you're working a hypertrophy program with more volume — and the correct amount of intensity — then you're going to grow your cross-sectional area.
If you're just working five sets of three repetitions as opposed to five sets of twelve repetitions, it could take longer for you to grow your muscle size, even though you're getting stronger. So, if your goal is growth, strength training might not be the best route.
Growing your cross-sectional area of your musculature allows for a greater strength adaptation. So they live on kind of a continuum, and that’s often how I will think about it as I’m working with a new strength and conditioning client.
Muscle size doesn't necessarily correspond to muscle strength. It’s possible to get stronger without getting bigger, to a degree. Remember, hypertrophy is about making your muscles, the actual tissues bigger and increasing their capacity. And strength training is about increasing the effect, the actual strength of those tissues, even if they aren't getting those noticeably bigger.
Hypertrophy vs strength training balance in workout blocks
Oftentimes I will kick things off with a new client with a hypertrophy block for about 2-3 weeks. Then a strength block for 2-3 weeks. Then maybe another strength block or another hype or power block, depending on the goal.
I generally block in two weeks. If I'm pushing, three. With those relatively short blocks, as a trainer, I have a lot of control and influence over your day-to-day nutrient intake, rest, all that. And I trust clients to report back to me truthfully if we're going to push three- or four-week adaptation blocks.
But after years of this experimenting with this rhythm, I know that within two-weeks blocks, with what I prescribe, the risk of injury, or the the risk-reward ratio is very low. With my method, you're going to get better and you're less likely to run into the soft tissue issue.
Pros and cons of hypertrophy vs strength training
Hypertrophy
Pros:
· You're not lifting as heavy a weight, so you don't have the wear and tear on the joints that is caused by heavy lifting.
· Growing the muscle through creating healthier tissue. With the pump. So literally, by getting a pump, you help create a healthier environment for tissue, and it grows from working toward failure or just higher volumes in general.
Cons:
· You have a higher number of repetitions per set. So that adds the repetitive stress on the joint.
· It can be painful because the pump can stretch the tissue and your skin. Some people don't like that tight feeling in the skin or muscles.
Strength Training
Pros:
· When you work for strength, you get stronger.
· You don't see the breakdown of the joint due to repetition (volume).
Cons:
· The repetitions are not enough to grow muscle efficiently, which means it's going to take you longer if you have a lower volume, so lower repetition count.
· If you overload too much, then you can see break down and the ligaments and joints due to too much weight or overload stress.
Who is a good fit for hypertrophy versus strength training?
If your joints and ligaments are happy, and you want to grow your muscle size, hypertrophy is a good starting point.
If you're not so much concerned with muscle size, then strength would probably be a solid starting point.
I generally do recommend a mixture with my training clients. Often, I start with hypertrophy just because we need to grow muscle. This also gives us a chance to reinforce some good habits as far as form and technique within some of our slower movements with higher volumes. And then we move to a strength block.
What is weight training and how does it work?
Weight training is just resistance-based training. We use bands, we use pulleys and cables, and they may be attached to a weight stack, or they might be attached to a band or whatever form of resistance. The bottom-line is that we need an adequate load for this kind of training in order to elicit the proper adaptation.
Load determines your volume. For instance, let’s say you couldn't move 300 pounds in a bench press, twelve times. But say you could move 95 pounds twelve times. If you can move 95 pounds twelve times you’re more likely to see that muscle growth. If you struggle with 300 pounds and you get it once, you're not going to see that muscle growth. This is why I say, if you're going into the weight room, always have a plan — and make sure your plan matches up with your goal.
A lot of people who might talk about “weight training” are really just doing some version of what some people bro workouts. That’s where you just throw weight on the bar and see how many times you can get it. There's a time for that, but more often than not, if you have a solid goal, that's not going to be the case.
How have you used hypertrophy in your own personal training?
I got to a place where I really wanted to cut up. I wanted to get my abs and see striations and all this other fun stuff. By the way, that’s what we trainers do when we get bored! So, I created a plan that I call the Rule of 60.
It’s a program for all your core movements (squat, bench press, deadlifts, etc.) at high volume —really, really stupidly high volume. Definitely not for the faint of heart or novice lifters by any means.
In my Rule of 60 plan, for those core movements you're hitting 60 repetitions per workout. That normally looks like 6 sets of 10 reps, or 5 by 12, or 4 by 15 repetitions. For your accessory movements like curls, then you’re doing 2 sets of 30 or 3 sets of 20, generally. That break up of volume per exercise sucks, BUT if you want to improve your overall muscle endurance and get cut up stupidly, it’s a great way to make progress quickly.
When I designed and tested the Rule of 60 plan, I had time for recovery, so it worked for where I was. And it was successful. I've had a few other coaches and trainers use it when they hit a plateau. Because it is a high-stress plan, you don’t spend any more than four weeks on it. Generally, it's just two- or three-week shock that forces your body to respond. Your nutrition and your hydration has to be on point. Otherwise, you'll break down and you won't be able to complete your workouts. I liked the ways it held me accountable in those realms as well.
So far, no injuries with this ambitious plan. Actually, some of the people that have tried it report back that they are seeing better mobility, less pain in their lower back, knees, hips, and elbows. And they've gotten the results, cut some fat off, etc.
Advanced and beginner hypertrophy workout plans
Of course, many of my clients are not hard-core strength and conditioning athletes but they still want to explore the benefits of hypertrophy workouts with their other performance adaptation goals. I’ve got a lighter version of the Rule of 60 you can use.
Maybe they are coming back from some type of cardiac event or surgery. Maybe they are recovering from a cold or COVID. A lot of volume may not be the best prescription for them, or if it is, it needs to be a really light load.
And you need more than a one-to-one repetitions to rest. If it takes you 30 seconds to knock out your repetitions, you need more than 30 seconds of rest. This is another situation where a strength-based program will probably serve better. Because, your loads or amount of weight you can move are already going to be relatively low, and we just want to get you stronger so that you can support yourself. If you’re coming back from a cardiac event you’re weak?
We focus on the quality of life type movements. Your kids don't give a damn what your 40 time is.
They don't care how high your jump, or if you can dunk a basketball or not. That's all ego. What your kids need you to be able to do is squat down and pick them up. To go to a knee and get back up without an aid or assistance.
So, my beginner hypertrophy workout plan is a home-based program. If you're coming off the couch for whatever reason and haven't moved around much, then this is a good one to do at home when you only need a pair of light dumbbells and a band. Download my Beginner Hypertrophy Workout Plan.
With my Rule of 60 plan, you need a weight room and some movement competency because I mean, it will break down as you work through your sets. And again, you need to know when to pull off weight. “Lighter, is righter … ” with this one because I've had coaches and trainers tell me yeah, “This was a real ego check. Everything about it is built around 60, so like 60 seconds of rest, and it's barely enough to actually have your energy stored for cover. If your load is right, you'll make it! It'll suck. You'll make it, though. Download my Rule of 60 Advanced Hypertrophy Workout Plan.
Final thoughts on hypertrophy vs strength training
As I have outlined here, there is a good time and place for both! It’s important to work with a qualified trainer when it comes to the balance and timing of hypertrophy vs strength training blocks. The biggest thing is to start with clarity about your performance adaptation end-goals and let that drive the balance of hypertrophy vs strength training (or power … or muscle endurance!) blocks you include in your personal workout plan.
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