You’ve probably read, heard, or seen the benefits of clean and presses and other explosive, classic lifts, and may be curious about what type of weight you should use, or how many clean and presses you should do.
Excluding warm up sets, you should aim to reach a total of 25 reps, split into sets of 3-5. Use a manageable weight which is challenging enough to limit yourself to this rep range. This number is a good start for most people, but will ultimately vary according to your goals. For most people, the clean and press is a great way to train for explosive power. Power equals force times velocity, and is different from strength (force) alone. This type of training can have a profound effect on your overall gains..
There are a number of factors to consider in regards to the amount of weight you should use, and your goals. Are you lifting for size, strength, or conditioning? Let’s continue.
How much weight should I use for the clean and press?
For those If you are experienced in the gym, and in good shape, start with a weight that you can do for 10+ reps on the standing military press. You may need to start even lighter if you’re unfamiliar with the clean and press.
It may seem, at first, that you should be able to do the same amount of weight that you can military press, or even more. But remember that when you do clean and presses, the press is only a small portion of the total exercise, so it’ll only be getting a portion of your energy. The rest of the exercise emphasizes primarily your lower body, as well as your upper back, biceps and forearms.
This is a big weight lifting movement that was formerly a part of competitive events, so you will go heavy eventually. But it is important to most of the exercise and work your way up to the heavy weights.
If you’re completely new to lifting, this is a pretty advanced movement, so it would be wise to learn the clean and press with a trainer. If you are confident that you can learn the clean and press, start with the empty bar and gradually work your way up to a weight that is challenging to do 7-8 reps with. .
How many clean and presses should I do to gain muscle?
If you want to gain as much muscle as possible from clean and presses, you’ll need to go pretty heavy and stay in the 3-5 reps per set range, but do at least 5 sets, 2-3 times per week. If you are only doing clean and presses that day, and no other resistance training, work your way up to 10 sets. So you’ll be looking at 25-50 total reps.
This is a very challenging exercise, so take plenty of rest between sets. 1 min of rest will be a minimum, but try to keep it to under 3 mins. Longer rest times like this will allow you to regain the maximum possible amount of strength for the next set.
Although the clean and press provides a near-complete total body exercise (see here), you’ll probably do other exercises too. So, assuming this will be a part of a larger training program, you should do your clean and presses either on leg day, after legs (if you prefer total-body workouts) or as a standalone workout on a day with no other weight training.
It is important to track your progress with other metrics besides just weight and what you look like in the mirror. The scales will not tell the full story of what’s going on with your body composition. I highly recommend you track your body fat using a body fat monitor, and use a retractable tape measure to keep track of the size of your waist, hips, arms, and legs. This will give you a more complete picture of your progress.
How many clean and presses should I do to lose fat?
The clean and press stimulates your metabolism better than most other exercises, and can produce a profound afterburn effect. So, when combined with a caloric deficit, it makes a powerful tool for fat loss.
If fat loss is your primary concern, you’ll want to use a slightly lower weight, but only enough to put you in the 7-10 reps per set range. Again, do 5 sets and work your way up to 10 sets over a few weeks or months. This will mean that you’ll be doing anywhere from 35-100 reps depending on your level of strength, stamina, and how long you’ve been training.
You’ll always need more rest between sets of clean and presses than you would between sets of a less intense, single body part exercise, but try to keep it as short as possible without sacrificing performance. 1-2 mins is a good amount of rest.
What is special about the clean and press?
The clean and press is not an easy exercise to learn, but the benefits are definitely worth the work. The clean and press will require you to use your entire body in a smooth, somewhat hard to learn movement. The beauty of this exercise is that it trains you to use your entire body to perform a single function. The great bodybuilder Tom Platz reportedly said that he used to visualize his body as a single giant piston when performing squats. I like this approach and find that this type of visualization also helps when doing clean and presses.
When you start going heavy, it also becomes an exercise in self confidence. You need to have the faith that you can get the barbell to your neck. I don’t like to go so heavy that I have to drop the bar, and feel like controlling the weight through the negative adds much to the effect of the exercise. Your forearms will usually be the weakest link, and continuous improvement in the clean and press will strengthen them greatly.
One of the best, yet most exhausting observations about the clean and press is that it is combining two to three movements into one, and moving a barbell throughout a human’s entire vertical range of motion. When you are doing one repetition of clean and press, you are really doing one repetition of a power clean and one repetition of standing military press. A super-rep, if you will. This means that low rep sets are a necessity more than a choice.
If you are using a light enough barbell to be able to do a set of 10 or more clean and presses, that’s really too light to see benefits from a power training perspective. You will be driving your metabolism higher and burning additional calories, but you are unlikely to keep gaining much muscle from this after initially adapting to this workload. It will still have some benefits for conditioning and balance, and if you’re a new lifter you’ll see some gains, but it will be markedly less effective then heavier sets with 3-5 repetitions.
So, first you need to master the exercise and build up confidence. Then, go heavy enough to necessitate sets of 3-5, and do 5 sets at least twice per week. You will see your explosive power skyrocket and, with good diet and sleep habits, you may improve your physique dramatically.
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