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Gridiron Warrior

Relative Intensity Calculator

What did that set really cost your athlete?
Coach, the number on the bar lies to you. 75% for a set of 10 looks like a light day on paper. Ten reps make it a true max effort. This chart tells you the relative intensity your athlete actually paid, so you stop cooking your kids on sets you thought were easy.

How to read this chart

Pick the reps you are running across the top. Pick what you want on the bar for those reps inside the grid. The row label on the left is the relative intensity of that set. The bar percent is the input. The row is the true cost.

Relative intensity is how hard the set actually was, as a percent of a max effort. Two sets at the same relative intensity are equal work even when the bar percent looks nothing alike.

Here is where coaches get burned. A coach writes 3x10@75% on the sheet and thinks he programmed a moderate day. Find it on the grid: run down the 10-rep column to 75% on the bar. That cell sits in the RI 100% row. Seventy-five percent looks moderate on paper. Ten reps make that set a true max effort.

So 3x10@75% means three max-effort sets back to back. That is why kids die on it. You did not program base work. You programmed a testing day and ran it three times.

What to program instead. If you want real base work at 10 reps, drop the bar percent into the yellow band. On this chart, 10 reps in the yellow base rows lands the bar around 60% to 64% (RI 80% to 87.5%). That is a set your athletes can repeat all week and still show up Friday. Tap any cell to run it.

The Full Table

Columns are reps. Cells are what you put on the bar. The row on the left is the relative intensity you earn. Tap a cell to run it.

Max: true test sets Heavy: eval and test sets Orange: a range to evaluate in Yellow: base, majority of your loading Too light: not enough to stimulate

Your Set

The %1RM you loaded for this set (48 to 100).
How many reps in the set.
Add it and the tool prints the actual bar weight.

Open the result

Drop your email and see the true relative intensity, the zone, and the bar weight.

True Relative Intensity
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