How much is to much if I feel fine?
I did chest and triceps yesterday, bringing each set to failure, 8 sets per muscle group total, using weight that lets me get a minimum of 6 reps. I'll hit chest and tri once more this week.
I'm on Dr prescribed TRT, so I am at the top of the natural range when I get blood work done 2 days after pinning. I pin 2 times a week. 44 M 6' 250
I feel like I could easily do 3 days of the same volume and intensity, if not 4 days. I don't feel sore or run down at all, even though I leave the gym with great pumps and pushing hard. I get good sleep and eat well(ish). I am consistently moving up in weight each week or 2 for my lifts, usually 5-10lbs depending on the muscle group. A little over a year into TRT and training, minus a couple of months due to a hockey injury.
Would I be just adding "junk" volume if I started doing 3 days of the same muscle group a week?
Current split is 5 days
chest tri
back bi
shoulder leg
chest tri
shoulder back bi
off
off
8 sets for each muscle group a day
I was thinking something like
chest tri morning/shoulders leg night
back bi
chest tri morning/ shoulders legs night
back bi
chest tri morning/ shoulders leg night
back bi
off
8 sets for each muscle group a day.
- Bookmark
- 0
- 0
Personally if you feel fine I see no reason to worry. Throughout the almost 20 years I've been lifting weights I've always made my best gains when doing the most weekly volume I could whether than was when natty or on gear, less is not more. Obviously it all goes downhill fast if you can't recover but you'll be able to tell that pretty easily as you feel like shit and start getting weaker instead of stronger!
Why are people giving me negative karma for this? I don't get it at least reply with something if you think I said something wrong
robinmoron23Been lifting for a minute myself, and I gotta say, hitting the same muscle group 3x a week sounds like a recipe for burnout. I tried that before and ended up feeling like a truck ran me over. Maybe throw in an arm day instead of killing chest and tri so much, give those muscles a chance to rebuild! Just my two cents, though!
Eastbeast38Im a all guy. I train for hours and hours. Go all out. You body will tell you in the am what it can handle. It will ajust over time also. Its next to impossible to overtrain imo if you check all the boxes imo.
I don’t believe in junk volume or over training. GET THAT WORK IN.
6 reps is too low imo unless you are strength training. Hypertrophy will be better 8-12 reps per set if that’s your goal. Go for drop sets to failure on last set. Break muscle fibres with max effort on heavier weight then pump the targeted muscle full of blood with higher/drop sets.
Frequency definitely trumps volume when you’re newer to training. You aren’t strong enough and don’t have as good a neuromuscular connection to recruit so many muscle fibers that it takes a long time to recover. So you can train more frequently and still recover. 8 sets for a muscle 3x a week will produce greater gains than 24 sets once a week.
2 a days and training 6 days a week is tough though. Getting enough sleep will be crucial for that to work, and enough calories, enough protein to rebuild and carbs to keep you going. Give it a shot for 4-6 week and assess your progress. If you’re progressing at a faster rate than you were hitting everything twice a week then stick with it. If you start going backwards than you know the frequency or volume is too high and you need to change it.
At a certain point probably around the end of your 2nd year of training when you’re moving heavier weights and connect with the muscle better you will probably have to back off on the frequency and at that point you’ll probably benefit more from higher volume and lower frequency as you’ll need more time to recover.
It all depends on what your goals are man. If you are training for powerlifting that’s not a bad program. If you are training to gain muscle and size that’s not the way to go at all, especially the low sets and rep ranges.
You’ve been at it for a year now. It’s time to increase sets and reps. You’re not building muscle doing 6 rep sets, I don’t give a damn what anyone tells you. And you are not building muscle not doing 8 sets per muscle group.
Most people who are gaining muscle and size are going heavy with higher rep ranges, in the 8-12 rep ranges. Arms it’s in the 12-15 rep range. Usually I do 4 working sets per exercise. Which means for chest for example I’ll do 3 sets to warm up. Then start working sets, I’ll do 4 exercises for chest x 4 sets per exercise = a minimum of 16 sets. Sometimes I go up to 20 working sets. You want to break down the muscle in order for it to grow. Doing 8 sets per muscle group isn’t enough to break muscle down enough to promote muscle growth.
That’s my 2 cents.
I'm doing the same 4 sets per exercise you described. 16 sets total for the week. 6 is the min, I am trying to get to failure, which is usually 10-12 reps. Or do you mean you're 16 sets per day, 32 total for the week per muscle group?
So my working sets look like this: 11 reps fail the 12th, 9 reps fail the 10th, 8 reps fail the 9th, 6 reps fail the 7th. Once I have the ability to do 10 reps on the last set, I move up in weight.
I do a 3 count down, a 3 count hold at full stretch, then push hard, repeat for each rep.
The counting is newish, just started doing that about 2 months ago. I had to drop weight when I started doing it. It made it so much harder. The stretch at the bottom feels so damn good, though. It feels even better doing seated cable flys, feels like my whole chest is being torn apart, in a good way.
I try to keep that mindset for all my workouts, I find back to be the hardest to push to failure. I always seem to give out with 1 or 2 in the tank still when working my back.
I was Airborne Infantry, so I can still hear my fireteam leader screaming when I want to give up on a hard set. You never really lose the mindset.
Yes sir I mean 16 sets per day. So if you train chest and tris 16 for chest and 16 for tris. 32 per body part for the week when training a body part twice a week.
I’m a retired Marine, so I know what you mean lol.
The reason you feel fine is you’re simply not strong enough yet relative to your body’s capability (being you’ve only been training a year). Increasing volume and intesifiers as a beginner/ intermediate is the way to go. Then as you get stronger, learn better form, learn what works best, transition to a more high intensity style program. 2 days a week for a muscle group is fine but 3 is ridiculous imo. Replace one chest tri with an arm day, and keep legs and shoulders separate. There is no way you will get max results hitting those 2 same day.
Just my opinion, been training a whileeeee, take what you want from it
CHEST TRI CHEST TRI CHEST TRI CHEST TRI
CHEST TRI BACK BI CHEST TRI BACK BI CHEST TRI BACK BI
Im running John Meadows Warlock program, but any of his training is good in my opinoin, i bought a program instead of winging it or trying to figure it out on my own, if thats not enough theres more advance splits with more intensity or volume, theres a section on his website that compares & shows whats tne workouts are & goals. RIP JOHN!!!
MOUNTAIN DOG
Hate to be a dick about this but it’s too not to
no you don't
The man tells no lies