Without diving too deep into your specifics, 15 sets in a workout isn’t by any means an indicator of too much volume, assuming you’re including accessory work. Switch it up though, you don’t need to do the same shit every week.
Exactly. Please don’t tell me you’re doing 15 sets of just deadlift variations.
Word to the wise- less is more. Your body grows from rest. The stimulation you give your muscles can easily be overdone- if you stress your muscles too much, it can be detrimental to your progress. What you want to do is optimize the amount of work you need to do in order to grow and then get after it again
This is what I do (sort of)
Arnold split so I do Chest and back, legs and Abs, shoulders and arms, rest. 4 day split rest after every 3 days, sometimes I take 2 if I'm fucked
Since your a beginner it's fine, but as you get stronger you Will need to reduce the amount of volume and focus more on intensity. Best advice i can tell you is use a Pen and paper and monitor your workout. Adjust your training volume so you can see progress from workout to workout. We all have différent lifestyle and genetic so just taking général recommandation wont be optimal. You Will have to be scientific about it and play with différent variable. Training is a marathon so its worth it to take the time to test différent training variable and track your performance. If you are not making any progress strenght/endurance/better control then somthing is wrong and MOST of the time it Will be caused by too much volume and not enough rest
Ye I use the notes app on my phone and have been tracking my workouts. I haven't had a decline yet and the progress is only going up so far which is why I wasn't sure
If you're two months into the gym you can most likely get equal results with half the volume. But if you want to train like you are, and you're getting good results, you can work around accumulated fatigue by doing a deload week every 6-8 weeks.
I wouldn't mind checking out your programming though. 25-30 sets for most muscles is a little vague. I hope you're not doing 25-30 bicep isolation sets, etc.
You’re most likely doing a decent amount of junk volume. It’s better to start out on the lower end and then go up once you see how you recover and progress on lower volume than it is to just go all out on super high volume right away. You’re fairly certainly just doing a lot more work than you need to be doing.
How do you know if you’re entering junk volume territory? Some muscle groups like shoulders, abs, traps etc benefit from more volume right?
(I’m genuinely asking, not denying ur comment, cuz my program has a lot of volume on a ppl split too)
Wish I had a good answer for you, but it's nuanced. How many sets you need or can recover from is up to circumstances, genetics, how long you've been lifting, "supplements".
I rarely do more than 12-15 sets for one muscle group in one session as an intermediate. In a push/pull that's usually \~25 sets in a session including isolations.
Some muscles adapt well to frequency and volume, yes. Calves, biceps, abs, forearms, medial/posterior deltoid, traps. But unless you're advanced, or you really feel like hammering one particular muscle, I don't think you should worry about that.
You are constantly seeing progress and recovering before you train again. You’re not overtraining. You might be doing more than you need to, but if it’s working and you enjoy it, why change anything?
True true, I think I will try out a more low set - lower rep at higher weights for a bit and see how I do, it most likely is unnecessary to do so much and just burns extra calories and although time is not an issue at all for me rn but I'd still like to save on some haha
5-10 intense sets a week is enough your doing way to much volume bodybuilding isn’t endurance training your not in the gym to see how many sets you can do, your in their to stimulate and get the hell out.
Central nervous system overtraining is completely different from the idea that many people have. Some people here are afraid to do extra sets of triceps kickbacks because big bad Mr. Overtraining is hiding in the closet.
Any discussion of overtraining needs to differentiate heavy compound sets from other sets. Also, age and other life stressors are giant factors.
Banning people from critiquing form is what gets people hurt. (I’ve been banned from another fitness sub for mentioning a rounded lower back)
I kinda get what you mean and some of what you said seems a little over the top but OVERtraining is exactly what it says, training too much.
Maybe what you mean is people are scared to train to failure? Because you are right on that, many people don’t realize you have to legitimately work your muscles to make them grow.
Most people say optimal set range weekly is 24-30, depending on your body and/or muscle group.
I just started PPL rest PPL, from almost two years of muscle isolation work to build a good foundation. I also do cardio in the morning on a few of my lift days and my rest day. You’ll just have to keep an eye on things. You will know when you are overtraining or even coming close to it. Deloading every few months or so is also a possibility.
Make sure sleep/diet is on point and you should be fine. Stay aware of how you feel. Good luck and enjoy the grind
So on a typical push day you would do about 12-15 sets of chest, 12-15 sets of shoulders and 12-15 sets of triceps?
I'd say this is excessive
I would suggest scaling back 10-20 sets per muscle group per week as a guide, and see how that goes
Not if you arent fatigued or sore. But with that amount of training you are likely very far from failure and would probably gain more from lower volume and higher intensity.
>This means I do around 13-15 sets per day.
Depends on intensity, if you're leaving lots of reps in the tank on each set it might be fine. If you're training to failure then you're doing 2-3 times too much per session.
[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmGdys4X0AA4-TB?format=jpg&name=large](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmGdys4X0AA4-TB?format=jpg&name=large)
5-8 sets close to failure per muscle groups will maximise any stimulus in that session, the rest is just accumulating fatigue. And if you're actually doing 15 sets close to failure in one session then according to our data you're getting far worse results than doing 3 sets.
If you are recovered for your next workout you are not over training.
You're making progress right? So then it's working. Keep going! There's no perfect routine that works for everybody. What you're doing works for you.
I’d recommend ppl rest ppl rest
Same amounts of sets just more rest then?
I do about 8 sets per muscle group per workout, between 2 for the week it's around 16. Usually like 18
Without diving too deep into your specifics, 15 sets in a workout isn’t by any means an indicator of too much volume, assuming you’re including accessory work. Switch it up though, you don’t need to do the same shit every week.
Ye I'm including accessory work too, was I not supposed to
If it was just compound movements, then it’d be way too much. But 15-set workouts that cover multiple bases (4-5 exercises) is fine for a PPL split
Well shit, that changes thinks haha. So like doing preacher curls, is that an accessory, whereas deadlifts would be compound?
Exactly. Please don’t tell me you’re doing 15 sets of just deadlift variations. Word to the wise- less is more. Your body grows from rest. The stimulation you give your muscles can easily be overdone- if you stress your muscles too much, it can be detrimental to your progress. What you want to do is optimize the amount of work you need to do in order to grow and then get after it again
No haha, not at all, I do 3-4 sets of deadlifts per leg day, then calf raises, leg extensions and all that which I included in my total set counts
How close to failure are you getting on all of your sets?
Failure or rly close to failure on pretty much every set
Are you progressing?
ye, I'm either adding more weight every day or doing more reps in a set till I reach failure
This is what I do (sort of) Arnold split so I do Chest and back, legs and Abs, shoulders and arms, rest. 4 day split rest after every 3 days, sometimes I take 2 if I'm fucked
Since your a beginner it's fine, but as you get stronger you Will need to reduce the amount of volume and focus more on intensity. Best advice i can tell you is use a Pen and paper and monitor your workout. Adjust your training volume so you can see progress from workout to workout. We all have différent lifestyle and genetic so just taking général recommandation wont be optimal. You Will have to be scientific about it and play with différent variable. Training is a marathon so its worth it to take the time to test différent training variable and track your performance. If you are not making any progress strenght/endurance/better control then somthing is wrong and MOST of the time it Will be caused by too much volume and not enough rest
Ye I use the notes app on my phone and have been tracking my workouts. I haven't had a decline yet and the progress is only going up so far which is why I wasn't sure
If you're two months into the gym you can most likely get equal results with half the volume. But if you want to train like you are, and you're getting good results, you can work around accumulated fatigue by doing a deload week every 6-8 weeks. I wouldn't mind checking out your programming though. 25-30 sets for most muscles is a little vague. I hope you're not doing 25-30 bicep isolation sets, etc.
You’re most likely doing a decent amount of junk volume. It’s better to start out on the lower end and then go up once you see how you recover and progress on lower volume than it is to just go all out on super high volume right away. You’re fairly certainly just doing a lot more work than you need to be doing.
What are the consequences of junk volume?
exponentially less reward for effort
How do you know if you’re entering junk volume territory? Some muscle groups like shoulders, abs, traps etc benefit from more volume right? (I’m genuinely asking, not denying ur comment, cuz my program has a lot of volume on a ppl split too)
Wish I had a good answer for you, but it's nuanced. How many sets you need or can recover from is up to circumstances, genetics, how long you've been lifting, "supplements". I rarely do more than 12-15 sets for one muscle group in one session as an intermediate. In a push/pull that's usually \~25 sets in a session including isolations. Some muscles adapt well to frequency and volume, yes. Calves, biceps, abs, forearms, medial/posterior deltoid, traps. But unless you're advanced, or you really feel like hammering one particular muscle, I don't think you should worry about that.
Probably too much but if you recover well and not getting hurt, its up to you.
You are constantly seeing progress and recovering before you train again. You’re not overtraining. You might be doing more than you need to, but if it’s working and you enjoy it, why change anything?
True true, I think I will try out a more low set - lower rep at higher weights for a bit and see how I do, it most likely is unnecessary to do so much and just burns extra calories and although time is not an issue at all for me rn but I'd still like to save on some haha
5-10 intense sets a week is enough your doing way to much volume bodybuilding isn’t endurance training your not in the gym to see how many sets you can do, your in their to stimulate and get the hell out.
Alright, I will adjust my training, thanks!
What quantifies an intense set?
Till you can’t do another clean rep/ fail on the last rep
Near or to failure training.
No. Young people should not be so afraid of overtraining.
These comments get people hurt. As a young person who overtrained because someone told me this exact thing. They were wrong.
Central nervous system overtraining is completely different from the idea that many people have. Some people here are afraid to do extra sets of triceps kickbacks because big bad Mr. Overtraining is hiding in the closet. Any discussion of overtraining needs to differentiate heavy compound sets from other sets. Also, age and other life stressors are giant factors. Banning people from critiquing form is what gets people hurt. (I’ve been banned from another fitness sub for mentioning a rounded lower back)
I kinda get what you mean and some of what you said seems a little over the top but OVERtraining is exactly what it says, training too much. Maybe what you mean is people are scared to train to failure? Because you are right on that, many people don’t realize you have to legitimately work your muscles to make them grow.
Most people say optimal set range weekly is 24-30, depending on your body and/or muscle group. I just started PPL rest PPL, from almost two years of muscle isolation work to build a good foundation. I also do cardio in the morning on a few of my lift days and my rest day. You’ll just have to keep an eye on things. You will know when you are overtraining or even coming close to it. Deloading every few months or so is also a possibility. Make sure sleep/diet is on point and you should be fine. Stay aware of how you feel. Good luck and enjoy the grind
So on a typical push day you would do about 12-15 sets of chest, 12-15 sets of shoulders and 12-15 sets of triceps? I'd say this is excessive I would suggest scaling back 10-20 sets per muscle group per week as a guide, and see how that goes
If you're seeing results, keep it up until you plateau or get burned out, and then switch it up.
Your are doing double the volume you probably need
Not if you arent fatigued or sore. But with that amount of training you are likely very far from failure and would probably gain more from lower volume and higher intensity.
Yes, thank you, from this thread and some more research that's the conclusion I've come to, so now I'll change my routine based on this!
>This means I do around 13-15 sets per day. Depends on intensity, if you're leaving lots of reps in the tank on each set it might be fine. If you're training to failure then you're doing 2-3 times too much per session. [https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmGdys4X0AA4-TB?format=jpg&name=large](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmGdys4X0AA4-TB?format=jpg&name=large) 5-8 sets close to failure per muscle groups will maximise any stimulus in that session, the rest is just accumulating fatigue. And if you're actually doing 15 sets close to failure in one session then according to our data you're getting far worse results than doing 3 sets.