Great video. I think alot of people forget the body will adapt to virtually any training protocol if you do it long enough. I've hypothesized for years that junk volume likely becomes more of an issue of diminishing returns instead of no effect at all. Glad to hear someone finally say it 💪
This. It's anecdotally proven by the fact that some people train with super high volume for extended periods and still keep getting gains even if the conventional wisdom says that their body doesn't have enough time to recover (which could be true to an extent, meaning that for example doing a hard squat workout every single day probably isn't optimal in any sense). However, human body clearly adapts to even seemingly insane amount of physical stress, given enough time. In modern world doing truly hard manual labor is increasingy rare so people often forget that for instance, working as a lumberjack back in the day with only saws and axes was equivalent to like 10x typical gym program. An average gym bro worried about 'junk volume' is nowhere close to the point where the returns are actually negative.
This is so good and unique in the way that you presented the topic. There are tons of videos out there about junk volume, but none of them that i have watched so far touched the topic from this angle. It is worth to hear many perspectives on the same sub-topic in fitness and in anything you are trying to learn in general. Great video, valuable information! Thanks
House of hypertrophy made a good point Since the 45 weekly set group was using low rest times They were getting less results per set and that could be a reason to why they experinced greater results than 20 to 25 weekly sets
The question is at what point this effective threshold of maximal gains per unit time is achieved. Would have to be quantified with sets using long-rest times (and probably also to failure unfortunately). If not, growth stimulus per set would be too variable to quantify.
Yes, this is what we ultimately want to know - how can we provide the best stimulus possible within a given amount of time? And yes, to answer this question, we would need to look a combination of volume, rest periods, proximity to failure, metabolite techniques, exercise selection etc.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 you are right i dont think there are many people who can get close to failure doing 45 sets/week and recover... i am currently trying to get the best recovery from doing 10-15 sets each muscle /week... i am an early intermediate
People think to much... There are three things all you have to know to have great body. 1. Consistency (workout 4~5days a week) 2. Nutrition 3. Safety Everything else is just junk noise.
I used to be consistance working out 6 days a week, training each body part between ~40-70 sets per week. I took care of my nutrition, ate/drank protein 7 times a day including a casein presleep, per day calories were between 4-6k, and did everything safely all natural. Didn't work as well as it does now with less volume, less protein less meals, less training days.
Basically what I tried to say was this, just as how I was overcomplicating my training thinking more and harder is better, the original commentar is over simplyfiying by what he/she wrote I think, no disrespect to the person, but on face value its too simplistic way to dismiss the details in the video, merely by been consistant, nutrition and safety. Best regards.
A practical way to find minimum effective volume is to start low, and increase sets per week. E.g. 2 sets, 3 sets. Make sure sets are taken close to failure and last set could be an amrap. If you can feel ready next session of muscle and can do the same quality reps + sets, you can add another set next week. For isolation movements you can really hit them alot more often (3-5x a week doing 3-5 sets) like bicep curls, rear delts, triceps, calves, because they recover alot quicker. No of sets depends on the rep range ( 5 sets for low reps and 2-3 sets for high (12+ reps)
Great video! I think for most people, both novice and advanced athletes, prioritizing form and recovery over volume is a good cue to prevent so-called junk volume. As an engineering student and an intermediate in strength training, I think of "junk volume" as either "diminishing returns" volume or high volume causing negative feedback to the body where the body, especially joints and tendons, are at risk of injury. Based on my experience, joints and tendons don't adapt to stress as fast as the muscles do especially for trainees who don't take PEDs.
Great channel and great content. Individual experience, nutrition, consistency...so many factors. For me as a natural male in my mid 50's starting 3 years ago with a 18 set per week PPL working my way up to my current 32 set per week PPL I am quite pleased with my progress. 4 sets of 10-12 reps X 4 exercises every training session, 6 days a week and one day off where I usually either paddle board/surf or ride my mountain bike for a couple hours. Last set to failure or 1 RIR. Workout is usually 1-1.20 hours. 2-3 days a week I add 10-15 mins of elliptical or rowing. De-load every 3 months. Take a week off every 3-4 months. Diet is very good to excellent. Feel great, look great, no joint soreness or pain, great pump, strongest/biggest I've ever been.
To reduce joint stress one can split up the sets on more days. So ,for example, instead of doing 6 sets twice a week, choose to do 4 sets 3 times a week. The number of sets are the same, but the load on the joint is more spread out giving more time for recovery. If you also do some strength training, instead of doing all the strength sets on the same day, just do one strength set before your regular lifting, because the first set is when you are strongest anyway and that set will tire out the strongest fibers from the start so you don't have do as many reps when you switch to the lower hypertrophy weight. This will lower the risk of injury. To make strength training even safer, use only 50-70% weight and use a resistance band for the remaining 20-40%. Restance bands are much gentler for the joints and it's much easier to abort a lift if you feel it was to heavy since the resistance quickly drops with bands.
It doesn’t always work that way in the real world. If sets are pushed to or close to failure there comes a point where you won’t even recover with higher frequencies. These studies don’t take pains, other life stressors, sleep disorders (because of high volumes) etc. into the equation. It’s not as simple as it looks. Multiple well educated and well trained coaches seem to train people mostly at 6-15 sets per week.
I wonder a thing I've never heard the answer: how much sets are x set of an exercise for the secondary muscles involved in that exercise? For example, if i do 4 sets of military press, i do 4 sets for my anterior deltoid, but how much sets am i doing for lateral deltoid and for triceps? 1? 2? 4? This is important because if i want to gain some time, i need to know how much work I've done for a certain muscle, so i can do less sets for him.
i think when people say you have to do 10 sets of a muscle they mean only the primary muscles working indeed you have a point i was wondering about the secondary muscles too xD i am currentrly on a program doing only 10 sets of shoulders (3 exercises OHP lat raises shrugs) and i am making more gains than when i did 15
2 types of trainees: those the cater their intensity to their volume & those who cater their volume to their intensity. I think you naturally learn to pace yourself, even if you don't think you are when you know you're going to be performing 15-20 sets for a given muscle group in a workout & naturally push harder to make the most of every set with heightened focus when you know you're only going to be performing a couple of sets for an exercise/muscle group in a given workout.
You really have the find the right balance between volume, intensity and frequency. They're the most important variables in your training and have to be the first to experiment with.
If you are morbidly obese I don’t think there is any junk volume if you are trying to lose weight. Even tho there may not be any extra muscle gain I think there may be additional fat loss.
Great video, can you please do one on delayed onset muscle syndrome ( DOMS) whether to train during DOMS, how DOMS affects untrained muscles, light vs heavy DOMS etc
I have made a video on this topic which you can find here ua-cam.com/video/r3fS5rMWknA/v-deo.html I also plan on making an updated video on DOMS at some point 👍
No one is talking about Systemic Fatigue? If blasting 30 Sets per week and muscle group for 52 Weeks straight would be possible without gear, I and many others would do it. But it just does not work that way. That might work in a 16 to 24 week study but not for someone lifting year after year. I suggest calling Volume that goes past diminishing returns junk volume as it also subsequently increases recovery cost of the stimulated muscle group and thus prevents you from stimulating the same muscle group again. Besides making you feel tired and sluggish for no added benefit.
This is another great point. I think the concept of 'systemic fatigue' is not very well established and we don't really know what it truly refers to. I plan on making a video about systemic fatigue at some point. However, I agreed that excessive volume could be considered 'junk volume's if we chronically breach our systemic capacity 👍
I agree, when I get overzealous trying to exercise the problems of my life away doing a 2+ hour workout including 405 sldl super set with muscle ups, curls, vertical pull, horizontal pull, more muscle ups, more curls, weighted ab wheel rollouts, muscle ups into burnout pullups, I feel great and accomplished during and directly after. The next day however my system is fatigued. Brain is foggy, everything's harder to move, including muscles I didn't train. I'd argue some was junk volume even though it was all hard, an amount of fatigue accumulated rendering me incapable to continue my pace into following day leads me to the conclusion that too much volume exists such that either, in my case fatigue be managed better, or people doing an extended workout could squeeze those sets in a narrower time frame and increase intensity. If also argue that if we let #sets = x, and we give one individual an hour to complete vs. 3 hours, results would be better with one hour due to lack of prolonged heightened levels of cortisol and having a better window to get nutrients in. I suppose the value is in the audience in that we shouldn't have beginners in fear of doing junk volume when they're nowhere near capacity, but conversely high level athletes can certainly over perform in a given instance such that following workouts and adaptation suffer. On the whole, as I have just stated I broke my own philosophy by performing a marathon workout only to over tire, if you lose yourself in the moment and are enjoying the workout don't beat yourself up over junk volume (just maybe don't let it become habitual).
One problem with these studies is they often don't train all muscles. IE doing 45 sets on just quads in a research study is a lot different than doing 45 sets on quads, hams, glutes, calves, abs, triceps, biceps, pecs, all back muscles, triceps, biceps. It seems at some point additional sets might still add muscle growth in a situation where only that muscle is fatigued, but in a real scenario where global fatigue exists from training the entire body, those sets might lead to loss of training progress.
I think more people are prone to training not hard enough than training too hard. So most junk volume comes from leaving too many reps in reserve, creating not enough muscle grow stimulus for the time and effort invested.
Maybe I missed it, but it seems you forgot what to me is the most important variable when considering volume, and that is RECOVERY. Your volume can be so high that it hampers recovery, which in turns lowers the quality of your subsequent training session or even forces you to take extra rest days. It took me quite a while to find the right amount of volume that allows me to recover properly for my next training session.
Yes, this is another consideration worth mentioning. However, recovery is quite complex in the context of hypertrophy training, because lifting performance is not directly correlated with the hypertrophic stimulus. For example, there are studies which train muscle groups 5x / week + which find superior muscle growth compared with training each muscle 1-2x / week. Even though recovery may not have been ideal, training muscles back-to-back produced greater gains 👍
I wonder if those studies excludes subjects taking supplements like creatine and whey protein. Because that could, in theory, increase gains in a high volume condition.
Good point. Most studies control nutrition & supplements to some extent to minimise its effects on the outcome. In the first study for this video, subjects tracked their food on MyFitnessPal and were given whey protein supplementation by the researchers. They were also told not to take any other supplements 👍
Of course it's real. Overtraining is the biggest mistake anyone could make in the gym. Only beginners and early intermediates should be encouraged to _(attempt to)_ overtrain until they plateau from it and cultivate discipline. Then train smarter and find the right amount of volume they can recover from optimally
there is a deafening chorus in the youtube fitness community screaming that intensity is king, and if you are doing more than 2-3 sets per exercise, you are sandbagging your sets. well I have tested this and it's completely ridiculous. I spent a few weeks doing just 1-2 sets per exercise, and I wasn't magically able to lift more weight than when I was training 4-7 sets per exercise. these people who say it's impossible to train an exercise to failure for 5+ sets in a row must have absolutely zero muscle endurance. no matter how hard I push a set, even well beyond failure with partial reps, pause reps or negatives, I can always just do another set after a reasonable rest interval. I find it very hard to believe that doing 1 set of 10 reps is somehow more stimulative than doing 10, 8, 7, 7, 6, 6, 4.
I definitely agree. I think people judge an exercise difficulty by the emotional and systemic stress, rather than the true definition of muscular failure 👍
Just look at any volume negatively effecting your "current" recovery ability as junk. Clearly excess volume will slow or prevent progression due to recovery issues. Consistent progression is always the the priority, intensity, volume, frequency and recovery are the parameters used that are blended to keep progression consistent. There is no "one way best way" for long, and the manipulation of the parameters will be individualistic. Naturally speaking, anyway.
just found your channel and it seems you've been nothing but consistent with your content you're criminally underrated wait till people find this gold mine of information that is your channel
Junk volume doesn’t exist lmfao it’s a new concept being thrown around by everybody. You train as hard as you can and sleep that’s all you need. If your body is begging you to stop stop. You just need to be in tune. Junk volume is a term used by people doing soft ass workouts and they cope with the term. Your body is amazing and will adapt fast. Push yourselves and don’t be so optimal and go by what “influencers” say. Try stuff out for yourself experiment it’s your body everyone’s different but I’ve been training non stop 13 years now and junk volume is a stupid myth
Literally. I feel like it’s just the new buzz term. Pretty sure it comes from the business side of fitness, where everyone needs to get eyeballs onto their content or programs or whatever, so everyone hops on board to whatever new trend there is. Because obviously no one would sell anything if their only advice was “Lift heavy stuff with good form, put it down when you can’t lift it anymore, do that for every body part, eat protein, then go tf to sleep” lmaoooo If you’re not growing in that equation, you’re leaving too many reserve reps in the tank/bad form, not eating enough protein, or not sleeping enough. Like it’s so simple lol
But what is with musle soreness? For example, if i train a musle group with 20 Sets a day, the muscle schould be longer sore than with only 9-12 sets a day. The time it takes to recover is probably mutch longer. But is the musle growing so mutch more? For example: 2 days with 9-12 Sets evry 2-3 days, rather then 20 Sets all 4-5 days?
Soreness is not a good indicator of growth If weekly volume is equal then frequency does not make a huge difference Doing 9 to 12 sets is probably better since you give the target muscle time to heal and the work quality will be higher because the muscle is less fatigued .
There are two parts to this question: soreness & frequency Here is a video on soreness ua-cam.com/video/r3fS5rMWknA/v-deo.html and here is a video on frequency ua-cam.com/video/nEetNfJJywU/v-deo.html
I need to see the study that says that 45 sets of quads gave the best growth.. i couldnt see how many excercises they did so i dont know how you got to 45 sets per week.. almost every study i read and literature says that almost always more than 25/30 sets per week is counter productive.. this study is sounding rrally weird to me.. and also, junk volume is almost always refered to in a single workout..
I dont think I've seen any studies which show less muscle growth with higher volumes. They are always neutral to positive. There is a new study which trained the quads with up to 52 sets / week and found superior growth. I'm not recommending super high volumes due to practical issues, but the research generally leans in favour of higher volume training
@@FlowHighPerformance1 after i droped the comment i went reaserching for this study and found the conversation between dr mike isratael and milo wolf i think.. so its recent right? Interesting, i always liked low to medium volume since you can increase the volume easier if needed and theres no recovery issues.. but this study is very interesting.. have some thinking to do about my workouts.. Sorry about the skepticims.. im new to this channel and been doing thinks my way for a while now
I haven't watched the video yet but really? Are people still asking this question? Go and workout for 3 days without stopping... you'll probably just keep getting bigger, right?
Most intermediates would plateau because some may do the same exercise, for same reps, same weight. Your body adapts to change, and not increasing intensity by any variable isn’t going to make you bigger.
Obviously there is a limit to volume. If take this to the extreme you would technically die if you kept training non-stop for days..... But that is not practically relevant....
@@FlowHighPerformance1 Of course, I purposely used an extreme scenario to get the point across. Most people train with way too much volume, not enough intensity, and then not enough rest.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 read the research, 8-12 reps so around 80% of 1rm, the 30-45 sets was 30 for upper and 45 for lower they counted bench and military press for chest and triceps, 5 sets each so its 10 per session x 3 days = 30 sets. same with back. legs had 3 workouts 5 sets each so 15 set x 3 days =45 sets. research says 68 minutes total workout. i think it is possible. instead of 3 days a week, make a upper lower split and super set the upper to chest back. possible problem is recovery. this maybe done by advance lifters who can recover from 5 sets of 80% 1rm.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 the measurements were biceps and thigh, no chest or back measurements. so for now the growth is effective for biceps and quads only.
Great video. I think alot of people forget the body will adapt to virtually any training protocol if you do it long enough. I've hypothesized for years that junk volume likely becomes more of an issue of diminishing returns instead of no effect at all. Glad to hear someone finally say it 💪
yes, exactly 👍
This. It's anecdotally proven by the fact that some people train with super high volume for extended periods and still keep getting gains even if the conventional wisdom says that their body doesn't have enough time to recover (which could be true to an extent, meaning that for example doing a hard squat workout every single day probably isn't optimal in any sense). However, human body clearly adapts to even seemingly insane amount of physical stress, given enough time.
In modern world doing truly hard manual labor is increasingy rare so people often forget that for instance, working as a lumberjack back in the day with only saws and axes was equivalent to like 10x typical gym program. An average gym bro worried about 'junk volume' is nowhere close to the point where the returns are actually negative.
this channel is amazing, brings up questions I didnt even have but I still end up being interested in and does a fantastic job answering them
Nice! Glad the videos are helpful 💪
This is so good and unique in the way that you presented the topic. There are tons of videos out there about junk volume, but none of them that i have watched so far touched the topic from this angle. It is worth to hear many perspectives on the same sub-topic in fitness and in anything you are trying to learn in general. Great video, valuable information! Thanks
Glad it was helpful 👍
House of hypertrophy made a good point Since the 45 weekly set group was using low rest times They were getting less results per set and that could be a reason to why they experinced greater results than 20 to 25 weekly sets
Yes, but that doesn't change the fact that more volume was better, it just means that each set was potentially less stimulative 🤔
The question is at what point this effective threshold of maximal gains per unit time is achieved. Would have to be quantified with sets using long-rest times (and probably also to failure unfortunately). If not, growth stimulus per set would be too variable to quantify.
Yes, this is what we ultimately want to know - how can we provide the best stimulus possible within a given amount of time? And yes, to answer this question, we would need to look a combination of volume, rest periods, proximity to failure, metabolite techniques, exercise selection etc.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 you are right i dont think there are many people who can get close to failure doing 45 sets/week and recover... i am currently trying to get the best recovery from doing 10-15 sets each muscle /week... i am an early intermediate
Exactly right, volume is not the only variable to consider, other factors matter too 👍
People think to much...
There are three things all you have to know to have great body.
1. Consistency
(workout 4~5days a week)
2. Nutrition
3. Safety
Everything else is just junk noise.
Exactly, mostly it is just consistency and hard work
Yes, these are definitely no. 1 priority.
The nuance can still help make our training more effective, but not as important as consistency over time 👍
I used to be consistance working out 6 days a week, training each body part between ~40-70 sets per week.
I took care of my nutrition, ate/drank protein 7 times a day including a casein presleep, per day calories were between 4-6k,
and did everything safely all natural.
Didn't work as well as it does now with less volume, less protein less meals, less training days.
Basically what I tried to say was this, just as how I was overcomplicating my training thinking more and harder is better, the original commentar is over simplyfiying by what he/she wrote I think, no disrespect to the person, but on face value its too simplistic way to dismiss the details in the video, merely by been consistant, nutrition and safety.
Best regards.
@@KenanTurkiye thank you for sharing!
A practical way to find minimum effective volume is to start low, and increase sets per week. E.g. 2 sets, 3 sets. Make sure sets are taken close to failure and last set could be an amrap. If you can feel ready next session of muscle and can do the same quality reps + sets, you can add another set next week. For isolation movements you can really hit them alot more often (3-5x a week doing 3-5 sets) like bicep curls, rear delts, triceps, calves, because they recover alot quicker. No of sets depends on the rep range ( 5 sets for low reps and 2-3 sets for high (12+ reps)
Good practical advice 👍
Great video! I think for most people, both novice and advanced athletes, prioritizing form and recovery over volume is a good cue to prevent so-called junk volume. As an engineering student and an intermediate in strength training, I think of "junk volume" as either "diminishing returns" volume or high volume causing negative feedback to the body where the body, especially joints and tendons, are at risk of injury. Based on my experience, joints and tendons don't adapt to stress as fast as the muscles do especially for trainees who don't take PEDs.
Definitely agree with this 👍
Great channel and great content. Individual experience, nutrition, consistency...so many factors. For me as a natural male in my mid 50's starting 3 years ago with a 18 set per week PPL working my way up to my current 32 set per week PPL I am quite pleased with my progress. 4 sets of 10-12 reps X 4 exercises every training session, 6 days a week and one day off where I usually either paddle board/surf or ride my mountain bike for a couple hours. Last set to failure or 1 RIR. Workout is usually 1-1.20 hours. 2-3 days a week I add 10-15 mins of elliptical or rowing. De-load every 3 months. Take a week off every 3-4 months. Diet is very good to excellent. Feel great, look great, no joint soreness or pain, great pump, strongest/biggest I've ever been.
Nice one, sounds like you have found a great routine for your lifestyle 👍
To reduce joint stress one can split up the sets on more days. So ,for example, instead of doing 6 sets twice a week, choose to do 4 sets 3 times a week. The number of sets are the same, but the load on the joint is more spread out giving more time for recovery.
If you also do some strength training, instead of doing all the strength sets on the same day, just do one strength set before your regular lifting, because the first set is when you are strongest anyway and that set will tire out the strongest fibers from the start so you don't have do as many reps when you switch to the lower hypertrophy weight. This will lower the risk of injury.
To make strength training even safer, use only 50-70% weight and use a resistance band for the remaining 20-40%. Restance bands are much gentler for the joints and it's much easier to abort a lift if you feel it was to heavy since the resistance quickly drops with bands.
No way best strength training is using 85% of one rep max for 3 to 5 reps at 3 to 5 sets
It doesn’t always work that way in the real world. If sets are pushed to or close to failure there comes a point where you won’t even recover with higher frequencies. These studies don’t take pains, other life stressors, sleep disorders (because of high volumes) etc. into the equation. It’s not as simple as it looks. Multiple well educated and well trained coaches seem to train people mostly at 6-15 sets per week.
I wonder a thing I've never heard the answer: how much sets are x set of an exercise for the secondary muscles involved in that exercise? For example, if i do 4 sets of military press, i do 4 sets for my anterior deltoid, but how much sets am i doing for lateral deltoid and for triceps? 1? 2? 4? This is important because if i want to gain some time, i need to know how much work I've done for a certain muscle, so i can do less sets for him.
I have made a video on this topic, which you can find here ua-cam.com/video/caPcbOzAy2s/v-deo.html
i think when people say you have to do 10 sets of a muscle they mean only the primary muscles working indeed you have a point i was wondering about the secondary muscles too xD i am currentrly on a program doing only 10 sets of shoulders (3 exercises OHP lat raises shrugs) and i am making more gains than when i did 15
@@FlowHighPerformance1 great video i cant believe you have a video for every question i have xD
Yes, it is a question I have had myself too 👍
2 types of trainees: those the cater their intensity to their volume & those who cater their volume to their intensity.
I think you naturally learn to pace yourself, even if you don't think you are when you know you're going to be performing 15-20 sets for a given muscle group in a workout & naturally push harder to make the most of every set with heightened focus when you know you're only going to be performing a couple of sets for an exercise/muscle group in a given workout.
Great point. I agree that we should always focus on quality first, and avoid increasing volume at the expense of quality 👍
You really have the find the right balance between volume, intensity and frequency. They're the most important variables in your training and have to be the first to experiment with.
If you are morbidly obese I don’t think there is any junk volume if you are trying to lose weight. Even tho there may not be any extra muscle gain I think there may be additional fat loss.
Great video, can you please do one on delayed onset muscle syndrome ( DOMS) whether to train during DOMS, how DOMS affects untrained muscles, light vs heavy DOMS etc
I have made a video on this topic which you can find here ua-cam.com/video/r3fS5rMWknA/v-deo.html
I also plan on making an updated video on DOMS at some point 👍
At what point is my warm-up considered junk volume, or how do I know if I'm warming up "too much" ??
1-2 warm up sets is usually plenty. Just make sure not to take your warm up sets close to failure, and you will be fine 👍
4 sets are my go to work for hypertrophy all the time. Except for legs, of course.
Junk volume is high volume without training to failure. If you are training high reps and you stop when it starts to burn, that is junk volume.
that is a good way to put it 👍
No one is talking about Systemic Fatigue? If blasting 30 Sets per week and muscle group for 52 Weeks straight would be possible without gear, I and many others would do it. But it just does not work that way. That might work in a 16 to 24 week study but not for someone lifting year after year. I suggest calling Volume that goes past diminishing returns junk volume as it also subsequently increases recovery cost of the stimulated muscle group and thus prevents you from stimulating the same muscle group again. Besides making you feel tired and sluggish for no added benefit.
This is another great point. I think the concept of 'systemic fatigue' is not very well established and we don't really know what it truly refers to. I plan on making a video about systemic fatigue at some point.
However, I agreed that excessive volume could be considered 'junk volume's if we chronically breach our systemic capacity 👍
I agree, when I get overzealous trying to exercise the problems of my life away doing a 2+ hour workout including 405 sldl super set with muscle ups, curls, vertical pull, horizontal pull, more muscle ups, more curls, weighted ab wheel rollouts, muscle ups into burnout pullups, I feel great and accomplished during and directly after. The next day however my system is fatigued. Brain is foggy, everything's harder to move, including muscles I didn't train. I'd argue some was junk volume even though it was all hard, an amount of fatigue accumulated rendering me incapable to continue my pace into following day leads me to the conclusion that too much volume exists such that either, in my case fatigue be managed better, or people doing an extended workout could squeeze those sets in a narrower time frame and increase intensity. If also argue that if we let #sets = x, and we give one individual an hour to complete vs. 3 hours, results would be better with one hour due to lack of prolonged heightened levels of cortisol and having a better window to get nutrients in. I suppose the value is in the audience in that we shouldn't have beginners in fear of doing junk volume when they're nowhere near capacity, but conversely high level athletes can certainly over perform in a given instance such that following workouts and adaptation suffer. On the whole, as I have just stated I broke my own philosophy by performing a marathon workout only to over tire, if you lose yourself in the moment and are enjoying the workout don't beat yourself up over junk volume (just maybe don't let it become habitual).
Thank you for the detailed information in this great video. I’ve always wondered if I’m doing too much… 🙏🙏🙏
no problem 👍
One problem with these studies is they often don't train all muscles. IE doing 45 sets on just quads in a research study is a lot different than doing 45 sets on quads, hams, glutes, calves, abs, triceps, biceps, pecs, all back muscles, triceps, biceps. It seems at some point additional sets might still add muscle growth in a situation where only that muscle is fatigued, but in a real scenario where global fatigue exists from training the entire body, those sets might lead to loss of training progress.
That's a good point. I think the time it would take to complete such high volumes would also be a limiter for most people 👍
I think more people are prone to training not hard enough than training too hard. So most junk volume comes from leaving too many reps in reserve, creating not enough muscle grow stimulus for the time and effort invested.
Yes, I would agree with this 👍
Maybe I missed it, but it seems you forgot what to me is the most important variable when considering volume, and that is RECOVERY.
Your volume can be so high that it hampers recovery, which in turns lowers the quality of your subsequent training session or even forces you to take extra rest days.
It took me quite a while to find the right amount of volume that allows me to recover properly for my next training session.
Yes, this is another consideration worth mentioning. However, recovery is quite complex in the context of hypertrophy training, because lifting performance is not directly correlated with the hypertrophic stimulus. For example, there are studies which train muscle groups 5x / week + which find superior muscle growth compared with training each muscle 1-2x / week. Even though recovery may not have been ideal, training muscles back-to-back produced greater gains 👍
@@FlowHighPerformance1 That's really interesting, I will do some research on that, thanks a lot for your quick reply, great channel man.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 Though I must admit, if I train a muscle group 5x in a week I will be so sore after that it'll take me a week to recover, haha.
@@zilvente haha, yes it is interesting 👍
I wonder if those studies excludes subjects taking supplements like creatine and whey protein. Because that could, in theory, increase gains in a high volume condition.
Good point. Most studies control nutrition & supplements to some extent to minimise its effects on the outcome.
In the first study for this video, subjects tracked their food on MyFitnessPal and were given whey protein supplementation by the researchers. They were also told not to take any other supplements 👍
Of course it's real.
Overtraining is the biggest mistake anyone could make in the gym.
Only beginners and early intermediates should be encouraged to _(attempt to)_ overtrain until they plateau from it and cultivate discipline.
Then train smarter and find the right amount of volume they can recover from optimally
Would love to see this same study done on people using ped’s
I would like to see this too, but it will probably never be done 💪
2:44 "basically wise thing..."
there is a deafening chorus in the youtube fitness community screaming that intensity is king, and if you are doing more than 2-3 sets per exercise, you are sandbagging your sets. well I have tested this and it's completely ridiculous. I spent a few weeks doing just 1-2 sets per exercise, and I wasn't magically able to lift more weight than when I was training 4-7 sets per exercise. these people who say it's impossible to train an exercise to failure for 5+ sets in a row must have absolutely zero muscle endurance. no matter how hard I push a set, even well beyond failure with partial reps, pause reps or negatives, I can always just do another set after a reasonable rest interval. I find it very hard to believe that doing 1 set of 10 reps is somehow more stimulative than doing 10, 8, 7, 7, 6, 6, 4.
I definitely agree. I think people judge an exercise difficulty by the emotional and systemic stress, rather than the true definition of muscular failure 👍
Just look at any volume negatively effecting your "current" recovery ability as junk. Clearly excess volume will slow or prevent progression due to recovery issues. Consistent progression is always the the priority, intensity, volume, frequency and recovery are the parameters used that are blended to keep progression consistent. There is no "one way best way" for long, and the manipulation of the parameters will be individualistic. Naturally speaking, anyway.
just found your channel and it seems you've been nothing but consistent with your content
you're criminally underrated
wait till people find this gold mine of information that is your channel
Glad you find the content helpful 👍
Junk volume doesn’t exist lmfao it’s a new concept being thrown around by everybody. You train as hard as you can and sleep that’s all you need. If your body is begging you to stop stop. You just need to be in tune. Junk volume is a term used by people doing soft ass workouts and they cope with the term. Your body is amazing and will adapt fast. Push yourselves and don’t be so optimal and go by what “influencers” say. Try stuff out for yourself experiment it’s your body everyone’s different but I’ve been training non stop 13 years now and junk volume is a stupid myth
I agree with most of your points 👍
Literally. I feel like it’s just the new buzz term. Pretty sure it comes from the business side of fitness, where everyone needs to get eyeballs onto their content or programs or whatever, so everyone hops on board to whatever new trend there is.
Because obviously no one would sell anything if their only advice was “Lift heavy stuff with good form, put it down when you can’t lift it anymore, do that for every body part, eat protein, then go tf to sleep” lmaoooo
If you’re not growing in that equation, you’re leaving too many reserve reps in the tank/bad form, not eating enough protein, or not sleeping enough. Like it’s so simple lol
But what is with musle soreness? For example, if i train a musle group with 20 Sets a day, the muscle schould be longer sore than with only 9-12 sets a day. The time it takes to recover is probably mutch longer. But is the musle growing so mutch more? For example: 2 days with 9-12 Sets evry 2-3 days, rather then 20 Sets all 4-5 days?
Soreness is not a good indicator of growth
If weekly volume is equal then frequency does not make a huge difference
Doing 9 to 12 sets is probably better since you give the target muscle time to heal and the work quality will be higher because the muscle is less fatigued .
There are two parts to this question: soreness & frequency
Here is a video on soreness
ua-cam.com/video/r3fS5rMWknA/v-deo.html
and here is a video on frequency
ua-cam.com/video/nEetNfJJywU/v-deo.html
Minimum effective volume for the win
How can you tell what your volume threshold is ?
The only way is to use trial and error over time. Start with around 10-20 sets / muscle / week and adjust from there 👍
I need to see the study that says that 45 sets of quads gave the best growth.. i couldnt see how many excercises they did so i dont know how you got to 45 sets per week.. almost every study i read and literature says that almost always more than 25/30 sets per week is counter productive.. this study is sounding rrally weird to me.. and also, junk volume is almost always refered to in a single workout..
I dont think I've seen any studies which show less muscle growth with higher volumes. They are always neutral to positive. There is a new study which trained the quads with up to 52 sets / week and found superior growth. I'm not recommending super high volumes due to practical issues, but the research generally leans in favour of higher volume training
@@FlowHighPerformance1 after i droped the comment i went reaserching for this study and found the conversation between dr mike isratael and milo wolf i think.. so its recent right? Interesting, i always liked low to medium volume since you can increase the volume easier if needed and theres no recovery issues.. but this study is very interesting.. have some thinking to do about my workouts..
Sorry about the skepticims.. im new to this channel and been doing thinks my way for a while now
I haven't watched the video yet but really? Are people still asking this question? Go and workout for 3 days without stopping... you'll probably just keep getting bigger, right?
Most intermediates would plateau because some may do the same exercise, for same reps, same weight. Your body adapts to change, and not increasing intensity by any variable isn’t going to make you bigger.
Obviously there is a limit to volume. If take this to the extreme you would technically die if you kept training non-stop for days..... But that is not practically relevant....
@@FlowHighPerformance1 Of course, I purposely used an extreme scenario to get the point across. Most people train with way too much volume, not enough intensity, and then not enough rest.
Yes, I always think it is a priority to train with good quality, and volume shouldn't be increased at its expense 👍
45 sets per week lol, workout 6x a week means 7-8 set per muscle for a whole body routine, nope...pass lol
Yes, 45 sets / week is absurd volume 📈
@@FlowHighPerformance1 to think they go to failure with each set, this is too much, i am going to give the research a reading lol
Yes, it's difficult to know exactly how hard the subjects were training 🤔
@@FlowHighPerformance1 read the research, 8-12 reps so around 80% of 1rm, the 30-45 sets was 30 for upper and 45 for lower they counted bench and military press for chest and triceps, 5 sets each so its 10 per session x 3 days = 30 sets. same with back. legs had 3 workouts 5 sets each so 15 set x 3 days =45 sets. research says 68 minutes total workout. i think it is possible. instead of 3 days a week, make a upper lower split and super set the upper to chest back. possible problem is recovery. this maybe done by advance lifters who can recover from 5 sets of 80% 1rm.
@@FlowHighPerformance1 the measurements were biceps and thigh, no chest or back measurements. so for now the growth is effective for biceps and quads only.
For me that sweet spot for volume that i found works great for even my friends is ...
Read more
How anyone would get 45 sets done in a week without frying their CNS I have no clue.
Yes, it is quite absurd 🤯
2:44
Sprinter vs marathon. Go hard go home. How do people run a marathon in under an hour
Not sure how relevant this is for muscle growth....
Lol 2 years ago i was did 42sets per muscle groups
That is alot of volume
@@FlowHighPerformance1 hahahahahaha and the result of that im lack of recovery and gains
LOL junk volume doesnt exitst LOL
depends how you define it
First comment :)))