What's going on, guys?
Sean Nalewanyj on www.SeanNal.com - www.RealScienceAthletics.com.
And in today's video we're talking about the subject of training frequency, and specifically
the approach of training each individual muscle group once per week only.
So it's become pretty common nowadays if you watch most content on the subject of training
frequency for most people to, basically just crap all over the idea of hitting each muscle
group only once per week.
Saying that it'll only work for steroid users or for people with way above-average genetics
and that it won't be effective for building muscle in average natural lifters.
And the truth is that, yes, if you're looking to gain muscle and strength at the fastest
possible rate, a once per week frequency almost certainly isn't gonna be ideal for the simple
reason that it doesn't actually take an entire week for a muscle to recover and grow after
it's been trained.
Depending on how much volume you use and how intensely your training and other factors
like diet and sleep, somewhere between two to four days is probably what you're looking
at for full recovery and growth after a given workout.
So by using a higher frequency your muscles are going to be stimulated more often and
that's going to produce a higher number of individual growth periods throughout a given
month and year.
If you only train a muscle once per week then that's fifty-four growth periods for the year,
whereas if you were to train it one and a half times a week you'd get eighty-one growth
periods, if you trained it twice a week you'd get a hundred and four and so on.
And I would say that depending on a person's individual experience level and the type of
weekly split they're following, anywhere between one and a half up to three times per week
would be the optimal frequency to fully maximize the rate of muscle growth over the long run.
I don't necessarily think that twice per week would literally be twice as effective as once
per week, or that three times a week would be exactly fifty percent more effective than
twice a week, because there are certain diminishing returns at play and total volume for the week
as a whole is still gonna be the most important factor by far.
But, yeah, no question for most natural lifters training each muscle more than once per week
will be ideal for the very best gains.
Now all that said, despite how strongly some people will advise against a once per week
frequency it's important to keep in mind that there's a very big difference between something
being sub-optimal versus being ineffective.
So just because training each muscle once per week isn't the optimal way to gain muscle
that doesn't mean that it doesn't work or that it can't be applicable in certain situations.
And in a lot of bodybuilding circles it actually wasn't that long ago where hitting each muscle
once a week was considered a pretty standard piece of advice.
And there are plenty of guys out there who have built great physique and gotten very
big and strong by training exactly that way.
Even speaking for myself, back in my more bodybuilding focused days when this was a
standard advice, that's exactly how I used to train and I eventually got up to achieving
probably 85% plus of my genetic muscle building potential that way.
Would I have gotten faster results with a higher frequency?
Yeah, most likely.
But I think that's exactly what the main factor at play here is.
It's primarily speed of results.
So a higher frequency will allow you to see faster gains because you're stimulating each
muscle for growth more often, however a lower frequency can still get you to the same goal
eventually as long as the total weekly volume is still the same, but it'll just take a longer
period of time.
So with all that said there are a few situations where training each muscle once per week,
which is usually gonna mean a four to five day per week of some kind, it could be done
in three days per week if you use enough volume per session, or you could also spread it out
over six days if you really wanted to, but usually four to five days per week will be
about right for most people.
There are a few situations where that could be a perfectly reasonable approach.
The first would be if you just really enjoy that style of training.
So you just find it more fun to go to the gym and really hammer one or two muscles per
session and give them your full focus rather than training your entire body or doing an
upper lower split or something along those lines.
You might have heard the saying that the best diet is ultimately whichever one you can stick
to, and that same way of thinking could be applied towards training as well.
Because if you genuinely enjoy your training then even if it is sub-optimal in terms of
building muscle as quickly as possible there's a better chance that you'll stay consistent
with it and you'll still end up reaching your muscle building goals in the long term but
it'll just take a bit more time.
The second situation, and this kind of overlaps for the first but, maybe your goal isn't even
necessarily to gain as much muscle as you possibly can.
So if you do want to put on muscle but you're not trying to look like a bodybuilder, maybe
you're going for a leaner look and so you're okay with making gains at a slower pace and
you'd rather hit each muscle once because you prefer that style of training, then in
that case that would be fine as well.
Third would be if it fits into your schedule better.
So maybe it's more convenient for you to train for shorter periods more often, maybe you
only have, say, 30 minutes in the morning to lift and so a full body workout or upper
lower or even legs push-pull is gonna be harder to fit into that shorter time frame.
In which case you could just go in and train one or two muscles during that 30 minute period
but do it four to six days per week.
The fourth situation would be if you're in a maintenance phase and your goal is to just
hold on to whatever existing muscle you've already built.
In that case, hitting each muscle once per week will easily be enough to maintain your
games and this wouldn't have to be a [Indiscernible] either, even three sessions per week would
be fine as long as the workouts contain enough volume and they're executed properly.
The fifth scenario would be if you find that it's easier on your joints.
So if you're dealing with a lagging joint or an injury of some kind then reducing the
overall training workload might be necessary so that you don't over stress it.
And along with bringing your volume down slightly, reducing the frequency could be helpful for
that as well.
So if, for example, your shoulder joint is giving you issues then maybe training your
shoulders twice per week is just going to be too much and giving them a full week of
rest might be better at least for a temporary period.
And then one final situation where hitting certain muscles once a week would make sense,
is if you're a more advanced lifter and you're going to be running some sort of body part
specialization cycle to bring up a lagging muscle.
So in that case you would increase the frequency of the muscle that you were wanting to focus
on, maybe up to, say three or four times a week, and then you'd bring your other muscles
down to once a week so that you could still make some progress with them but free up more
time and more recovery resources for whatever body part you're trying to prioritize.
So bottom line on everything we've covered, is training each muscle once a week optimal
for seeing gains at the fastest rate?
No, probably not, but as long as the total overall weekly volume is acquitted then you
can definitely still make significant gains using a lower frequency but it will likely
just take a longer period of time in comparison to using a higher frequency.
And on top of that, there are several situations like I’d just mentioned we're hitting each
muscle once per week might actually be the better option for some lifters.
So, I hope this advice was helpful.
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Thanks for watching, guys.
And I'll see you in the next video.