Work out frequency - what dictates it?

[jj80]

Couple of trends I notice in work outs -

For more advanced trainees volume goes up, but so does the break between work outs. (e.g. 10 sets per muscle group, 1 week breaks between work outs)

For newer trainees I notice less sets but sometimes even a 48 hour break between muscle groups.

What's this based on? Or am I imagining things.... What dictates sets, reps and breaks between work outs? I work out the same muscle group every 4-5 days. I bench around 105kg and pull down 150kg (legs are injured, dont ask).

Then there's smolov jr work outs which have an insane frequency and are aimed at intermediate/advanced only.

 

[0ni]

I don't even know where to start on this one
I'll make a long story short and say that total monthly volume is probably the most important thing and if you're used to 1000 lifts a month it won't really matter if you do 35 lifts every day, 250 lifts one day a week or 83 lifts 3x a week

 

[solarbear]

I think you know the answer to your own question. The stronger you are the more weight you move. The more work you end up doing in a workout. The longer the break.

Age plays a factor too. Training squats 3x per week left my joints in bad shape even though only one session was heavy. I had injuries running down the right side of my body from my ankle to my neck. Training them once per week I feel great.

 

[Bazza20]

I think you know the answer to your own question. The stronger you are the more weight you move. The more work you end up doing in a workout. The longer the break.

Age plays a factor too. Training squats 3x per week left my joints in bad shape even though only one session was heavy. I had injuries running down the right side of my body from my ankle to my neck. Training them once per week I feel great.

Tell that to the o lifters that high bar squat 300+ and squat every day of the week.

 

[dave]

There is a lot to frequency. Smolov doesn't go all out every day so whilst frequency is higher overall work is not crazy high (close to it though). I aim for work (volume, intensity and frequency) as a given for the week. If you do once a week frequency you can have higher volume and intensity, three times a week it needs to drop down. Each always interplay.

I'm not going to go into it anymore than that.

 

[richottr]

I don't go by a written routine with set days, I go by when my body tells me it's ready, which is normally about 4 - 5 times per week at current with continuing improvements.

 

[solarbear]

Tell that to the o lifters that high bar squat 300+ and squat every day of the week.

Doubt too many here are going to the olympics so your point is kinda moot.

 

[Bazza20]

Doubt too many here are going to the olympics so your point is kinda moot.

My point was there is a lot more to it than how you were trying to put it. So no it's not a moot point.

 

[Goosey]

Couple of trends I notice in work outs -

For more advanced trainees volume goes up, but so does the break between work outs. (e.g. 10 sets per muscle group, 1 week breaks between work outs)

For newer trainees I notice less sets but sometimes even a 48 hour break between muscle groups.

What's this based on? Or am I imagining things.... What dictates sets, reps and breaks between work outs? I work out the same muscle group every 4-5 days. I bench around 105kg and pull down 150kg (legs are injured, dont ask).

Then there's smolov jr work outs which have an insane frequency and are aimed at intermediate/advanced only.

Why are you asking this question?

Everyone ability to recover from one workout to another differs, in part, solar bear is correct, as Bazza states, there is no simple cookie cutter answer.

 

[0ni]

Doubt too many here are going to the olympics so your point is kinda moot.

xD

 

[RyanF]

My understanding of it is that as a beginner, it doesn't take much work to stimulate progress, be it in terms of strength, size, or some other measure. You pretty much just have to look at a barbell and bam! There's 10lb of new lean body mass. Since progress is stimulated with relatively little work, a high amount of volume isn't needed, thus recovery needs are low and you can do everything more often. As you progress further, it takes more than just showing up and going through the motions to spur on new developments. The volume required by a lot of intermediate and advanced lifters to make even a little bit of progress is often so great that it takes longer to recover from. But even if it doesn't take any longer to recover from, the volume required for each lift/body part/muscle group is still so great that it becomes impractical to train the same lifts/parts more than once or twice a week. If you're like me and have no life, then you might be able to get away with 4 hour training sessions to get in enough work for each lift/part/group in one day to push progress, and you might be able to do that 2 or three times a week and recover just fine. If you do have a life, and can only train for, say, an hour a day, then it often becomes more practical to spend one hour each week on legs, one on shoulders, one on back and one on chest, as oppose to going for 4 hours straight 3 times a week.

But there are still advanced lifters who train full-body several times a week. Olympic weightlifters were mentioned earlier, and are a good example of this. They often do near-maximal full-body training for several hours daily, several days consecutively. It depends a lot on what training techniques you use, what outcomes you're chasing, what you do for recovery, and plenty more factors.

 

[Oli]

most on this forum aren't going to need more than 3-4 days a week, even roided.

 

[vonfram88]

if you are hitting your major muscle groups hard enough, it will take at least 4 to 5 days for them to recover.

 

[Goosey]

if you are hitting your major muscle groups hard enough, it will take at least 4 to 5 days for them to recover.

Opinion will vary, recovery and intensity of "mechanical" work the muscle receives is subjective and the time it takes for one's ability to recover from one workout to another and whether one needs 1 or 5 days ultimatly depends very much on the individual's genetics.

 

[Darkoz]

I wonder if there's something amiss with the way we've conducted our workouts over the years with amount of people you read about in their training logs and even in this thread of injuries/joint problems sustained and most are still well under 35 years of age.

 

[Bazza20]

I wonder if there's something amiss with the way we've conducted our workouts over the years with amount of people you read about in their training logs and even in this thread of injuries/joint problems sustained and most are still well under 35 years of age.

Of all the sports i have done lifting is the most injury free by a long way. Any injuries I have currently are from footy or work.

 

[Darkoz]

Of all the sports i have done lifting is the most injury free by a long way. Any injuries I have currently are from footy or work.

As it should be too Bazza
Oops And just realsed I posted the above post in the wrong thread, was supposed to be in the 'over 30's thread'

 

[Goosey]

I wonder if there's something amiss with the way we've conducted our workouts over the years with amount of people you read about in their training logs and even in this thread of injuries/joint problems sustained and most are still well under 35 years of age.

Damn good question D and it's not until you reach our age to realize you can have many injures throughout your life but only so many recoveries.

The other thing I've noted...
It's easy to know when lifting weights causes injury, but almost impossible to tell whether its the weight training thats caused the injury in the sport played.

 

[solarbear]

If you started lifting in your teen years and lifted hard, like the Chinese Olympic lifters who get hand picked at a young age, you likely develop a tolerance for training frequency that the majority of lifters will never have. Be interesting to see a study on this.

 

[0ni]

There was a study that showed elite powerlifters increased their lifts more training 6x a week than 3x a week with the exact same volume and percentages. Just split in two