Intensity is how hard, volume is how much, frequency is how often. Manipulating those three things influences recovery and determines results. You can’t dial up all three at the same time or else things go wrong. Even increasing two at once gets tricky, but it’s certainly possible.
You got a ton of advice for this in the thread you started back in October (and some of the suggestions included training them every day). Have you put any of that advice into action these last six months?
It did last week. I had overdone it by adding daily runs for 3 days. So now I’ve dialed back: either the session I just described, OR a run, OR a gym trip, but only 1 per day.
See my log for details and feel free to ask more there.
PS I still do 60 unbroken swings every single night regardless of the other work.
I’m a fan of high frequency, but one of my big realizations is that you (or at least I) need significant loading contrast to not get hurt. I also (on the wrong program) don’t have the ability to stick to that sort of contrast. It’s why I fail on things like westside. DE or RE days just turn into slightly less than ME days. I think you can pretty easily train daily if you not only account for total volume but also make the loading significantly different day to day. I do this, and keep myself interested, by inventing some sort of challenge in my head on the lighter loading days. It may be for time constraints. It may be EMOM. It may be conditioning between sets. It may be intensity sets like tabata, or myo reps, or drop sets or whatever.
== Scott ==
The running. Biking etc was not done for muscle building but my twice a week HIT workouts were. My point was those extra activity of biking and so forth dug into my recovery ability so I had little reserves left for building muscles .
If you are interested in training 6 days a week with a high Intensity and very low volume, Christian Thibaudeau’s “Best Workout for Natural Lifters” follows this concept. It seems like it may be something up your alley!
For sure, that’s what I was getting at. Those activities, especially when training for triathlons, will eat into your recovery a lot more then sub max chins/dips/etc and are working different systems than those involved in hypertrophy.
If you vary your intensity like: 1 day really heavy, two very light days, two medium days, one plyometric day, one technique day etc it’s doable.
OR
You could just do 1 on 2 really challenging sets per muscle/movement per day and then finish. I trained like that a while back and got good pretty good results from it (eat least in terms of building strength).
By training submaximally with ultra-high frequency and on rare occasion, training all out. There are about a million examples of this. Sumo wrestlers (the highest overall muscle mass on the planet), wrestlers’ necks, auto mechanics’ forearms, speed skaters’ quads, soccer players’ calves, swimmers’ lats, Crossfitters’ traps, on and on and on.
I try to workout (full workout) everyday. I’ve never noticed any negative side effects (maybe no positive either but that’s a different topic ) until now. The difference now is I’m eating in a deficit. I’m sure great things can be accomplished for anyone willing to sleep 7-8 hours a night and eat like an animal. I wonder how many of the ones who struggle with frequency are under eating.
Check out some of Chad Waterbury’s High Frequency Training stuff on here. I’m on my phone right now, so it’s a pain to search and link, but there are articles on here. It may give you some ideas on how it can work.
The greatest sprinting coaches have their trainees sprint 100% all-out once a week or less.
The best crossfitters I know only attempt a PR in a given movement about once every three months.
Powerlifters, the strongest dudes on the planet, only usually peak two or three times a year.
So your answer is anywhere from once a week to once every six months.
But, Most people are not willing to wait six months to test their abilities in any endeavor.
So, think once a month is good for smaller movements, quarterly is good for major compound movements, and 2-3 times a year is good for full body challenges involving multiple events like PL or strongman.
I’m Interested to see what others have to say. How often should you go all out and test max performance?
Mental problems. I might could make more gains if I cut back. Might being the key word as I’ve never tried it. This June I’ll be running an actual program by a well respected professional to a T. So, when he says rest I’ll rest. Looking forward to it.
Also, I have made progress, that’s undeniable. The question is could I have made more with less. I think the answer lies somewhere between more rest and more food, but I honestly lean towards food a lot more.
Been following this thread with interest. Many insightful advice from fellow trainees.
If I could, I would train every day, or at least 5-6 days a week. In my case, this would work if volume and intensity was cut back, which is obvious for most trainees.
Lessons learned over the years of training has taught me my individual response to training. And I would say that’s even more important than frequency, volume or intensity.
I seem to respond well to HIT, better than HVT - Ok, that’s good to know. I need variety in order to make it interesting, prevent adaptation and injury - Also good to know. Strength is not my preceding factor to growth - A very recent knowledge. I simply can’t get enough sleep due to a life with kids - Ok, here’s my great limiter for now, and probably for a few more years. All in all - Good to know myself better! I still have made progress thanks to that.
A shortcut to my return in the irongame was a deep dive into the current science of excercise. It helped a lot. And guess what - The much critizised SuperSlow protocol worked wonders for me - to begin with… I would make sure to include a workout of SuperSlow whenever doing full body everyday - as well as 1-2 days of aerobic excercise only. Next life?
I would instead offer that, if a sub failure set of bodyweight exercise prevents recovery from training, that trainee is in really BAD shape. I imagine that same trainee can’t play a pick up sports game or run around with their kids/grandkids without compromising recovery.
My 2 cents: there’s a difference between “training” and “using” the same muscles each day, and there’s a difference between “training” and “testing”. You can do movements that rely on compound/natural movements like ring work, pull ups, squatting, swings, running, etc… daily. You shouldn’t try to break PRs on these daily, but you definitely can train them daily. I did 100 swings and 10 get ups 6x a week for an extended period, but only “tested” occasionally. Dan John has many examples of doing the important movements each day, as does Pavel (whose program called for swings and get ups I just mentioned daily for weeks).
I think the confusion is in isolation/body building style workouts. You cannot have “arm day” or “chest day”, where you isolate movements and completely fatigue muscles on a string of consecutive days on a regular basis. Just my thoughts/experience.
I do this too, so it’s not a dig, but I think we really may just be seeing a lot of confirmation bias:
HIT worked for me, therefore:
Only HIT works, therefore:
Anything not HIT doesn’t work, therefore:
Training differently (lower intensity/ higher frequency) can only work for those people different than me, therefore:
When I tried those different “methodologies” it didn’t work (because it’s too much or whatever)
How long have you given other methods before you don’t like them? If you’re like me, it’s about two days.
I think your expectations of yourself are driving your results rather than the other way around. You spend time on this forum and in the gym, so I can’t imagine you’re so deconditioned daily push-ups are negatively impacting your ability to recover.
Honestly, do you care enough to force yourself out of what you’re currently doing? You have a method you prefer, and it certainly is a stressor to force yourself into a different one. We all have real-life things we’re not willing to do anymore - I simply am not going to diet hard, so I don’t really want to be extremely lean; that doesn’t mean large deficits only work for people on drugs though. It’s not wrong to just be more comfortable training the way you’ve carved out for yourself.
I may be misreading and your intent was to contrast methods rather than consider a change of pace for yourself. If so, my apologies.
) until now. The difference now is I’m eating in a deficit. I’m sure great things can be accomplished for anyone willing to sleep 7-8 hours a night and eat like an animal. I wonder how many of the ones who struggle with frequency are under eating.