One of the main questions I see in forums, twitter, and facebook when talking about programming is always the same: how often can I workout? The answer to this is always the same: it depends. To effectively answer how frequently you may do it, we should first know how hard, and how much we’ll be doing it.
It all boils down to our love triangle
Now pick two
Now pick two
Yes, pick two. Barring enhancers, there’s no human way and amateur will be able to sustain a high volume, high intensity, high frequency training regime without burning out sooner rather than later. So you get to pick only two.
Intensity + Volume = High Intensity Training
This is the most common choice we see in most routines. Go tough one time a week. Obliterate the muscles with as much as they can take (think lifting heavy) for as long as they can take it (mid-high sets with low-mid reps). This is what most bodybuilding splits come from: leg day is around 12 sets for the legs in every which way (squats, machines, etc.) till you need a wheelchair to get out of the gym. You’ll be doing this again in around 5-7 days. Next time you go to the gym you’ll obliterate your chest or your arms or your back. You can even go every day to the gym without really upping your frequency.
Think of things you can only do once or twice a week: bodybuilding split, sprints, HIIT, etc.
Intensity + frequency = High frequency Training
This is my absolute favorite. You get to go heavy and often. Think programs likeGTG,PTTP or among the lines. You do a
Nothing builds strength and power as a good and heavy Deadlift. Nothing builds injuries as a good and heavy Deadlift done for reps too often. Photo by Tom Woodward
small amount of heavy work with a lot of rest every day (or 5 days a week). Your CNS gets fried, you get no pump but plates in the barbell just keep adding up like crazy. Remember, there’s no going to failure in this scheme.
Think along the lines of strength practice: GTG, PTTP, Pavel’s 40 day workout, most things written by Dan John
Volume + frequency = Endurance work
You won’t be going heavy (remember, heavy depends a lot on the persons capacities, some may think a 300 lb DL is an easy feat, others may feel it’s impossible), so you can take your reps to the higher numbers. Of course, being a high frequency type of training, there’s no way you can go to failure either without really compromising your performance for your next session. Think about someone who goes for a run every day, or someone who walks everywhere or uses his bike to go to work. You’re putting a heck of a workload every day, but it’s a light workload, so you should be able to recover well from practice to practice.
Thin along endurance training, or recovery. I don’t really know much here to give you many details.
How to pick
Think about your goals first.
Are you going for strength? size? endurance? power? Then you pick what best suits you and your way of life. There’s no reason to lie to yourself saying you’ll be doing this every day if your life will get in the way by day 3. You can get strong, big, lean and conditioned with any of the three picks.
What works best for what:
- Intensity + Volume: Conditioning + Hypertrophy + Strength
- Intensity + Frequency: Strength + skill development
- Volume + Frequency: Conditioning + endurance + flexibility (yep, yogis were right)
- Diet: Fatloss (sorry, there’s no other way around it)
So take your pick!
Motus Virtute
PS: Studies show that the Nº1 way to be awesome is following this blog (just sayin’).