Training Frequency Science | How Often To Train Each Muscle?

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Last week, we talked about training volume. In this video, I go into detail on training frequency for hypertrophy. After this video, you will have a clear idea of how you should organize your training to support muscle growth, including examples.

How often you train each muscle group is an important training variable because it impacts how much volume you can handle and your recovery. Some people like to train a muscle group so hard once every week, that they cannot train that muscle group again until the next week. Although this may “feel” effective because the muscles you train are very sore post-workout, there are more effective ways to organize your training. It’s generally a good idea to divide the volume you have per muscle group over multiple training days.

Let’s say you train your back with 16 sets in a week. If you perform all of these 16 sets in 1 training day, the second half of your workout will be of lower quality. The first 8-10 sets or so will fatigue your back for the rest of your training session and your performance will drop. This is different if you divide those 16 sets over 2 training days. You will be able to maintain a high level of performance on most of your sets since you are more recovered. And if you consistently perform better in your training, eventually you will get better training adaptations. The research supports this. When having a higher training frequency allows you to perform more volume in your workouts, you gain more muscle and strength.

Higher training frequencies also work well because they allow you to practice your main movements more often. Strength is a skill that requires consistent practice. So if you want to improve a certain exercise, it makes sense to practice that exercise more often in a week.

The last interesting theory for why higher training frequencies are more effective for muscle growth has to do with muscle protein synthesis. Muscle growth basically occurs when muscle protein synthesis exceeds muscle protein breakdown. Research shows the rate of muscle protein synthesis remains elevated for about 48 hours after training. So the muscles you train stop growing after about 2 days. If we consider this, it does not make sense to train a muscle group just 1x per week.

Now that we know higher training frequencies are beneficial for gaining muscle compared to bro splits, it's time to look into some example training splits that fit within high frequency training. There actually are many different ways you can divide your weekly volume to train each muscle group 2-3x per week. In this video, I show you several different example training splits that you can experiment with. Next to full-body training, I also discuss upper lower splits and push pull legs splits

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SCIENTIFIC STUDIES MENTIONED:

Training Frequency for Muscle Growth:




Training Frequency for Strength:


Protein Synthesis Study:


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MUSIC CREDIT:
Music by Ryan Little - For Hyrule! -

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