No Frills Muscle Building? Q: What’s the latest on training for muscle size? Do I have to spend an hour or two in the gym five or six days a week to put on some muscle? A: Not unless you want to. I believe most people will be encouraged by recommendations made by UK exercise scientists from Southampton Solent and Manchester Metropolitan Universities. After an extensive literature review, James Fisher, James Steele, and Dave Smith identified and grouped 57 peer-reviewed journal articles providing evidence-based guidelines for training to build muscle. Their review distills muscle building to the essentials, including a few heartening surprises. (The full report can be found in Medicina Sportiva, 17 (4): 217-235, 2013) The single most important requirement for building muscle is maximum effort to stimulate the growth of as many muscle fibers as possible. Pushing or pulling should be continued until you can’t do another repetition in good form, the point of momentary muscular failure. That can be accomplished with high or low repetitions and heavy or light resistance. Single sets and multiple sets appear to achieve essentially the same results. Rest periods between sets or exercises appear not to affect results; rest as long as you need. Both slow and fast repetitions are effective, as long as muscular tension is maintained. Both full and limited range movements build muscle. Isometric contraction also works. "Muscle does not know what it contracts against; it simply contracts or relaxes," Fisher et al explained. "Our suggestion is to perform a variety of upper and lower body exercises, utilizing divergent grips and body positions to insure comparable hypertrophy for the entire muscular system," the UK researchers wrote. They warn, however, that muscle shape and response vary from person to person; they are largely beyond the control of the individual. Muscles respond differently for each person. Symmetrical development is not the norm. In addition, combining endurance training with strength training does not appear to impede hypertrophy. “In fact, the addition of high intensity cycling might increase muscular hypertrophy,” the researchers added. Importantly, no training for up to three weeks does not appear to cause significant muscle shrinkage, and may even increase results upon return to training. “This seems logical” the researchers wrote. “The body does not grow during training, but rather whilst recovering from the training stimulus. Brief periods of excessive training require a similar period of no training to allow the body to recover and prepare for further training.” The researchers ended with a word or two on expectations. While the time required for muscular growth varies from person to person, significant hypertrophy usually begins to appear within three weeks of starting resistance training. Untrained persons gain faster than trained persons. “It should be realized that once a person is in some degree of trained state that their rate of growth is likely to diminish,” the researchers observed. While the vast majority of people respond positively to muscle training, it has been reported that roughly one percent are low responders and three percent are high responders. Most people fall somewhere in the middle. http://www.cbass.com/FAQ(10).htm (Bottom of page)
Here's the report for reference: http://ssudl.solent.ac.uk/3128/1/Ev... Recommendations for Muscular Hypertrophy.pdf
I skimmed through this study. The conclusions are valid for non trained people. Almost all the studies quoted in it are of untrained individuals. As someone put it elsewhere on this forum, an untrained person will put on muscle just by showing up at the gym!
The more trained you become, if you want to keep putting on muscle, you are going to need more volume in the gym and more sessions. Period. One set per body part, one session a week might be okay (but certainly not optimal) for a novice, but it ain't gonna cut it for intermediate or advanced trainees. The body needs more stress for it to adapt (i.e. build more muscle). One study shows the optimal number of training sessions for an elite athlete was 12 which means 2 sessions a day, 6 days a week. Note though, for natural trainees, genetics will play a huge part in determining what the max muscle that can be built. We've already discussed the interference effect i.e. your weight training gains will be negatively affected by doing endurance activities, elsewhere on the forum. This doesn't affect novices but it sure affects everyone else. One good thing about becoming more trained is that you recover faster from each workout. The body is by definition becoming more trained to do a particular exercise. Protein needs are actually lower on a gram per body weight basis since the body becomes more efficient at recycling protein and also because there's less and less muscle that can be built as you advance.
To be fair the article itself does say it's for untrained people and that for trained people, there needs to be some changes: "The present article has not considered the disparity in hypertrophy between trained and untrained individuals, primarily because most research studies utilize untrained participants, and due to the vague interpretations of trained, untrained, and recreationally trained. However, we should also recognize that once a person is in some degree of trained state that their rate of response is likely to diminish. We suggest that future research needs to consider this area in greater detail regarding manipulation of the variables discussed herein. " That last sentence is a bit odd since there is tons of research amongst trained people and we know how to train them further!
Twelve sessions a week?! Good luck with that. Elite athletes may practise their chosen sport several days a week in accordance with the SAID principle (Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demands), but let's not mistake the practise of technique with pure strength training 12 times a week. As for the supposed need for more volume and the inclusion of trained study participants, yes, there have been studies and reports in this regard: