Low Volume Training
Low Volume Training
Everything you need to know about low volume training
A lot of people are singing the praises of minimalist/low volume training these days. All over Twitter and social media generally, you’ll see posts telling people to lower the volume and shorten their workouts.
You don’t need all that volume in your training.
Lower the sets and increase the quality.
Stop wasting time on junk volume in the gym!!!
- @GymGigaChad_122294
The low volume approach makes a couple of key promises
Shorter training sessions
For a lot of people, a major barrier to the gym is the time dedication people think is required for making gains in the gym. The minimalist approach promises much less time in the gym without losing any of the benefit.
Quality over quantity
A greater focus on rep and set quality is not only emphasized but required to making a minimalist approach possible. It’s as much a call to quality as it is to shorter workouts.
We know the relationship between gains and volume is non-linear. In other words, you don’t make gains in direct proportion to the amount of volume you add.
Fatigue, being one of the main factors in limiting our ability to endlessly make gains, adds up pretty quickly. Fatigue happens at multiple levels.
Intra-exercises
You may notice that your first few working sets are your best sets for all of these categories.Force production
Mind-muscle connection
Pump quality
Add too many sets and we see notable drop-offs in all of the above.
Training sessions
The deeper into a training session we go, the more general fatigue begins to catch up to us, making the overall quality of our lifts drop off significantly.Across mesocycles (month long training cycles)
Peak performance across month-long training periods is different for everyone but we can roughly say that by week 4 we are pushing our hardest with bigger weight/reps than we started the month with. Having said that, fatigue eventually accumulates and will require a rest period to recover and reset. This assessment is greatly determined by how much volume is done per week.
If, per session per muscle group, you are performing above 8 working sets. This is considered higher volume. Let’s say for example, that for chest we perform 9 working sets. Broken up into 3 exercises, this is 3 working sets per exercise.
Seems strange that this is considered higher volume. Many legit training programs recommend higher than this and don’t market themselves as “high volume.” But recognize that not only is this example on the lowest end of the “high volume” categorization, but that experience level will also play a role in what is considered high volume as well.
Side Note: There isn’t anything intrinsically wrong with high volume training. Many advanced lifters, myself included, don’t mind spending extra time in the gym when possible. If you train intelligently, you can work in more volume without having too much of a drop-off in performance.
There are plenty of trainees looking to develop a big chest, for example, who may do anywhere up to 15-20 sets per session on chest alone without making signifiant improvements on strength and size. These are the individuals who need to hear the message of low volume training the most.
If you are lifting above (especially well above) 8 working sets per muscle group per session and not seeing significant gains, consider these other factors and see if any number of these apply to you…
Are you often still sore from last time hitting the same muscle group?
Are you making little to no progress with your lifts?
Do you feel systemic fatigue more and more often?
Is the beginning of each training session very good but gets noticeably worse roughly half-way through?
Are your pumps poor or nonexistent?
Is your mind muscle connection lacking?
If any number of these factors is true for you, it is likely a reduction in volume can seriously improve your training results.
So what rep range gets us closer to optimal? The evidence suggests that optimal volume for making gains is somewhere in the 10-20 sets per muscle group per week range.
Beginners - Intermediates: 10 sets per muscle group per week
Intermediates - Advanced: 15-20 sets per muscle group per week
This roughly translates to anywhere from 5-10 working sets per muscle group per session (assuming 2 sessions per week). However, while the higher end of that range (10 sets per muscle group per session) may cover the bases for all trainees, a lower volume approach (5-6 sets per muscle group per session) can be used to benefit all trainees (as long as we approach our training intelligently).
It should be noted that for more advanced lifters, marginal gains can be made at the higher volumes (15-20 sets per muscle group per week), however we can still make up most of the gains with less volume.
The key to making unlocking low volume is with intensity. In order to take full advantage of less volume, we need to make each and every set as dialed in as possible. Fortunately there is an inverse relationship between lower sets and higher intensity. This means that with fewer reps, the amount of focus and intensity we can put into each rep goes up!
So, how intense should our lifts be? To make low volume work an RPE of at least 9 (RIR 1) needs to be employed.
RPE: RPE stands for "Rate of Perceived Exertion." It is a subjective method of measuring intensity levels during exercise based on how hard an individual feels they are working. RPE is often measured on a scale from 0 to 10, with 0 being no exertion at all and 10 being the highest level of exertion possible without form breakdown.
RIR: RIR stands for "Reps in Reserve." It is a measure used to determine how many repetitions an individual has left in a given exercise before reaching failure or the inability to complete another repetition. RIR is often measured on a scale from 0 to 5, with 0 indicating that the individual has reached failure and cannot complete any more repetitions, and 5 indicating that the individual could complete five more repetitions before reaching failure.
Additionally, using high intensity training modalities such as well programmed supersets and drop sets are a great way of driving intensity with the few sets we have. Some useful programming techniques are
performing drop sets on machines and cables that have easily adjustable loads.
performing supersets on antagonist muscle groups such as a pull and a push movement simultaneously.
This leads us to our last remaining factor, which makes low volume training viable..
Free weights typically require more sets to warm up to working sets compared to machines. This is because free weight exercises require more stabilization, which can lead to more variability in technique and a greater need for warm-up sets to ensure proper form and prevent injury. Additionally, the stabilization required for free weight exercises can reduce the likelihood of achieving a high RPE (rate of perceived exertion), which can limit the overall directed muscle stimulus.
Furthermore, because we may be working with less volume when using free weights, it becomes increasingly important to make every set count in order to maximize stimulus. This is where machines can be useful. By providing a more stable and controlled environment, machines can assist in our goal to maximize stimulus with every set. This can allow us to focus more on targeting specific muscle groups, rather than expending extra energy on stabilization.
Of course, it's important to note that there are benefits to using free weights, such as increased neuromuscular activation and the ability to perform compound movements. However, when it comes to maximizing stimulus with limited volume, machines can be a valuable tool in your training arsenal.
For many, myself included, eliminating the use of free weights is one of the major downsides of low volume training. I love to squat, deadlift, and bench press. Forgoing those movements for the sake of optimizing my training is not something I do willingly and why I consider this form of training to be useful under particular circumstances, where necessary.
Additionally, I enjoy my time in the gym and don’t mind adding more volume and time for the marginal gains it affords me.
It should also be noted that for many intermediate - advanced lifters, this form of training is probably the most viable whereas for beginners and people just entering their intermediate phase, it can be a bit more tricky. As a friend of mine put it…
“Theres a big difference in telling an intermediate to advanced lifter to do 2-3 working sets tops knowing that those reps will look right, be technically sound, and build momentum in the overall program (be it adding muscle mass or getting stronger) compared to guys that actually need more reps to refine the learning of 'how.'
Giving those guys the same prescription guarantees you're going to see a lot of misses, mis grooves, ugly grinds, weird reps etc. You cant really tell that group 'only two working sets' because they cannot execute the movement properly to get the right stimulus or juice out of the movement in the first place.”
- @grecian_the
This training method is probably best performed by trainees with more experience as they are more likely to maximize stimulus with less volume than those with less experience. More volume may benefit newer lifters who just need more experience pushing weight around.
I recommend people consider this method if..
they find themselves short on time for months at a time and need to go with shorter workouts.
they find themselves consistently experiencing systemic fatigue from high volume training without the significant gains to justify it.
Low volume training has these three requirements.
Decrease sets per muscle group per session to the 5-6 set range (twice a week). This puts us in the 10-12 working sets per muscle group per week.
Increase intensity to 9 RPE at least. We want to work pretty close to failure on most, if not all of our sets.
Reduce or eliminate the use of free weights and stick primarily to machines as much as possible.
Happy Gains,
- Michael