how adaptive is the body?

**rangers97** · 24-Nov-04, 12:03 PM

OK, we all know a muscle needs "rest" to repair itself and be able to grow larger the next time you work it out, and this is generally called an adaptive response to the stimulus. But how adaptive is the body? Some would say it is incredibly adaptive. So, if you work your chest on a monday and then rest it for a week and do it again the next monday, you should in theory be able to lift slightly more if all your nutrition and rest is constant. Now, you do this for a few weeks and your body becomes used to working out your chest once a week on a monday. Whats to say that if you worked out more often that your body will not adapt to the new stress placed on it?

What I am asking I guess is, how adaptive is the body? If you are being reasonable in terms of your volume and frequency, can you work out a part twice a week and get a greater adaptive response because you are obviously stressing the body more, and if you continue to rest and feed it constantly, shouldn't it learn to adapt to the newer more frequent stresses, and therefore the possibility of greater results than the traditional once per week workout routine?

I would like to hear todd's and mostmuscles' opinions in this, since we know Todd is the master max-ot guy on this site and he is hard core once per week, lol, and most muscle has some interesting ideas that I have read so far.....of course everyone elses opinions are more than welcome as well!!

thanks

**MostMuscle** · 24-Nov-04, 02:49 PM

Thanks for the shout out Ranger! I will give you my thoughts based on my experience & education.

First off, the body is a beautiful, extremely efficient machine able to adapt to incredible outside stresses, but only if allowed time & materials. I have read that an intense weight training session can cause similar muscle damage to that of patients during minor surgery, so one must realize that true recovery is going to take some time. Many people use soreness as a gauge to recovery, but it has been found inaccurate as it simply means that the inflammation of the muscle has been reduced but usually not actual repair is just in a starting stage. This is the main reason why the “7 day rule” has been very popular and very effective. In fact, some studies stated that it may take up to 10 days for 100% recovery, especially since many people forget that the CNS is taxed also during intense exercise and also needs adequate rest. Now some believe that there is no such thing as overtraining, just under eating. I am not a fan of this philosophy. While adequate nutrition is a key component to recovery, you cannot continue to pound your body and CNS day after day, week after week and expect to “eat your way out” of the recovery hole. Your strength levels will fall, your joints and connective tissue will fail you and you will most likely be injured (Now you will have plenty of time to recover!).

Strength Coaches solved this by implementing a periodization program. You could easily implement this into your program. To use your example, you could hit chest 2 times a week for 3-4 weeks then change to a lower frequency/volume for the next 4 weeks. Or you could implement shorter cycles (if you are an advanced weight trainer) and use heavy/light, low rep/high rep workouts in the SAME WEEK. Or you could try some overreaching followed by supercompensation, this is something I am doing this week for example. I am training extremely intense Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. I have added weight as well as volume (tough stuff). But I do this so I can relax Thursday-Sunday during the holidays this week and not have to worry about going to the gym. The 4 days of rest will be much needed and I should be back next week bigger, stronger and (almost) fully recovered.

Another thing you must consider is your own goals. I am lucky enough to be exposed to both traditional athletes as well as bodybuilders. From my experience, rest is a much bigger issue with bodybuilders than performance athletes. Athletes many times must perform on high levels 1-5 times per week depending on their sport and whether they are in or out of season. Many athletes practice 4+ times per week, in addition to intense weight training and actual game play and many continue to excel year after year. They are a rest example of what the body is capable of. But even athletes have down time, off season and active recovery periods.

Also remember there are a wide range of ways to increase your workout intensity away from adding in exercise sessions. In many cases, more is not always better.

I know my response may be confusing as I am supporting both views. I feel that the additional workout CAN be done, but must be planned and countered with significant “down time”. At the same time, as Todd will surely tell you, your workouts should be “insanely” intense. Not crazy, but you should be working at a level that you really don’t even want to do another chest exercise for a week!

**rangers97** · 24-Nov-04, 03:16 PM

wow quite a response!

What are your opinions on splitting up a routine during the week? For example, if you normally did say 8 sets for chest in a week, what about doing 4 sets on monday and 4 sets on say thursday? Same with all other exercises, just halve the volume and double the frequency? Will you get the same/better results? Does it work like that?? lol

**Todd** · 24-Nov-04, 03:25 PM

That above post of yours was put beautifully MostMuscle...I agree on EVERYTHING you said...100%...so my input on all this is...refer to MostMuscle's post above.

:

**MostMuscle** · 24-Nov-04, 06:39 PM

As far as splits, try this:

Using your example you normally do 8 total sets for chest. Instead of cutting it in half and doing 4 & 4, try 6 and 6 for a total of 12 sets. Doubling your sets (16 sets) may be too much in the beginning. This way you can increase the total amount of sets in the given time frame AND increase intensity(weight) via the split.

Please remember that the numbers above are just an example and not hardfast set in stone but I think you will get the idea.

ajarvis · 25-Nov-04, 09:00 AM

Question for curiosity sake- What about people that do physical work? Say someone who has never done physical labour, but their job means they have to do it every day. Eventually they do adapt but the first couple of weeks are usually pure hell since they are reusing the damaged muscles every day until the weekend. Then they get a couple days rest and do it all over again. Granted it's not the same as lifting weights but if they are sore the next day they've damaged the muscles right? So how do they end up adapting with only 2 days rest on the weekend?

**MostMuscle** · 25-Nov-04, 11:19 AM

ajavis.....I believe that labourers are most likely never fully recovered. If you look at the non-accident injury rates amongst say construction workers, you will see that back pain is number one. Many don't have the choice to take a few days off and must mask (painkillers) or simply work through the pain. Also kept in mind that their goal is to accomplish the given task, not to grow big muscles and while some workers are extremely strong, many are not in good physical shape.

ajarvis · 25-Nov-04, 01:26 PM

I agree with you that a lot of labourers (that I've known/seen) are not in good shape, but are strong! If they never fully recover that would their CNS would be really stressed, and that could explain the knee, ankle, shoulder, back pain etc. I guess. Would you think that could improve by simply changing jobs? or taking a vacation...

**MostMuscle** · 26-Nov-04, 08:40 AM

The additional rest via a vacation or changing job tasks would have a positive effect for the workers, but unfortunately this is not an option for most.

**cursor** · 26-Nov-04, 10:05 AM

Laborers very frequently don't adopt quality/body-saving skills (despite on-job training). Leg-lifting vs. bent-over back-lifting is a single example. I suspect that if they/we would adopt more responsible working techniques, bodies would be stronger and more injury free.

**Firehawk** · 28-Nov-04, 10:13 PM

They probably don't/can't eat on a regular basis either, leaving their muscles starving and thus CAN"T recover fully even if they wanted to.

luke.w · 29-Nov-04, 09:50 AM

The reason why constuction workers or most of them aren't in shape is because a lot of them don't live healthy lives, they drink,smoke, and eat crap. If they trained with heavy weights and eat right (dosen't matter if they ate twice a day) they could be strong and look musclely also.

I've known some older workers who trained,and lived healthy lives work labor all day long and just ate 2 or 3 big meals a day. who are strong and have all the muscles too. Training with heavy weights will make the job easier and cause their pains to stop.

Tuna Fish · 29-Nov-04, 09:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MostMuscle

Strength Coaches solved this by implementing a periodization program. You could easily implement this into your program. To use your example, you could hit chest 2 times a week for 3-4 weeks then change to a lower frequency/volume for the next 4 weeks. Or you could implement shorter cycles (if you are an advanced weight trainer) and use heavy/light, low rep/high rep workouts in the SAME WEEK.

I agree with this, but....

Todd- you actually agree 100% with this??? :confused: That flies in the face of the "once per week/pure overload/maximum efficiency" style of working out that you've espoused since I started posting here.

Would you mind expanding on this, as I've never, and I mean NEVER heard you say that you agree with A) 2x per week B) high rep scheme included, or C) periodization programs.

What gives???

Tuna

ajarvis · 29-Nov-04, 02:08 PM

From what I've seen you're all right

construction workers have very bad habits (this is a general comment) such as smoking drinking etc. all the time, and don't eat right. What prompted my question is my father was a construction worker but was big (6'2, about 210 - 215 lbs) muscular etc. My BF when he was in construction (and now) has big arms but the rest of him didn't really develop a lot of muscle from when he was in construction (for 3 years). He doesn't eat properly thats for sure. lol if I didn't cook he might not eat at all and if he did it would be hot dogs

But his goal is to be a fire fighter so he wants to workout lift weights jog etc. I just don't want him overdoing it and hurting himself!

**Todd** · 29-Nov-04, 05:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tuna Fish

I agree with this, but....

Todd- you actually agree 100% with this??? :confused: That flies in the face of the "once per week/pure overload/maximum efficiency" style of working out that you've espoused since I started posting here.

Would you mind expanding on this, as I've never, and I mean NEVER heard you say that you agree with A) 2x per week B) high rep scheme included, or C) periodization programs.

What gives???

Tuna

I guess what I meant was is I agree with what MostMuscle is trying to get at with that post in general...as in you need to try different schemes and find what works best for YOU. I especially agree with this part of what MostMuscle posted:

Quote:

Originally Posted by MostMuscle

Also remember there are a wide range of ways to increase your workout intensity away from adding in exercise sessions. In many cases, more is not always better.

I know my response may be confusing as I am supporting both views. I feel that the additional workout CAN be done, but must be planned and countered with significant “down time”. At the same time, as Todd will surely tell you, your workouts should be “insanely” intense. Not crazy, but you should be working at a level that you really don’t even want to do another chest exercise for a week!

So yes, while I do personally advocate once per week training with low volume/high intensity approach, I also agree that there are other ways to reach the same goal. I may argue that Max OT is a more efficient way to reach the same goals, but I do know that it is not the ONLY way. What is important and should be the take home message, is use a method that fits your daily life, goals, and allows you to get the results you are after. If you are unhappy with what's happening/not happening, then try something new, don't settle.