How Many Sets Are Needed to Maximize Muscle Growth? (Ft. Brad Schoenfeld)

As emphasized in my previous videos, when it comes to creating the optimal training program, there's a lot of variables that need to be considered and one of the most important factors to consider is training volume or how many sets you perform for each muscle group per week. And despite being such an important variable, there's actually not much applicable research that has been done on the topic. However, one researcher, Dr. Brad Schoenfeld, who has published over 100 peer reviewed articles, has recently published a meta analysis on the optimal number of sets sets per week. Since I don't think there's a more qualified person to seek advice from regarding this topic, I've asked him to do an interview with me on it. So without further ado, here's the interview. Alright guys, so I'm here with Brad Schoenfeld and first off Brad, I just want to give you a huge thank you for making this video possible. I know that a lot of my subscribers follow and admire your work and I personally view you as one of the few trustworthy and educated guys in the fitness industry.

So.

So I'm really glad you're able to speak with me on this topic. So again, thank you so much for making this opportunity possible.

My pleasure.

Jeremy, to kick this off, I think a good place to start is just to go over the results of the recent 2016 meta analysis you published regarding optimal training volume. I've personally gone over it, but if you could just go through some of the main results of the study, I think that would be really great for the viewers.

So the primary result was that we showed a pretty clear dose response relationship between volume and hypertrophy. Meaning that as the level of volume goes up, so does the muscular gains. Now we found, so we basically looked at it in a bunch of different ways and we've actually played around outside of the study with some of the data and just looked, trying to analyze it in different ways but it's pretty clear we stratified between 1 to 4 sets, 5 to 9 sets and 10 plus sets and at each bump up you saw a fairly substantial bump in hypertrophy. Now it's not like if you do 9 versus 10, you're going to see that difference. We're stratifying so there's really, you're averaging out those results and the difference between 10 and 1 to 4 was about double the amount of hypertrophy doubled roughly. So it went from about 5% on average. Roughly 10% on average.

What I find interesting in your study is that volumes much lower than you'd expect Were still able to provide significant muscle gain. Gain, which I think is promising for those who can only get in a few workouts per week. Or for example, older individuals who might do better with lower volume.

No question. Jeremy, I want to point out a couple of things. We looked at sets per muscle per week. It wasn't sets per week, just sets per muscle group per week, which is really the first one to do that. In the past people have looked at volume, but they've just looked at single versus multiple sets in a session. We looked at weekly volume on a per muscle basis, which was kind of, I think, not only unique and cool, but it's really more indicative of how bodybuilders and most people think of training in that respect. And yeah, like as you pointed out, within that context, you can do a fairly minimal, very low volume routine and still see fairly substantial growth benefits.

With that being said about lower volume workouts for those who do have more time to work out and want to maximize muscle growth, did you find in optimal number of weekly sets per muscle group that would allow one to do so? And if not, is there an approximate number of sets or general guideline that you could recommend?

The answer to that is no. Really? There's not been enough studies that have looked at above 10 or so sets per week. I mean there's been a few, but just not enough where we could have analyzed it from a statistical standpoint to get a good feel for that. The limited studies that have been carried out do seem to suggest that training at higher volumes than the 10 sets is beneficial. But again, when you're dealing with few studies, it's hard to draw those conclusions. If you're asking me for practical recommendations, I'd say a couple things. Number one, we can only provide general guidelines. So research. This is one of the real issues with the gap between what people think about research and what you actually can extrapolate. So research provides guidelines, but we what you have to appreciate is that when I carry out a study, I'm going to see huge variations inter individual variations in how people respond. But what that means is that you have to consider the individual that some people from a volume standpoint would do better on a somewhat lower volume. Some people are going to do better on a somewhat higher volume. From my own personal experience, if you want to ask me about that, I have found that somewhere between 10 to 20 sets per muscle per week seems to be a good general guideline there. But I think some people just hard to respond and usually I feel that when someone doesn't respond as well, they can benefit, usually benefit from higher volumes.

Yeah. And another thing you mentioned in your study and something you alluded to in your answer is that there's an inverted U curve when it comes to volume and muscle growth. So obviously too little volume isn't optimal for muscle growth, but too much can be detrimental as well due to recovery issues. So I definitely agree with you that there's a lot of individual variation and you need to find the sweet spot in terms of how much volume works best for you. And on that note, I've noticed that you're a big fan of using a periodized approach when it comes to training for muscle growth. So how do you think we can use periodization with what we know about volume and muscle growth?

Yeah, well, it kind of follows what you just talked about with the inverted U. It's very clear that the human body can be pushed very, very hard and respond to a huge amount of stress and have a positive outcome from it as long as it's not prolonged. So for very short periods of time, you can really push the human body and it's going to adapt. The body is very adaptive, but if you continue to push it and push it and push it at very high level, it's kind of like running a car on, revving it constantly and never letting up the gas pedal. And at some point that car engine is going to go. Obviously a machine is not. The human body is a machine, but it's a very complex machine. But the principle is still similar that over a certain time prolonged exposure to very high stresses is going to cause you to overtrain, to have negative effects. So the idea behind periodizing volume, going from let's say a lower volume to a moderate volume to a high volume over time just makes intuitive sense. It's never been studied, so certainly that's something that needs study. It would be a hard study to carry out just from a logistical standpoint. I hope to be able to do that in the future, but just because of the time commitments involved to really get into that, it would be somewhat difficult. But I certainly will say that I've used this extensively. I've worked with very high level bodybuilders, pro bodybuilders, and high level national competitors, both chemically enhanced and natty. So on both levels, and on both levels have seen very good results. I've seen several pounds of muscle gain over, let's say a several month period, three month period, gotten several pounds of muscle growth, or at least lean mass growth, and that's very good. For someone who's as a well trained subject.

Yeah. And while we're on the topic of periodization, do you think this approach is still optimal for beginners who can likely just follow a linear progression approach by simply adding weight or reps to the bar every week and then maybe they can transition to periodization later on?

Yeah, I absolutely feel that the beginners do not need periodization. Depending upon how you do it, it can actually be detrimental. My general rule for newbies for the first couple months of training at least is to focus on motor patterns. So to do that you want to keep things as similar as possible. You want to have the same exercises. Basically you want to do higher, somewhat higher reps of 10 to 15. So you're getting repetition volume. Basically you want to keep that if you're doing sets of three, you don't get enough reps going to really develop those neural patterns properly. So my general philosophy is to keep them in very similar programming the first couple months. And not only do I not program my not periodize, I specifically keep their program very limited in terms of the variation.

I totally agree with you there. I think a lot of beginners make the mistake of changing up their variables too often, which doesn't lead to much progress in the long run. But now I'd like to move on to some of the limitations you've mentioned in your study. One of them was that the optimal number of sets per week will likely vary for each muscle group. My assumption would be that larger muscle groups would probably need a higher number of weekly sets when compared to smaller muscle groups. But what's your opinion on this?

I'm not necessarily on board with that. I think again, that is largely an individual factor. What I would say. So here's what I would say. You get substantial biceps work when you're doing back exercises. And by the way, our actual meta analysis included that. So if someone did a bicep, a lat pulldown, we consider that a biceps exercise, you're doing elbow flexion. So you would need less. I would definitely concur that you need direct, less direct biceps, which you wouldn't necessarily need to do a heck of a lot of biceps curls or triceps press downs. If you're doing a well balanced compound movement routine, you're doing pressing exercises, pulling exercises, you're going to get a lot of biceps work. But if you're counting those as biceps exercises, I don't think you necessarily need less for smaller muscle groups. I think it is specific to the individual.

Yeah. And while we're on the topic of sets per muscle group, one question I often get asked is how to bring up lagging body parts. I think other than ensuring that you have a solid mind to muscle connection with that muscle and ensuring that you're performing the exercises for that muscle with proper form, one effective way to bring up a lagging body part is to simply increase the number of weekly sets for that muscle group. Would you agree with this?

I generally would. So I actually mentioned that before that usually it's my experience that if a muscle is a hard gainer, a particular muscle is hard to grow, then my general response is try higher volume. But if someone has been using a lot of volume, it's possible they are locally overtrained that there actually have been. You can have muscles that are overtaxed, if you will. Perhaps. I also would say that outside of volume, that prioritizing the muscle is the first thing I always say. So doing it first in your routine, let's say your biceps are lagging, I would do them first. I don't care if it's a small muscle group, do them first in your routine, do it before your chest or whatever you're going to do. And prioritizing it so that you're hitting it when you're freshest is usually a good way to ensure that you're going to stimulate it to its maximal effect.

Another limitation you've mentioned is that most of the studies you've included in your meta analysis was done on untrained subjects, with only two of the studies being done on resistance trained individuals. So. So in your opinion, how would the optimal weekly sets per muscle group differ between untrained versus trained individuals?

I can only give you a hypothesis based on my own personal experience, but I would hypothesize that they need more volume trained subjects just because they can handle larger stimuli and that it takes more to cause them to adapt. The only reason a person's going to adapt is by challenging them beyond their present capacity. So higher volumes would be a primary way to challenge someone beyond their present capacity. And I've at least anecdotally seen that in my own clients. But that's just the hypothesis and like I said, I'm currently carrying out a study now where we're looking at the dose response in well trained subjects. So I'll have a better answer for you probably in two or three months from now on. That and I will say there were people that disagree with that in the HIIT community. High intensity training, the onset failure crowd will say they think the requirements go down, so we'll find out.

So, to quickly sum up everything we previously discussed, here are some practical takeaways. If you're looking to maximize muscle growth, then you probably want to perform between 10 to 20 sets per week for the main muscle groups like the chest, back and leg muscles. If you're more of a beginner, then it might be best to stick to the lower end of this range, whereas more advanced individuals might do better by either sticking to the higher end of this range or periodizing their program such that you increase volume throughout the weeks and then go back down to prevent overtraining. Other muscle groups, like the traps, arms and front delts, already get a lot of indirect work from your other lifts and thus less direct sets are needed for them. Although the optimal number of sets per week for them is not known and will vary based on your routine, they should have less direct sets dedicated to them than your main muscle groups do, unless you're trying to prioritize them. Alright, well, I think that pretty much sums up all the questions that I had. Again, huge thank you Brad for making this possible and taking the time to do this video with me. I also wanted to briefly mention some of your books for those who might be interested. So for those interested in more of the science and research behind muscle growth, I think your book Science and Development of Muscle Hypertrophy would be the best bet. And then for more of the practical application of this, would you suggest your book Max Muscle Plan?

Yep, exactly. The Science and Development of muscle of Muscle Hypertrophy is a textbook. So it gets into the real nitty gritty of the science. But you need really, you should have a science, somewhat of a, at least a basic science background to read that book. Max Muscle Plan is a consumer book that will be specific to those who just want a routine. It has a six month program. I certainly discussed the science, but it's done in more of a layman's fashion.

All right, cool. So I'll link both of those in the description box down below for any of those who are interested and that pretty much wraps this video up. Thank you guys so much for watching and once again, thank you Brad for making this possible. We all really appreciate it.