Building Work Capacity

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hey,

Q1) I loosely quote, but from my understanding of your stance, more volume is generally better as long as one can recover from it. How do you determine if someone is able to handle the volume? Is it being able to progress weight/reps in the following week(s)?

Q2) Within a training plan, is the goal to do just enough volume to see a progression in weight/reps, or as much volume as possible to which the person can tolerate and trust that progressive loading will happen in due course?

Q3) When working at volumes that haven’t been done before, would you expect an inital dip in performance and then a big inflection point once the person inevenitably becomes adapted to the stress, thus finally reaping the rewards of their hard work?

I love training, work in a gym so have a lot of time to train, and could/have accumulated 15-25 sets/week of pressing, squatting, hinging and pulling without feeling overly beat/sore.

Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t mind doing less and seeing the same results, but am aware of the dose-dependant, albeit diminishing returns, relationship with volume and gainzzzz, so wouldn’t wanna be short-changing myself due to thinking I need to actually force progressive overload by doing less.

Thanks!

2

Kweng,

We think that more training tends to produce more adaptations, provided people can handle it. Monitoring those adaptations over time is useful for determining the efficacy of the program, as well as keeping tabs on feelings of fatigue, e.g. soreness, tiredness, motivation to train.

I do not think the concept of minimum effective dose is useful from a programming standpoint, nor do I think it’s determinable, mainly because fitness adaptations are somewhat unpredictable. The goals of program design are to get the best adherence, most adaptations, and lowest injury risk. “Just enough” is not something I’d aspire to.

I would not necessarily expect a drop in performance if the bump in volume (and training load) was necessary for the individual. If it’s a bit premature or the person has detrained from reduced volume, exposure, e.g. moving from 3 sets of 5 to 1 set of 5, then a period of reduced performance or reduced adaptation rate is possible.

Hope this is helpful.

-Jordan

2 Likes
3

This response has been more useful than you could imagine.

Thank you Jordan!!

4

Thanks for the kind words!