"Junk Volume"

[Sacario]

5 sets or 30 sets. 200 MG or 1500 MG. 2500 cal or 5000 cal. I'm still a 190 lb. little bitch. God made you who you are just do what you like and can be consistent with. Took me a long time to come to that conclusion.

 

[aHarness]

I'd be interested to hear some guys here ...how high have you pushed volume? This could be anything... no days off, long workouts tons of sets, full body Ed..just the most you have tested out the "more is better" approach.

I've personally never pushed too high...I know one arms workout I did Serge nubrets workout. 8 supersets of bi and tri, then repeat for another. So 32 total...to failure...until towards the end I didn't care lost focus

Think it was press down/cable curl x8
Dips/barbell curl x8

I’ve never counted but with arms, delts, and quads easily 20+ maybe even 30 or more.

As for days consecutively in the gym, I don’t think I’ve gone more than 6 (not including going in for cardio, calves, abs, etc)

 

[Mufasa123]

I'd be interested to hear some guys here ...how high have you pushed volume? This could be anything... no days off, long workouts tons of sets, full body Ed..just the most you have tested out the "more is better" approach.

I've personally never pushed too high...I know one arms workout I did Serge nubrets workout. 8 supersets of bi and tri, then repeat for another. So 32 total...to failure...until towards the end I didn't care lost focus

Think it was press down/cable curl x8
Dips/barbell curl x8

Understand also volume isn't just volume. Over training symptoms are delayed reaction time, inability to sleep or excessive sleep and all similar... that ain't muscular.

So... 10 sets of squats is FAR FAR MORE strenuous than 10 sets of curls or side laterals.

As far as stimulus being mechanical workload - it's about balance. More micro trauma at the muscle is better. A max single causes more micro trauma than a single done at 80% of that. However you can't do enough singles at 100% to get the same as 3x10 at 80%. Additionally stimulus is not just a point in time, you are driving adaptation over a period so total workload in a period. Max singles will fry you fast and blow you up. 3x10 at 80% is infinitely more sustainable so better for hypertrophy/microtrauma in a single workout and over a period.

Now that you know those relationships...the total volume that can be tolerated by any single individual in a workout and over a time series off the varies widely. It can be expanded with training but not a whole lot in reality. Even psychology of an individual plays a role (how much excitement they need to hit their 1rm tended to correlate to a lower tolerance for high % work).

Now where the rubber meets the road here is similar to anabolics. Once you understand the basics and typical reactions... It's up to the individual to try and find out what works for them. We can complicate and science the shit out of everything but most is fairly basic and pragmatic with properly used science answers the why's but doesn't specify with much accuracy the individual how's.