Almost all successful advanced natural lifters I've talked to had a phase where they did a LOT of VERY hard training. They didn't die. Some got injured. Some got burnt out. Adjust and move forward. But many adapted and even thrived on plans that might look silly to the average lifter today. In the silver era a lot of this stuff was standard. Doing more than a couple sets on a movement was just what people did. You only find what is too much by...well...doing too much. Don't be afraid of the work. You can always scale back volume, that is indeed a thing. Just because you are natural doesn't mean you should coddle your body. It can recover from a LOT. With a reasonable plan that has a variety of joint-friendly exercises and rep ranges, you can build up to more quality sets than most people think, and you very well might HAVE to if you want to grow your best. People usually want the extremes, either 8 hour arm workouts (that they do either ONCE...or most likely never) or 6 minute abs. The reality is that it's going to take a LOT of work to even sniff your potential, which is probably also a lot higher than you think (that's the good news). Listen to your body, build up gradually, get in your quality sets, track them over time (BOOSTCAMP IT) and keep learning. I have zero issues with HIT if it's gotten you great results. That's fucking awesome and I love seeing people train hard. The bigger issue is that when it stalls it has a limited number of levers that you can pull to keep making progress, and you never see the ones that flatline on it but who would have kept growing just by doing a bit more. Quality and quantity BOTH matter, and you can often do more of both than you think. Books that will help sort out the details (yes, they matter!) Book 1: SWEAT (beginners/intermediates) www.verityfit.com/product-page/sweat Book 2: Ring Training For Hypertrophy (ring enthusiasts) www.verityfit.com/product-page/ring-training-for-hypertrophy Book 3: Resurrecting Your Gains (intermediates/advanced lifters) www.verityfit.com/product-page/resurrecting-your-gains-finding-your-muscle-growth-formula Can check the site for full Tables Of Contents of each book. Appreciate the support!
@@faithalone5081 doesn't sound like a very intelligent superset to me. Trying to do cheat shrugs with a fatigued posterior chain wouldn't be particularly productive. In general lower body compounds aren't very supersetable unless it's a very small movement like neck, forearms, abs, etc.
I was just thinking about starting a yt channel and my first video was gonna be titled "F_ck overtraining" .. thanks for saving me time and energy, now I can go train in peace
If the average person thinks they’re overtrained, what they really mean is they work too much and sleep too little, lifting weights is hardly a part of it
@@SkogensHjaerta If you do everything to recover but you still did not that is going to be overtraining though. I had this issue quite a few times, I slept and ate well, pushed myself and my weights did not went up, sometimes even dipped, thats when I take a week off, do some light cycling in the meanwhile and than do it again for a few months
@@Artdaclownindisbitch generally ppl assume over training with becoming chronically exhausted, which can be the case, connective tissue becoming progressively sore, is also an issue, typically being sore before a workout should be an easy sign to back off, while just being exhausted is tougher to decide since people assume it to just be mental and not physiological
I had to start studying much harder in university and IT certifications to the point I was taking 2 naps a day and I had no energy to train. Definitely was over stressed but not overtrained
@@ClassicPhysique27 naps are acceptable, and common in college, strangely after college people will say naps mean you’re old, no they mean you’re recharging
@@_baller depends on the person. I don't take naps because it ends up screwing up my rhythm and I always then have trouble falling asleep at night and getting a proper night's sleep which hurts me in the long run.
Absolute facts and a reality check most people need “It’s going to be hard, it’s going to be harder than you thought it would be, and that’s why most people don’t get the physique that they want, because it is difficult, but that’s what makes it worth it”
@@Shvabicu I use to think the same way. I’m doing way more volume than I’ve ever done and I go beyond failure or failure every set and feel fine. Sleep and not underestimating your capabilities, goes a long way
@@daviddietsch I ran a 4 week block of high frequency where I completely broke down by the fourth week. I could only pull my 6rm deadlift for a single and just left the gym after that first set of the workout. Took a week off afterwards and I'm making insane progress on less frequency and volume now. PRs every session. You simply can't recover from some things no matter the sleep. Also, it heavily depends on exercise selection. If you're only doing bb isolations and machine compounds, systemic fatigue will be nowhere near someone who does conventional dls, barbell squats etc.
@@faithalone5081 I thought that was the case for me but turns out I was just rushing progressove overload (doing weight I couldn't manage for more than a few reps and doing sets on that)
@@Akathysia this. I was "forcing" progression because SS taught it that way and it was working fine for a while until the tendonitis manifested. Also my sleep quality had already been crap for many years.
@@Akathysia Been there, done that. My sign was the permanent lower back soreness, knee pain, and lots of disdain for lifting where as before it was fun. SS did a number on us.
Idk who SS is but yes not getting enough sleep, increased stress levels on top of hard training will lead to that fatigue which presents itself as overtraining. I get where he's coming from
@@JT-gk4qk I've made many videos on this, and written a book. Bulking was a big part of it. Exercise selection, technique, programming. Tons of factors. Coming up on 10 years of lifting, I'll do a full recap of my training history around September.
The hardest part about training is having the discipline to SLEEP more. I love to train hard but then in the evening, I want to do other things than get more hours of sleep in. Gotta get the priorities straight and commit, sleep is one of these priorities.
The limiting factor for a few of us isn't that we can't add sets but rather we can't add time in the gym. For me the only variable I can really manipulate is intensity because I just can't be spending more than 1.5 hours in the gym every day and I'd need to cross over that in order to add more sets (unless I compromise the rest times between sets)
Sometimes it's not though. That is only 6 exercises if you take, on average, 15 minutes each. 2 minutes a set, 5 sets and you're at 10 minutes of just waiting. Some sets take longer than others and people often want to also do some cardio. 90 minutes is not a whole lot of time. @@joojotin
@@mcgruber The time recommendations come from rest times and number of exercises and sets. If you have 5 sets per exercise 6 exercises that is douple or triple too much the amount of work you should do when training close to failure 1-0 RIR. Only fullbody workouts should last 1.5 to 2 hours if even then. What you desrcibed is huge overkill. I really dont know how you assume that is something you should do. Maybe you are one of those who think volume is king? If so huge mistake, you have forgotten fatigue completely, which also means you are not advanced.
@@joojotin Double or triple too much? Am I talking to Mike Mentzer? Who the fuck is saying 2 sets is the most you should be doing? There are literally studies on people doing 52 sets of quads a week and are still seeing gains. Stay small.
When it comes to overtraining in my experience is joint fatigue is the real killer. As someone who has an asshole shoulder, it's really easy to lose shoulder strength and stability throughout a workout let alone a week of lifting,MMA training and doing a moderately physical job. I have re aggravated my shoulder so manytimes training how I like. But now having hard limits on any form break down has helped maintaine me being pain free but actually feel stronger everywhere else in life despite numbers on the bar being way lower than they used to be for that rep range. Overtraining is something that can quickly sneak up on you espcailly if you have pre existing conditions.
People forget the work capacity is another training parameter that they can train and manipulate. Overreach constantly (and recover after) and you'll increase work capacity.
So true... Besides myself and my friend (who is 19 and hopped on juice sadly), I legit never see anyone getting to or even close to failure. It's a sad reality where people are not willing to put in the work
@@tomaszsosnowski9279 You know what you may be correct. My first gym was cheaper and it was a fully commercial gym. The new one I go to is more expensive and slightly private-esque but not too much. In the old gym people trained harder
Tbf I only just noticed that because I usually am busy failling and not watching others unless I see them set up huge weights and am curious. I have started making sure with every set I can't lift my arms and still try again, then keep loweringthe weight till I can't lift anything... I know I didn't leave a kilo of strength, nevermind reps at any weight
I'm one of those who responds well with high intensity/low volume. I have an extremely laborious job and this type of training helps me get in enough rest and my job is excellet pre-exhaustion generally. It's great when people notice your physique and hard work. Thanks Geoffrey, great video.
As a natural the greatest thing I ever discovered was Reg Park's Mr Universe course. Yes there was an ungodly amount of volume, but now I weigh 230 lbs at 6' 2" and have built a relatively classic physique. Jamie Lewis talks about this all the time. Yea Steve Reeves for example did full body 3 times a week, but he was also doing handbalancing and callisthenics at the beach all day every day. This goes for the earlier York systems too, off days were weak point/fun days.
Yea there are some CRAZY workouts on Jamie's site. Very much not safe for work and lots of enhanced anecdotes but yea, good inspiration overall. And 230lbs is stacked!
There are other routines Reg used, but this is one I have used with success in the past. His training for power/1958 Mr Universe article is also a treasure trove of information. ditillo2.blogspot.com/2009/05/how-i-trained-reg-park.html?m=1
Recently I’ve been messing around with slightly higher volume than I’ve been doing to make sure I’m hitting everything as hard as I can. I find that when I go up in volume my effort tends to go down and progress slows down as well. Still testing around with it to be sure. I personally think it’s more of under recovering for myself instead of doing to much. Always nice to hear some reassurance that you can’t just b*tch out in the gym and you have to try new things to keep progressing💪🏾
All about finding that sweet spot where there's enough quantity but the quality is still high. When I find quality dropping I tend to scale back, quality (both technique and proximity to failure/effort) is always a high priority.
GVS is a former endurance athlete with very high work capacity (part of it innate and part of it from training). Training and recovery is his job and lets him pay bills. I think he really overestimates normal-people-with-sendentary-jobs' work capacity. He really is an outlier for it as he even had good result with german volume training which is honestly a stupid, gruesome program that most people just don't make progress with as it's just too hard to recover from. I think most people would gain a lot from focussing on increasing their work capacity ( after getting their newbie gains and developping proper technique). All of the really jacked natty dudes I know have really high work capacity and I think it's not a by chance.
@@joojotin If you need to end your set before 3 RIR because you're gassing out, yeah it's a pretty big problem to grow muscle. If you can't recover from 5 sets of legs and you need to constantly have deloads and reduce volume all the time, it's also a big problem. I'm not telling you to run a marathon but being fit and able to recover from stuff is a useful ability to develop.
You really nailed it with this one. I always was a advocate of high volume with close to, and even sometimes beyond failure. And it absolutely worked for me, doing 140-190 total body working sets a week for over five years now. No one wants to go through this, because this mentzer mentality spreads lilke plague on social media at the moment and people are just prone to buy in to this mentality that less is more, because its easier. Everyone trains "ideal" nowadays, sitting on a desk for eight hours straight a day, thinking 3 lousy sets on the pec deck in the evening is the sweetspot of growth.
This is why I fw you brodieGVS. You’re the only person on here that unapologetically goes ham regardless of the fear-mongering of too much volume. I always laugh when I see these volume vs intensity debates bc these people are so pathetic and helpless. Like aw geez I wanna work out hard and I wanna work out a lot but I just don’t now which gosh darn one to pick🙄! Everyone always acts like you have to sacrifice one for the other when really you should be trying to maximize both (within reason)
I made the same point under one of Dr. Paks videos when he and Dr. Mike were preaching the 3-4 rir. I got so many keyboard warrior comments denying training to failure and volume training being the only way to grow naturally! Happy to see that there is a lot of people with the right mentality here.
After a long recovery, plenty of time to watch GVS, I’ve finally found the formula of intensity, volume & recovery that works for me. I lift 4 on, 2 off, with only mild soreness and continued strength improvements in my rather experienced body. Simply put; I you look like GVS when you train, you will improve if you are eating and sleeping well.
Since I have discovered your channel, my gains really increased. I feel like the increased intensity in my workouts is one important dimension of my recent progress. All I have to do is, recovering well between sessions. x)
Yeah, I go with higher reps, in the 12-20 range, because I'm 48 with joint problems and trying not to injure myself. As soon as I can hit that 20 reps, I raise the weight. Also, I work a physical job for 50-60 hours a week, so I get some exercise at work and am a bit tired when I get home. I also live in the countryside, and the nearest gym is 45 minutes away, so home workouts only. During the 2 months of winter we get in Florida, the job slows down so I hit it hard, since I have a bit more time to recover and less physical demands at work. I'm in better shape than most and enjoy working out, so I'm satisfied with it.
I’ve gotten good results from low volume high intensity, but I’ve seen the best results doing higher volume. I don’t think it’s a bad idea to bulk and track your progress trying both. Try a 4 month bulk and a 1 month cut and actually see how much you built. That’s exactly what I did these past 5 months and I learned a lot about lower volume workout (6-8 sets per week to failure specifically). I maintained my muscle and gained very little training every single set to failure with each exercise every 4-5 days. I grew better on 12-18 sets, with the same level of intensity.
Its off topic but i find it hilarious after your technique cyborg video dr mike keeps making videos with HUGE GUYS ( clearly not blasting drugs ) working out with TINY weights.
Yep technique is a huge part of it, and knowing yourself. Most lifters who have been at it hard for 5+ years know where they break down, and how to avoid doing so.
@@GVS True, I've been lifting for almost a year and I thought I good to train shoulders like 4-5 days a week but I got a minor shoulder impingement. It's almost better now after a couple weeks, so I'm going to get back to lifting but be more aware of my shoulder joints.
Nice video man, I wish I had it in me to workout for 10+ hours a week 8 - 10 sets a week per body part is for sure the sweet spot, atleast for me as an intermediate Not spending mutiple hours in the gym, but still getting muscle and strength increases week by week
@@BigronnieTriceps Nothing wrong with 8 sets. At the end of the day your performance slowly increasing is the most important, whatever volume you need to do that is what you should be doing. Let progress dictate volume, don't do volume for volume's sake.
@@BigronnieTriceps Maintenance volume would actually be around 30% of your normal volume. 8 sets per week per muscle group is actually enough to make significant gains provided it's done consistently week to week.
both! over training and never training hard either junk volume which just makes you tired and puts you in a perpetual hole where you cannot gain strength anymore but never pushes your limits. You can only fix it through healthier hormone levels (via lifestyle) and awareness practice so you actually notice what is happening in the body. Without working on awareness you won't know if you are over training or under training or like I said option C - both.
I started experimenting with lower volumes recently. I trained to failure or beyond with anywhere between 4 and 8 sets per week. It worked great for a while and I felt awesome, but I stalled pretty quickly unless I was bulking hard. I'm now going back up to 6-12 sets and have experienced better progress with minimal additional recovery demands. My back still needs more than 12 though. I follow that guy you mentioned. I watched his videos. He is not completely unreasonable about his stance, unlike many HIT advocates, but I do think he is unaware of the reality-3-6 sets is just not enough for many intermediate and advanced lifters.
I take practically all of my sets to failure.. safely of course. The reasoning to this is I only workout twice a week because I struggle to find the time for a third day since I have a family and I want to spend time with my kids, so I am able to recover from this type of training quite easily. I've been doing it like this for over a year and have not had any issues. I've seen great results doing it this way, but I know there are gains to be had if I could squeeze in an extra day.. but I'm not a fitness influencer, so I'm not paid to be as jacked as I can humanly be, so I'm okay with it. My progress is slower than it could be, but it's about the journey, not the end result.. the end result, being jacked, is pretty awesome.
Tbh if I feel super sore and I go and hit the gym I become weaker on my exercises, it really depends on what you can recover from if you know how to train sufficiently hard
Soreness goes away after you've trained hard consistently for a few months. Soreness usually means you aren't used to using that muscle or that you are doing junk volume, in my personal experience. If you go hard 4 times a week the soreness will go away.
@@AdventureThroughLifeI agree,but if you love training you would have no problem doing that and doing extra stuff on hard movement patterns like squats for example,which will lead to more soreness regardless especially with free weights
@@AdventureThroughLife same. I tend to only get sore if it's a new movement or one I haven't done in a long time. After the 2nd workout with that exercise the DOMS from it is much lower and by the third or fourth time there's no soreness after. Also doing the same exercise at reduced load often "flushes out" the soreness as well.
@@goggins6121 no if you're regressing more than a couple sessions in a row you need to adjust something. A regression once in a while could just be from poor sleep the night before or a lapse in nutrition, if it's multiple sessions in a row there is an actual problem.
100% agree with everything you say. It's another way of coping that anyone who trains harder than you must have genetics/ PED advantage, so coming to the gym for an hour 3 times a week and doing 3 sets of 10 on a muscle group is the most optimal workout possible (for example). If people are too busy to train longer, that's understandable, but don't conflate that with an inability to recover from anything more. I know from experience that you absolutely can overtrain compounds to your own detriment, especially squats and deadlifts, but that isn't an issue most people training for hypertrophy face.
Great vid. There is a common message i see on social media that I think leads to undertraining and effort issues. That message is you do not need to get sore to grow. I believe this leads to training intensity, volume and all-around effort issues. As soreness can be a good tool to use to measure all those things. When I started training with the mentality of always trying to reach that place of soreness, I found myself hitting that threshold much more often than I thought I could. I used to think it was difficult for me to get sore in certain areas. i realize now I wasn't getting sore because i wasn't training that area hard enough to get sore.
I'm 57 years old and I've been lifting since I was about 15 years old. Sadly, over the past few years, I have found it increasingly easier to overtrain with weights. Please be aware that AGE is a very important factor with respect to overtraining.
Overtraining can manifest itself in a continuum ranging from pissing pepsi to not being able to lift as heavy as your last workout (assuming all other variables held constant, e.g. weight); so I disagree that "if you're only lifting weights, the chances of you overtraining are pretty damn close to 0" - no shit lifters are unlikely to get rhabdomyolysis, but that doesn't mean they're invulnerable to overtraining.
I agree. I think his phrasing was a little cavalier in the intro. ESPECIALLY if you are able to train hard you are able to under recover. If you couldn’t, there wouldn’t be a recovery process for the body to adapt to anyway. Personally I find inserting more rest days (ie 2 on 1 off) allows a lot higher effort in the gym and a greater stimulus per workout. I think the video is better received in terms of INTRA workout workload rather than weekly or per microcycle workload. I think pushing it harder and longer in each session makes sense, but it might be better in the context of more rest to allow recovery from that greater stimulus.
Yeah Geoffrey's bias is high volume because that's what he responds to and that's how he likes to train. He's definitely an outlier in that regard and sometimes it seems like he forgets that. Most beginner and intermediate lifters I see in the gym are doing too much volume and too little effort. While I may not experience "over training syndrome" that doesn't mean I don't understand when I'm overreaching and would benefit from a deload. If you're training hard it's inevitable that you will benefit from taking a deload in some capacity at some point, probably every few months or so.
Hey bro I appreciate this video. Ive recently increased my volume and decreased rest periods in between sets and doing it 6 days a week as of 3 weeks ago and my strength gains are up and my body seems to have gotten used to the frequency. Glad for the insight.
Just because Geoffrey can recover fine from relatively high volume doesn't mean everyone can. We're all different. Just now I lift 3 days out of 6. Yesterday trained legs + deadlifts, and then some upper body today - let me tell you, my body and mind are totally f""ked from those 2 sessions to the point where I NEED a rest. In this state, lifting again tomorrow would be a bad idea and probably indicative of a mental health disorder.
This is quite accurate. Nowadays I'm barely able to do strength training twice a week with much lesser weight than a few years ago. Whereas in 2019, I used to go to the gym 4 times a week, 1.5 hours a day (Undertraining upper body since I was a beginner and didn't know how to push hard), then come back, and play/practice (Serious) badminton for 6 hours spread throughout the rest of the day, and I still used to feel fine. I was never at my 100% while playing badminton, but my 100% kept on going up and up and up. I improved by leaps and bounds and I was able to notice the improvement while I was quite tired from the strength training throughout the week. I just got used to it and never got injured due to overtraining. When I first joined the gym, in early 2019, I was a complete beginner never having lifted any weights, and I didn't even know I wasn't working hard. The sets felt hard to me, so I used to just stop when I started feeling my arms burning. The ability to push until failure only came to me in 2021 when I had bought a rack and weights to make my own small home gym. Now, I'm much heavier, don't have that much time, and feel much weaker than before. I can now push myself hard on strength training exercises, but I'm just not used to very high volume of work and neither do I have the mental energy to try :( Hopefully office workload reduces soon and I am able to focus more on my physical health again.
Hi Jeff, tried your recovering powerlifting program and man,the rest pause on upper 2 were brutal; also i always underestimated how much work can be done in 2 sets, i am an early intermediate and i think im gonna stick with this one for a long time even when cutting. Thanks for all your work, cheers.
Will Tennyson did an interesting video recently where he scaled back the volume a fair bit and seems to have seen results. All I know is that longer training sessions/more volume turns my sleep to crap. I'm going low volume and there's nothing you can do to stop me!!!!
Both work and have different usages. I just got done about a month ago with my “volume reset” because my volume got so high in the year or so. That’s suppose to be kind of a “maintenance” phase but I definitely had gains (the lifting was volume probably cut by 2/3rds and weight slightly over what you would be doing otherwise). My theory would be a combination of the higher weight gave a different adaptation and the lower volumes actually gave my body the chance to fully heal from the high volume beating it took for almost a year.
@@amorfati4927 Yeah that makes sense. I'm going to try upping the weight and intensity but dropping the amount of sets. Also going to try slightly shorter rest periods between sets. I used to be under a minute between sets for isolation and about 2 for compound but gradually drifted to bigger rest periods. We will see how it goes!
did the whole a lot of volume things, plateu constantly, feeling sluggish every day in the game, trained 6 days a week, tendonitis on multiple places, minimal progress body composition wise. Started 8-13 sets per muscle a week, injuries improved a lot, progressive overload regulary, body composition improved, feel energized when going to the gym. Its not a gimmick, its not to sell stuff. Your whole training is just more volume, nothing else. Good thing people like max euceda, davis diley, paul carter, TNF, JPG, ryan jewers exist. Helped me tons. Was following people who only preached you need to kill yourself in the gym and do more volume volume volume. Lucky there are people who know their shit
Yeah GVS has a volume bias (as he's an outlier) and is a bit out of touch with how average people respond to training. Just like Mr. America Heart is an outlier in terms of low volume, GVS is for high volume. Just seeing how the majority of people train at your local gym should clue you in that's in not lack of volume that's the issue, more so their intensity, strength, and lack of eating.
that is a sick mental image, I kinda hate harcore moshing, but then I did some spin kicks in the pit a week ago and it was blast. Cant wait to do stuff like that when im hench
Your a fuckin inspiration man. Keep up the good videos. You can't put limitations on others like that though. I started to get horseshoe shaped triceps... Are you saying I shouldn't have tried to do that? Because looking like you is unrealistic? Man you got to inspire people more. Preach the hard work part sure... But most people fail not because of their own genetics... (In some rare cases it can be)... It's because they trained and dieted wrong. I think "TONING" and higher rep workouts combined with training to failure... is so underrated that it's ridiculous that nobody else has figured this out by now. I call it "endurance weight lifting". My free training program is against the normal ideology but I promise this shit works... And that it will work for anyone that tries it. That's why I made it FREE... So they have no regrets if they try it. They lose nothing. 3 days of super hard work a week. Full body workouts... Working out every other day. You inspired me to push myself and I don't think that was a bad thing... No matter how you try to spin it. I also have that "fuck you nobody else can tell me what I can and can't do" type of attitude. Maybe that makes a difference with my gains.
I lift almost every day. At a certain point I can see my sleep getting worse each day. And it improves right after stopping for a couple of days. And id I push through, my sleep gets REALLY bad. I have years years of empirical evidence of this phenomenon, on myself. I've always wondered if it's actually a sign of overtraining.
Finding your ideal volume is just a whole lot of experimenting for me the paul carter method works wonders now 5-6 sets per week per bodypart and 2x a freq for only back (something im working on improving now) progressive overload is happening every week every single set added reps, weight and often times even both
With the hype around high volume nowadays i think people do it and dont realize how much the quality of their sets has gone down. Were not robots, its human nature to pace yourself in one way or another. You mentioned it in the video, and your training backs it up. You have to be VERY intentional with maintaining quality, and thats a skill as well as potentially limited by lifestyle. Good vid.
GVS youre great and have some of the best takes out there. Been working out about 2 and a half years, have been plateaued for about the last year with only minor aesthetic changes no increase in strength or size. These past years I have been working about 5-7 times a week always working out while other body parts are sore. Last couple months I started working out 2 days a week, upper and lower day, and only work out the next day when I am completely recovered from the last day. Ex, wont work upperbody until legs are completely recovered, then legs dont come until upper is sore. I also started doing upper body completely with calisthenics, and lower only in gym, with up wards of 8-10 sets of squats with different variations. I have not had progress like this since I began. Im up 10 pounds, my lifts are up 20, I feel better. I do think there really is something to systematic rest and how important it is, I'm not saying that volume is bad, but recovery is better. I do think this is just working right now because Im kinda shocking my body, it will adapt. I also workout less, so burn less calories, and have more time at home, so eat more, this also contributes to my gains, but thats only possible because of this low volume workout. Right now I am loving it and it is working, I am sure I will plateau with this aswell and will need to adjust some things, I just hope to recognize when this happens sooner. Because I kinda have wasted a year I feel like, not making any gains.
If you are overtrained you will know. I experienced it first hand. Was super lean with chronic sinusitis. Clinically low test (55 mg/dl doc thought I had a pituitary tumor lol). Just felt tired all the time. You will know. This mainly happens when underfueled, again, I was super lean.
As long as you are progressing - why do more? Use the minimal effective volume. But if your workouts are no longer effective - of course you need to go up. I personally enjoy the feeling of having to put everything into less sets because I have only 4-6 opportunities per workout and muscle group and I want to make them count. When I feel like it doesnt do it for me anymore and I dont feel sore/pumped etc I up the dosage.
I think id disagree with the conceptualization of overtraining. Sounds like in his view its not overtraining until youre experiencing rhabdo like symptoms. Which is fair. But there also overtraining in relation to optimizing hypertrophy. Theres a point of diminishing returns where youre training too much to allow time for your muscles not only to recover but to grow. Its not uncommon for people to go all out for 8 weeks or so, take a week or two as a back off (maybe even unplanned) and experience their most growth in that period because their body finally has time to grow. Im just saying you dont need to be bedridden or hospitalized to be overtraining.
100%, he inflated the symptoms of overtraining/overreaching. If you're training hard you can only train for so long before you will benefit from some type of deload. Saying otherwise is just silly. And yes you can even overreach only training 4 days per week with moderate volumes.
Glad you made this video just a few weeks ago I up'd my volume (doing 3 sets of everything before now doing 3-5 depending on the lift) and have been seeing great results I've been adding a rep every session which I wasn't doing before
I like to think I'm one of those guys that does train hard, I despise taking weeks off and with my job and lifestyle I sometimes burn the candle from both ends, that being said, I've also suffered symptoms from what I would say is overtraining and overuse. Tendon and joint pain, Injury despite having good form Fatigue that doesn't seem to go even between rest days. And I would argue a loss of appetite too. I've been watching the TH-cam fitness guys for over three years now and there's always been one constant between them all. You've got to train hard. Ain't no shortcuts with us natty guys!
i agree with you all the way! Ive been training natural for over 17 years and my training have been higher effort and volume than most people. Im benching 315 for 10 reps and ohping 225 for 8 reps im happy with my results compared my other friends who always say my training is too much
The problem with failure studies is you don't know how hard their failure was. If someone put a pow pow to your head and said do 2 more reps I'm sure most of those "failures" from the studies would show they had more in the tank.
I think a lot of people would benefit from a more established base of endurance combined with flat-out effort. Training as a high school milers we alternated workouts of 3.2 mile runs, 8-12 440s, and 5.4 mile runs. I'm sure this helped me in my loaded bike ride across the US and Canada, my carrying loads up mountains, and (50 years later) my volume/intensity tolerance (and needs!) in the gym. Thanks for the slice of reality Geoff.
Yesterday I got a new PR: 50 total chin-ups spread across 21 sets to failure, in one day. My abs/obliques/pecs/triceps were slightly sore today, but that was about it. I did take a rest day today, but that was due to other factors. I'm probably fine on volume, though normally I do 6 sets per exercise per day, but at times I have days when I shoot for a volume PR and the above is what it can look like, depending on the exercise (most of my volume PRs are around 12-16 sets, at present). I'm 37, natty, and have been training for under 11 months now, with rather good results - including losing over ~25 kg and going from ~39-42% body fat to under 27%.
The reason this is a conversation is think is because a lot of people workout but then do not know how to train. Thats why im grateful for sports because the effort and intensity needed for the gym is so much less fatiguing and easier mentally. I can train super hard over and over again because i am extremely comfortable with being uncomfortable.
After 13 years of natural lifting I'd recommend cycling between extremely high volume and high volume. I could have done much more in the past, like you say.
The people who worry the most about overtraining are the ones that almost never need to worry about it. The people that should worry about overtraining almost never think they're overtraining. Bottom line, for 90% of gym people, Sticky Ricky is right: More is more.
I train like Mike mentzer said. For upper body it work very well. Lower body with squads and deadlift is not recommended to go to failure,better with machines. 1set to failure and then superset with half the weight without rest in-between. That's enough. The warm up sets are also volume.
Wtf! I only watched the first 20 seconds and turned it off lol if you think overtraining is not a thing then ok. I done it a few times myself and wondered why I was getting so many injuries. I take more time to recover now and feeling great
Did GVS change? He used to say "I have average genetics and proper hard work and training got me here... Most people don't need amazing genetics to get an amazing physique. Most people fail because they fail with their training, diet, or sometimes both..." Now GVS is like... Don't aspire to look like me because you can never do it... Don't even try... You just don't have what it takes.
Completely agree his content has went to crap. Pretty sure he’s hopped on juice and is now parroting the “I work harder than everyone else bro” typical juicer crap
Where did he say that? He said if people knew how hard he worked to get the physique they wouldn’t be too enthusiastic about starting the journey because they want shortcuts. Way to misinterpret a point
Nah, GVS does not train calves. He has talked about not really caring about calves in some videos previously. His calves look like they are not specifically trained. If he was on steroids, I would argue that would affect calves as well, which arguably isn't the case. Just watch at 12:40. I am a small guy and contrary to what he is saying, I have added calves to my boostcamp and my small body has bigger calves than GVS. I care.
he found fontain of youth ... like most "natural" instagram, youtube people lol . I remember good old days back in 2013 when fanboys were defending Hodge twins when somebody would pretty much said truth and called them out " stfu bro you don't train hard". Thing is, most people don't "achive " physique they want because: 1) aspired physique isn't achivable naturally 2) people they follow aren't natural 3) their role models don't have actual jobs, rather film themselfs in gym 4) at some point you figure you need to get good at something else in life, things that will put food on a table, looking good isn't that in 99,9998% casses In reality you should work out and find ways how to improve, but it should never be your only goal in life. One guy on youtube said something years ago and it stuck with me " be a guy who lives his life and just happends to lift". Nowdays i see 17 years old boys on steroids... Faster you remove yourself from this "bro you don't train hard enough" mindset healthier your mental state it will be.
slightly inspired by your advice I have stopped putting goal sets in my workout plan. Now i just have a rep range, and I continue doing sets to failure, until I can't get in the rep range without changing the weight. Hoping for some work capacity gains!
I been on a “low volume” training approach for the last year and it’s been good for me personally. I feel like I am able to push more on one set. Granted I work up to a top set, sometimes 2 sets depending on my energy level and the given exercise. My question is, wouldn’t it be good for seasoned lifters to occasionally scale back the volume to resensitize the body to volume once more?
About a few weeks ago I started adding one more set to all my exercises, until last week it felt horrible and I was just always tired that I don't even feel like working out for some days and skipped 2 days. But suddenly this week I can do all my exercises no problem with the 1 additional set for all my workout days and it feels like I can even add one more set for everything. Tbh I'm not sure what happened at all but this feels amazing. Also I tend to go to failure on all my exercises except for stuff like heavy barbell bench presses because I don't have a spotter nor a safety catch. For clarification this is into my fourth month of consistent training.
Almost all successful advanced natural lifters I've talked to had a phase where they did a LOT of VERY hard training. They didn't die. Some got injured. Some got burnt out. Adjust and move forward. But many adapted and even thrived on plans that might look silly to the average lifter today. In the silver era a lot of this stuff was standard. Doing more than a couple sets on a movement was just what people did. You only find what is too much by...well...doing too much. Don't be afraid of the work. You can always scale back volume, that is indeed a thing.
Just because you are natural doesn't mean you should coddle your body. It can recover from a LOT. With a reasonable plan that has a variety of joint-friendly exercises and rep ranges, you can build up to more quality sets than most people think, and you very well might HAVE to if you want to grow your best.
People usually want the extremes, either 8 hour arm workouts (that they do either ONCE...or most likely never) or 6 minute abs. The reality is that it's going to take a LOT of work to even sniff your potential, which is probably also a lot higher than you think (that's the good news). Listen to your body, build up gradually, get in your quality sets, track them over time (BOOSTCAMP IT) and keep learning.
I have zero issues with HIT if it's gotten you great results. That's fucking awesome and I love seeing people train hard. The bigger issue is that when it stalls it has a limited number of levers that you can pull to keep making progress, and you never see the ones that flatline on it but who would have kept growing just by doing a bit more. Quality and quantity BOTH matter, and you can often do more of both than you think.
Books that will help sort out the details (yes, they matter!)
Book 1: SWEAT (beginners/intermediates)
www.verityfit.com/product-page/sweat
Book 2: Ring Training For Hypertrophy (ring enthusiasts)
www.verityfit.com/product-page/ring-training-for-hypertrophy
Book 3: Resurrecting Your Gains (intermediates/advanced lifters)
www.verityfit.com/product-page/resurrecting-your-gains-finding-your-muscle-growth-formula
Can check the site for full Tables Of Contents of each book. Appreciate the support!
What if i rackpull till failure and superset that with cheatshrugs till failure
@@faithalone5081 doesn't sound like a very intelligent superset to me. Trying to do cheat shrugs with a fatigued posterior chain wouldn't be particularly productive. In general lower body compounds aren't very supersetable unless it's a very small movement like neck, forearms, abs, etc.
Thanks
I was just thinking about starting a yt channel and my first video was gonna be titled "F_ck overtraining" .. thanks for saving me time and energy, now I can go train in peace
What do you think of max euceda and sean nalewanyj, and just recently will tennyson low volume approach?
Bro said he is gonna improve camera quality but did exact opposite
Think the lense was smudged or something man I'm good at this TH-cam thing ain't I
@@GVSyour content is good enough i never cared about it
Hahaha
He films in the sauna. This is a video about recovery after all....
Regressive Underload or something
If the average person thinks they’re overtrained, what they really mean is they work too much and sleep too little, lifting weights is hardly a part of it
most ppl fuck up their food intake and sleep, thus get not recovered in time. but that's not an overtraining issue, it's a recovery issue
@@SkogensHjaerta If you do everything to recover but you still did not that is going to be overtraining though. I had this issue quite a few times, I slept and ate well, pushed myself and my weights did not went up, sometimes even dipped, thats when I take a week off, do some light cycling in the meanwhile and than do it again for a few months
@@collan580 yeah that's what deloading is for. but the point of the video is that almost nobody comes anywhere near to really NEEDING a deload.
Are your joints and tendons getting progressively more sore and painful if so u may be overtraining or it could be terrible form also
@@Artdaclownindisbitch generally ppl assume over training with becoming chronically exhausted, which can be the case, connective tissue becoming progressively sore, is also an issue, typically being sore before a workout should be an easy sign to back off, while just being exhausted is tougher to decide since people assume it to just be mental and not physiological
I would say most people are not overtrained, but overSTRESSED
I had to start studying much harder in university and IT certifications to the point I was taking 2 naps a day and I had no energy to train. Definitely was over stressed but not overtrained
@@ClassicPhysique27 naps are acceptable, and common in college, strangely after college people will say naps mean you’re old, no they mean you’re recharging
@@_baller depends on the person. I don't take naps because it ends up screwing up my rhythm and I always then have trouble falling asleep at night and getting a proper night's sleep which hurts me in the long run.
💯 life happens. War, taxes, murder, tornados, disease, one of the kids die, family member dies, layoffs, company closes, house fire, car crash,.....
@@zerrodefex if they happen, they happen kiddo, that’s the point, if they harm your sleep, you probably don’t get much sleep to begin with
Greg is gonna get harder than last time when he sees this…
😂😂😂
Exactly
He's so annoying now a days
LOL
How many social points do you think GVS has?
Absolute facts and a reality check most people need
“It’s going to be hard, it’s going to be harder than you thought it would be, and that’s why most people don’t get the physique that they want, because it is difficult, but that’s what makes it worth it”
Bs. It's very easy to overshoot and regress due to systemic fatigue
@@Shvabicu I use to think the same way. I’m doing way more volume than I’ve ever done and I go beyond failure or failure every set and feel fine. Sleep and not underestimating your capabilities, goes a long way
@@daviddietsch I ran a 4 week block of high frequency where I completely broke down by the fourth week. I could only pull my 6rm deadlift for a single and just left the gym after that first set of the workout. Took a week off afterwards and I'm making insane progress on less frequency and volume now. PRs every session. You simply can't recover from some things no matter the sleep. Also, it heavily depends on exercise selection. If you're only doing bb isolations and machine compounds, systemic fatigue will be nowhere near someone who does conventional dls, barbell squats etc.
@@Shvabicu
1. Your work capacity sucks
2. You're too green to know anything if you're making PRs every session
@@AlgernonBrosplitz no, it doesn't. My cardio is very good as well. And no, I'm well into intermediate at 155/125/190 kg SBD. Your effort must be low.
Most people get a feeling of overtraining because of their state of mind.
Always stressed= close to 0 recovery ===> overtraining/burn out symptoms
Or no sleep
@@faithalone5081 I thought that was the case for me but turns out I was just rushing progressove overload (doing weight I couldn't manage for more than a few reps and doing sets on that)
@@Akathysia this. I was "forcing" progression because SS taught it that way and it was working fine for a while until the tendonitis manifested. Also my sleep quality had already been crap for many years.
@@Akathysia Been there, done that. My sign was the permanent lower back soreness, knee pain, and lots of disdain for lifting where as before it was fun. SS did a number on us.
Idk who SS is but yes not getting enough sleep, increased stress levels on top of hard training will lead to that fatigue which presents itself as overtraining. I get where he's coming from
Oh and I'll post the 140k Q&A on the community tab sometime this weekend!
Cant wait
@@JT-gk4qk I've made many videos on this, and written a book. Bulking was a big part of it. Exercise selection, technique, programming. Tons of factors. Coming up on 10 years of lifting, I'll do a full recap of my training history around September.
Hell yeah
Undertraining is killing your gains!!! We've come full circle.
FULL CIRCLE IS KILLING YOUR.... Ok, that's too much.
The hardest part about training is having the discipline to SLEEP more. I love to train hard but then in the evening, I want to do other things than get more hours of sleep in. Gotta get the priorities straight and commit, sleep is one of these priorities.
The limiting factor for a few of us isn't that we can't add sets but rather we can't add time in the gym. For me the only variable I can really manipulate is intensity because I just can't be spending more than 1.5 hours in the gym every day and I'd need to cross over that in order to add more sets (unless I compromise the rest times between sets)
1.5h is more than enough
Sometimes it's not though. That is only 6 exercises if you take, on average, 15 minutes each. 2 minutes a set, 5 sets and you're at 10 minutes of just waiting. Some sets take longer than others and people often want to also do some cardio. 90 minutes is not a whole lot of time. @@joojotin
@@mcgruber The time recommendations come from rest times and number of exercises and sets. If you have 5 sets per exercise 6 exercises that is douple or triple too much the amount of work you should do when training close to failure 1-0 RIR.
Only fullbody workouts should last 1.5 to 2 hours if even then. What you desrcibed is huge overkill.
I really dont know how you assume that is something you should do. Maybe you are one of those who think volume is king? If so huge mistake, you have forgotten fatigue completely, which also means you are not advanced.
@@joojotin Double or triple too much? Am I talking to Mike Mentzer? Who the fuck is saying 2 sets is the most you should be doing? There are literally studies on people doing 52 sets of quads a week and are still seeing gains.
Stay small.
@@mcgruber Nowhere did I said 2 sets. I just told you, you train like idiot. No the 52 sets group did not see more gains.
I edge to you geoff
So you're always leaving a rep in the tank?
@@Universalaud thats the way brother
@@Universalaud😂😂
And I peg myself 2 U. Circle of life🥰
It's almost like every body is different and everybody should experiment to see what their body responds to instead of being a sheep
When it comes to overtraining in my experience is joint fatigue is the real killer. As someone who has an asshole shoulder, it's really easy to lose shoulder strength and stability throughout a workout let alone a week of lifting,MMA training and doing a moderately physical job. I have re aggravated my shoulder so manytimes training how I like. But now having hard limits on any form break down has helped maintaine me being pain free but actually feel stronger everywhere else in life despite numbers on the bar being way lower than they used to be for that rep range. Overtraining is something that can quickly sneak up on you espcailly if you have pre existing conditions.
Well said.
People forget the work capacity is another training parameter that they can train and manipulate. Overreach constantly (and recover after) and you'll increase work capacity.
That doesn’t mean you can increase the amount of work which is productive
Thank u for keeping us big as hell
So true... Besides myself and my friend (who is 19 and hopped on juice sadly), I legit never see anyone getting to or even close to failure. It's a sad reality where people are not willing to put in the work
So much this. I very, very rarely see anyone go to failure (or close) in my gym
That's probably the choice of your gym.
@@tomaszsosnowski9279 You know what you may be correct. My first gym was cheaper and it was a fully commercial gym. The new one I go to is more expensive and slightly private-esque but not too much. In the old gym people trained harder
Tbf I only just noticed that because I usually am busy failling and not watching others unless I see them set up huge weights and am curious.
I have started making sure with every set I can't lift my arms and still try again, then keep loweringthe weight till I can't lift anything... I know I didn't leave a kilo of strength, nevermind reps at any weight
I'm one of those who responds well with high intensity/low volume. I have an extremely laborious job and this type of training helps me get in enough rest and my job is excellet pre-exhaustion generally. It's great when people notice your physique and hard work.
Thanks Geoffrey, great video.
As a natural the greatest thing I ever discovered was Reg Park's Mr Universe course. Yes there was an ungodly amount of volume, but now I weigh 230 lbs at 6' 2" and have built a relatively classic physique. Jamie Lewis talks about this all the time. Yea Steve Reeves for example did full body 3 times a week, but he was also doing handbalancing and callisthenics at the beach all day every day. This goes for the earlier York systems too, off days were weak point/fun days.
Send link to the reg park routine please
Yea there are some CRAZY workouts on Jamie's site. Very much not safe for work and lots of enhanced anecdotes but yea, good inspiration overall. And 230lbs is stacked!
There are other routines Reg used, but this is one I have used with success in the past. His training for power/1958 Mr Universe article is also a treasure trove of information. ditillo2.blogspot.com/2009/05/how-i-trained-reg-park.html?m=1
Thanks bro, there really is no natty limit
Don't waste your bulk - train hard 👤
very true
Mmm too late
Recently I’ve been messing around with slightly higher volume than I’ve been doing to make sure I’m hitting everything as hard as I can. I find that when I go up in volume my effort tends to go down and progress slows down as well. Still testing around with it to be sure. I personally think it’s more of under recovering for myself instead of doing to much. Always nice to hear some reassurance that you can’t just b*tch out in the gym and you have to try new things to keep progressing💪🏾
All about finding that sweet spot where there's enough quantity but the quality is still high. When I find quality dropping I tend to scale back, quality (both technique and proximity to failure/effort) is always a high priority.
GVS is a former endurance athlete with very high work capacity (part of it innate and part of it from training). Training and recovery is his job and lets him pay bills.
I think he really overestimates normal-people-with-sendentary-jobs' work capacity. He really is an outlier for it as he even had good result with german volume training which is honestly a stupid, gruesome program that most people just don't make progress with as it's just too hard to recover from.
I think most people would gain a lot from focussing on increasing their work capacity ( after getting their newbie gains and developping proper technique). All of the really jacked natty dudes I know have really high work capacity and I think it's not a by chance.
@@garak55 You can build work capacity by simply creeping up volume slowly
@@garak55Work capacity is bs for trying to grow muscle. Unless you are very out of shape, it won't make difference.
@@joojotin If you need to end your set before 3 RIR because you're gassing out, yeah it's a pretty big problem to grow muscle. If you can't recover from 5 sets of legs and you need to constantly have deloads and reduce volume all the time, it's also a big problem. I'm not telling you to run a marathon but being fit and able to recover from stuff is a useful ability to develop.
You really nailed it with this one. I always was a advocate of high volume with close to, and even sometimes beyond failure. And it absolutely worked for me, doing 140-190 total body working sets a week for over five years now. No one wants to go through this, because this mentzer mentality spreads lilke plague on social media at the moment and people are just prone to buy in to this mentality that less is more, because its easier.
Everyone trains "ideal" nowadays, sitting on a desk for eight hours straight a day, thinking 3 lousy sets on the pec deck in the evening is the sweetspot of growth.
This is why I fw you brodieGVS. You’re the only person on here that unapologetically goes ham regardless of the fear-mongering of too much volume. I always laugh when I see these volume vs intensity debates bc these people are so pathetic and helpless. Like aw geez I wanna work out hard and I wanna work out a lot but I just don’t now which gosh darn one to pick🙄! Everyone always acts like you have to sacrifice one for the other when really you should be trying to maximize both (within reason)
More hard work sets, more often. Yeah, lots of people aren't gonna like hearing that. But I'd agree it's what most of us need.
I made the same point under one of Dr. Paks videos when he and Dr. Mike were preaching the 3-4 rir. I got so many keyboard warrior comments denying training to failure and volume training being the only way to grow naturally! Happy to see that there is a lot of people with the right mentality here.
Dr. Mike says 0-3 RIR for hypertrophy.
After a long recovery, plenty of time to watch GVS, I’ve finally found the formula of intensity, volume & recovery that works for me. I lift 4 on, 2 off, with only mild soreness and continued strength improvements in my rather experienced body. Simply put; I you look like GVS when you train, you will improve if you are eating and sleeping well.
Since I have discovered your channel, my gains really increased. I feel like the increased intensity in my workouts is one important dimension of my recent progress. All I have to do is, recovering well between sessions. x)
Yeah, I go with higher reps, in the 12-20 range, because I'm 48 with joint problems and trying not to injure myself. As soon as I can hit that 20 reps, I raise the weight. Also, I work a physical job for 50-60 hours a week, so I get some exercise at work and am a bit tired when I get home. I also live in the countryside, and the nearest gym is 45 minutes away, so home workouts only. During the 2 months of winter we get in Florida, the job slows down so I hit it hard, since I have a bit more time to recover and less physical demands at work. I'm in better shape than most and enjoy working out, so I'm satisfied with it.
I’ve gotten good results from low volume high intensity, but I’ve seen the best results doing higher volume.
I don’t think it’s a bad idea to bulk and track your progress trying both. Try a 4 month bulk and a 1 month cut and actually see how much you built. That’s exactly what I did these past 5 months and I learned a lot about lower volume workout (6-8 sets per week to failure specifically).
I maintained my muscle and gained very little training every single set to failure with each exercise every 4-5 days.
I grew better on 12-18 sets, with the same level of intensity.
Its off topic but i find it hilarious after your technique cyborg video dr mike keeps making videos with HUGE GUYS ( clearly not blasting drugs ) working out with TINY weights.
I thought I was overtraining, but I was just using sloppy form and injuring myself.
Yep technique is a huge part of it, and knowing yourself. Most lifters who have been at it hard for 5+ years know where they break down, and how to avoid doing so.
@@GVS True, I've been lifting for almost a year and I thought I good to train shoulders like 4-5 days a week but I got a minor shoulder impingement. It's almost better now after a couple weeks, so I'm going to get back to lifting but be more aware of my shoulder joints.
6:19 Horsecockery influence ftw
Nice video man, I wish I had it in me to workout for 10+ hours a week
8 - 10 sets a week per body part is for sure the sweet spot, atleast for me as an intermediate
Not spending mutiple hours in the gym, but still getting muscle and strength increases week by week
I mean thats basically maintenance volume, so its definitely not the sweet spot. No one I know thats big got big off 8 sets a week.
@@BigronnieTriceps Nothing wrong with 8 sets. At the end of the day your performance slowly increasing is the most important, whatever volume you need to do that is what you should be doing. Let progress dictate volume, don't do volume for volume's sake.
@@BigronnieTriceps from ur wrong mindset i can tell ur so small
@@BigronnieTriceps Maintenance volume would actually be around 30% of your normal volume. 8 sets per week per muscle group is actually enough to make significant gains provided it's done consistently week to week.
It’s cool to see the amount of passion GVS puts into his messages.
Easily one of your best videos - FACTS! Straight up FACTS!!!!!
both! over training and never training hard either
junk volume which just makes you tired and puts you in a perpetual hole where you cannot gain strength anymore but never pushes your limits.
You can only fix it through healthier hormone levels (via lifestyle) and awareness practice so you actually notice what is happening in the body.
Without working on awareness you won't know if you are over training or under training or like I said option C - both.
More sets of pull ups? HELL YEAH
overtraining with squatting and deadlifting heavy and frequently is actually very achievable. Dont’t know how you can say otherwise
He did mention it. He said "choosing exercises with less systemic fatigue"
I started experimenting with lower volumes recently. I trained to failure or beyond with anywhere between 4 and 8 sets per week. It worked great for a while and I felt awesome, but I stalled pretty quickly unless I was bulking hard. I'm now going back up to 6-12 sets and have experienced better progress with minimal additional recovery demands. My back still needs more than 12 though. I follow that guy you mentioned. I watched his videos. He is not completely unreasonable about his stance, unlike many HIT advocates, but I do think he is unaware of the reality-3-6 sets is just not enough for many intermediate and advanced lifters.
One of your best videos, Geoff, for that I salute you!
I take practically all of my sets to failure.. safely of course. The reasoning to this is I only workout twice a week because I struggle to find the time for a third day since I have a family and I want to spend time with my kids, so I am able to recover from this type of training quite easily. I've been doing it like this for over a year and have not had any issues. I've seen great results doing it this way, but I know there are gains to be had if I could squeeze in an extra day.. but I'm not a fitness influencer, so I'm not paid to be as jacked as I can humanly be, so I'm okay with it. My progress is slower than it could be, but it's about the journey, not the end result.. the end result, being jacked, is pretty awesome.
Tbh if I feel super sore and I go and hit the gym I become weaker on my exercises, it really depends on what you can recover from if you know how to train sufficiently hard
Soreness goes away after you've trained hard consistently for a few months. Soreness usually means you aren't used to using that muscle or that you are doing junk volume, in my personal experience. If you go hard 4 times a week the soreness will go away.
@@AdventureThroughLifeI agree,but if you love training you would have no problem doing that and doing extra stuff on hard movement patterns like squats for example,which will lead to more soreness regardless especially with free weights
@@AdventureThroughLife so if someone says, im regressing on my lifts, im not making progress, your advice would be keep doing that for months? lul
@@AdventureThroughLife same. I tend to only get sore if it's a new movement or one I haven't done in a long time. After the 2nd workout with that exercise the DOMS from it is much lower and by the third or fourth time there's no soreness after. Also doing the same exercise at reduced load often "flushes out" the soreness as well.
@@goggins6121 no if you're regressing more than a couple sessions in a row you need to adjust something. A regression once in a while could just be from poor sleep the night before or a lapse in nutrition, if it's multiple sessions in a row there is an actual problem.
100% agree with everything you say. It's another way of coping that anyone who trains harder than you must have genetics/ PED advantage, so coming to the gym for an hour 3 times a week and doing 3 sets of 10 on a muscle group is the most optimal workout possible (for example). If people are too busy to train longer, that's understandable, but don't conflate that with an inability to recover from anything more.
I know from experience that you absolutely can overtrain compounds to your own detriment, especially squats and deadlifts, but that isn't an issue most people training for hypertrophy face.
Great vid.
There is a common message i see on social media that I think leads to undertraining and effort issues. That message is you do not need to get sore to grow.
I believe this leads to training intensity, volume and all-around effort issues. As soreness can be a good tool to use to measure all those things.
When I started training with the mentality of always trying to reach that place of soreness, I found myself hitting that threshold much more often than I thought I could.
I used to think it was difficult for me to get sore in certain areas. i realize now I wasn't getting sore because i wasn't training that area hard enough to get sore.
I'm 57 years old and I've been lifting since I was about 15 years old. Sadly, over the past few years, I have found it increasingly easier to overtrain with weights. Please be aware that AGE is a very important factor with respect to overtraining.
I love this philosophy. Very nice man. Overtraining is overblown.
We're all gonna make it brazzz
I doubt it
Except for the guy who said that.
L + enhanced + leg skipper + candy crane DL form + junkie
@@FTCRW this is a mystery to me
Overtraining can manifest itself in a continuum ranging from pissing pepsi to not being able to lift as heavy as your last workout (assuming all other variables held constant, e.g. weight); so I disagree that "if you're only lifting weights, the chances of you overtraining are pretty damn close to 0" - no shit lifters are unlikely to get rhabdomyolysis, but that doesn't mean they're invulnerable to overtraining.
I agree. I think his phrasing was a little cavalier in the intro. ESPECIALLY if you are able to train hard you are able to under recover. If you couldn’t, there wouldn’t be a recovery process for the body to adapt to anyway.
Personally I find inserting more rest days (ie 2 on 1 off) allows a lot higher effort in the gym and a greater stimulus per workout.
I think the video is better received in terms of INTRA workout workload rather than weekly or per microcycle workload. I think pushing it harder and longer in each session makes sense, but it might be better in the context of more rest to allow recovery from that greater stimulus.
Yeah Geoffrey's bias is high volume because that's what he responds to and that's how he likes to train. He's definitely an outlier in that regard and sometimes it seems like he forgets that. Most beginner and intermediate lifters I see in the gym are doing too much volume and too little effort.
While I may not experience "over training syndrome" that doesn't mean I don't understand when I'm overreaching and would benefit from a deload. If you're training hard it's inevitable that you will benefit from taking a deload in some capacity at some point, probably every few months or so.
Obviously you are correct , despite the denial this channel is no different to any other, he needs to say provocative stuff to gain views.
had my personal best 3 years ago. have matched my prs but not above. time to lock in.
It was relieving when you started rowing that EZ bar. I thought you were gonna curl it 😂
Hey bro I appreciate this video. Ive recently increased my volume and decreased rest periods in between sets and doing it 6 days a week as of 3 weeks ago and my strength gains are up and my body seems to have gotten used to the frequency. Glad for the insight.
This is all so trueGVS💪🏽
This guy saved my lifting career. ❤
Just because Geoffrey can recover fine from relatively high volume doesn't mean everyone can. We're all different. Just now I lift 3 days out of 6. Yesterday trained legs + deadlifts, and then some upper body today - let me tell you, my body and mind are totally f""ked from those 2 sessions to the point where I NEED a rest. In this state, lifting again tomorrow would be a bad idea and probably indicative of a mental health disorder.
Yo this is what I need to hear. Keep them videos coming man. I appreciate it
This is quite accurate. Nowadays I'm barely able to do strength training twice a week with much lesser weight than a few years ago. Whereas in 2019, I used to go to the gym 4 times a week, 1.5 hours a day (Undertraining upper body since I was a beginner and didn't know how to push hard), then come back, and play/practice (Serious) badminton for 6 hours spread throughout the rest of the day, and I still used to feel fine. I was never at my 100% while playing badminton, but my 100% kept on going up and up and up. I improved by leaps and bounds and I was able to notice the improvement while I was quite tired from the strength training throughout the week. I just got used to it and never got injured due to overtraining.
When I first joined the gym, in early 2019, I was a complete beginner never having lifted any weights, and I didn't even know I wasn't working hard. The sets felt hard to me, so I used to just stop when I started feeling my arms burning. The ability to push until failure only came to me in 2021 when I had bought a rack and weights to make my own small home gym.
Now, I'm much heavier, don't have that much time, and feel much weaker than before. I can now push myself hard on strength training exercises, but I'm just not used to very high volume of work and neither do I have the mental energy to try :(
Hopefully office workload reduces soon and I am able to focus more on my physical health again.
Right. No one wants the truth. Great video 💪👍💯
Hi Jeff, tried your recovering powerlifting program and man,the rest pause on upper 2 were brutal; also i always underestimated how much work can be done in 2 sets, i am an early intermediate and i think im gonna stick with this one for a long time even when cutting. Thanks for all your work, cheers.
We need more channels like this 👍
Will Tennyson did an interesting video recently where he scaled back the volume a fair bit and seems to have seen results. All I know is that longer training sessions/more volume turns my sleep to crap. I'm going low volume and there's nothing you can do to stop me!!!!
Both work and have different usages.
I just got done about a month ago with my “volume reset” because my volume got so high in the year or so. That’s suppose to be kind of a “maintenance” phase but I definitely had gains (the lifting was volume probably cut by 2/3rds and weight slightly over what you would be doing otherwise). My theory would be a combination of the higher weight gave a different adaptation and the lower volumes actually gave my body the chance to fully heal from the high volume beating it took for almost a year.
@@amorfati4927 Yeah that makes sense. I'm going to try upping the weight and intensity but dropping the amount of sets. Also going to try slightly shorter rest periods between sets. I used to be under a minute between sets for isolation and about 2 for compound but gradually drifted to bigger rest periods. We will see how it goes!
did the whole a lot of volume things, plateu constantly, feeling sluggish every day in the game, trained 6 days a week, tendonitis on multiple places, minimal progress body composition wise. Started 8-13 sets per muscle a week, injuries improved a lot, progressive overload regulary, body composition improved, feel energized when going to the gym. Its not a gimmick, its not to sell stuff. Your whole training is just more volume, nothing else. Good thing people like max euceda, davis diley, paul carter, TNF, JPG, ryan jewers exist. Helped me tons. Was following people who only preached you need to kill yourself in the gym and do more volume volume volume. Lucky there are people who know their shit
Yeah GVS has a volume bias (as he's an outlier) and is a bit out of touch with how average people respond to training. Just like Mr. America Heart is an outlier in terms of low volume, GVS is for high volume. Just seeing how the majority of people train at your local gym should clue you in that's in not lack of volume that's the issue, more so their intensity, strength, and lack of eating.
I started following Paul Carter's advice 3 months ago and I'm progressing fastest I ever have not counting my newbie era
Loved it when he said "Sometimes less is more, but most of the times more is more"😂
>cold hard truth
GVS confirmed tough-guy hardcore enjoyer?
Now I can't stop picturing GVS throwing spin kicks in the pit.
that is a sick mental image, I kinda hate harcore moshing, but then I did some spin kicks in the pit a week ago and it was blast. Cant wait to do stuff like that when im hench
Your a fuckin inspiration man. Keep up the good videos. You can't put limitations on others like that though. I started to get horseshoe shaped triceps... Are you saying I shouldn't have tried to do that? Because looking like you is unrealistic? Man you got to inspire people more. Preach the hard work part sure... But most people fail not because of their own genetics... (In some rare cases it can be)... It's because they trained and dieted wrong. I think "TONING" and higher rep workouts combined with training to failure... is so underrated that it's ridiculous that nobody else has figured this out by now. I call it "endurance weight lifting". My free training program is against the normal ideology but I promise this shit works... And that it will work for anyone that tries it. That's why I made it FREE... So they have no regrets if they try it. They lose nothing. 3 days of super hard work a week. Full body workouts... Working out every other day.
You inspired me to push myself and I don't think that was a bad thing... No matter how you try to spin it. I also have that "fuck you nobody else can tell me what I can and can't do" type of attitude. Maybe that makes a difference with my gains.
Thank you for being my friend.
Overtraining is definitely a thing mate , if it wasn’t you may as well train full body everyday for faster progress , try it see how you get on .
You should make a 5 day plan on boostcamp
I lift almost every day. At a certain point I can see my sleep getting worse each day. And it improves right after stopping for a couple of days. And id I push through, my sleep gets REALLY bad.
I have years years of empirical evidence of this phenomenon, on myself.
I've always wondered if it's actually a sign of overtraining.
Finding your ideal volume is just a whole lot of experimenting for me the paul carter method works wonders now 5-6 sets per week per bodypart and 2x a freq for only back (something im working on improving now) progressive overload is happening every week every single set added reps, weight and often times even both
I usually take every set to failure, and I still recover. Amazing.
S tier content and D tier camera wtf
With the hype around high volume nowadays i think people do it and dont realize how much the quality of their sets has gone down. Were not robots, its human nature to pace yourself in one way or another. You mentioned it in the video, and your training backs it up. You have to be VERY intentional with maintaining quality, and thats a skill as well as potentially limited by lifestyle. Good vid.
"There's no easy way out
There's no shortcut home
There's no easy way out
Givin' in can't be wrong"....
NO BUT... BUT MY RIR!!! MUH SFR!! I just take the train for fun pill now days, which just so happens to be most fun when u train rly fricken hard
GVS youre great and have some of the best takes out there. Been working out about 2 and a half years, have been plateaued for about the last year with only minor aesthetic changes no increase in strength or size. These past years I have been working about 5-7 times a week always working out while other body parts are sore. Last couple months I started working out 2 days a week, upper and lower day, and only work out the next day when I am completely recovered from the last day. Ex, wont work upperbody until legs are completely recovered, then legs dont come until upper is sore. I also started doing upper body completely with calisthenics, and lower only in gym, with up wards of 8-10 sets of squats with different variations. I have not had progress like this since I began. Im up 10 pounds, my lifts are up 20, I feel better. I do think there really is something to systematic rest and how important it is, I'm not saying that volume is bad, but recovery is better. I do think this is just working right now because Im kinda shocking my body, it will adapt. I also workout less, so burn less calories, and have more time at home, so eat more, this also contributes to my gains, but thats only possible because of this low volume workout. Right now I am loving it and it is working, I am sure I will plateau with this aswell and will need to adjust some things, I just hope to recognize when this happens sooner. Because I kinda have wasted a year I feel like, not making any gains.
If you are overtrained you will know. I experienced it first hand. Was super lean with chronic sinusitis. Clinically low test (55 mg/dl doc thought I had a pituitary tumor lol). Just felt tired all the time. You will know. This mainly happens when underfueled, again, I was super lean.
As long as you are progressing - why do more? Use the minimal effective volume. But if your workouts are no longer effective - of course you need to go up. I personally enjoy the feeling of having to put everything into less sets because I have only 4-6 opportunities per workout and muscle group and I want to make them count. When I feel like it doesnt do it for me anymore and I dont feel sore/pumped etc I up the dosage.
I think id disagree with the conceptualization of overtraining. Sounds like in his view its not overtraining until youre experiencing rhabdo like symptoms. Which is fair. But there also overtraining in relation to optimizing hypertrophy. Theres a point of diminishing returns where youre training too much to allow time for your muscles not only to recover but to grow. Its not uncommon for people to go all out for 8 weeks or so, take a week or two as a back off (maybe even unplanned) and experience their most growth in that period because their body finally has time to grow.
Im just saying you dont need to be bedridden or hospitalized to be overtraining.
100%, he inflated the symptoms of overtraining/overreaching. If you're training hard you can only train for so long before you will benefit from some type of deload. Saying otherwise is just silly. And yes you can even overreach only training 4 days per week with moderate volumes.
Glad you made this video just a few weeks ago I up'd my volume (doing 3 sets of everything before now doing 3-5 depending on the lift) and have been seeing great results I've been adding a rep every session which I wasn't doing before
I want that as a 10 hour TH-cam Video : 0:47
It's as mesmerizing like a lava lamp just with muscles.
I like to think I'm one of those guys that does train hard, I despise taking weeks off and with my job and lifestyle I sometimes burn the candle from both ends, that being said, I've also suffered symptoms from what I would say is overtraining and overuse.
Tendon and joint pain,
Injury despite having good form
Fatigue that doesn't seem to go even between rest days.
And I would argue a loss of appetite too.
I've been watching the TH-cam fitness guys for over three years now and there's always been one constant between them all.
You've got to train hard.
Ain't no shortcuts with us natty guys!
I don't agree that a given number of Google search results are representative or reliable indicators of most things
i agree with you all the way! Ive been training natural for over 17 years and my training have been higher effort and volume than most people. Im benching 315 for 10 reps and ohping 225 for 8 reps im happy with my results compared my other friends who always say my training is too much
The problem with failure studies is you don't know how hard their failure was. If someone put a pow pow to your head and said do 2 more reps I'm sure most of those "failures" from the studies would show they had more in the tank.
Cant wait to get back into the gym tomorrow after a shoulder strain
I think a lot of people would benefit from a more established base of endurance combined with flat-out effort. Training as a high school milers we alternated workouts of 3.2 mile runs, 8-12 440s, and 5.4 mile runs. I'm sure this helped me in my loaded bike ride across the US and Canada, my carrying loads up mountains, and (50 years later) my volume/intensity tolerance (and needs!) in the gym. Thanks for the slice of reality Geoff.
Yesterday I got a new PR: 50 total chin-ups spread across 21 sets to failure, in one day. My abs/obliques/pecs/triceps were slightly sore today, but that was about it. I did take a rest day today, but that was due to other factors. I'm probably fine on volume, though normally I do 6 sets per exercise per day, but at times I have days when I shoot for a volume PR and the above is what it can look like, depending on the exercise (most of my volume PRs are around 12-16 sets, at present).
I'm 37, natty, and have been training for under 11 months now, with rather good results - including losing over ~25 kg and going from ~39-42% body fat to under 27%.
Short of the most elite advanced drug free PLers/Strongmen/strength enthusiasts, this applies to that crowd as well.
Great video
The reason this is a conversation is think is because a lot of people workout but then do not know how to train. Thats why im grateful for sports because the effort and intensity needed for the gym is so much less fatiguing and easier mentally. I can train super hard over and over again because i am extremely comfortable with being uncomfortable.
After 13 years of natural lifting I'd recommend cycling between extremely high volume and high volume. I could have done much more in the past, like you say.
The people who worry the most about overtraining are the ones that almost never need to worry about it. The people that should worry about overtraining almost never think they're overtraining. Bottom line, for 90% of gym people, Sticky Ricky is right: More is more.
I train like Mike mentzer said. For upper body it work very well. Lower body with squads and deadlift is not recommended to go to failure,better with machines.
1set to failure and then superset with half the weight without rest in-between. That's enough. The warm up sets are also volume.
Wtf! I only watched the first 20 seconds and turned it off lol if you think overtraining is not a thing then ok. I done it a few times myself and wondered why I was getting so many injuries. I take more time to recover now and feeling great
Did GVS change? He used to say "I have average genetics and proper hard work and training got me here... Most people don't need amazing genetics to get an amazing physique. Most people fail because they fail with their training, diet, or sometimes both..."
Now GVS is like... Don't aspire to look like me because you can never do it... Don't even try... You just don't have what it takes.
Completely agree his content has went to crap. Pretty sure he’s hopped on juice and is now parroting the “I work harder than everyone else bro” typical juicer crap
Where did he say that? He said if people knew how hard he worked to get the physique they wouldn’t be too enthusiastic about starting the journey because they want shortcuts. Way to misinterpret a point
Nah, GVS does not train calves. He has talked about not really caring about calves in some videos previously. His calves look like they are not specifically trained. If he was on steroids, I would argue that would affect calves as well, which arguably isn't the case. Just watch at 12:40. I am a small guy and contrary to what he is saying, I have added calves to my boostcamp and my small body has bigger calves than GVS. I care.
he found fontain of youth ... like most "natural" instagram, youtube people lol .
I remember good old days back in 2013 when fanboys were defending Hodge twins when somebody would pretty much said truth and called them out " stfu bro you don't train hard".
Thing is, most people don't "achive " physique they want because:
1) aspired physique isn't achivable naturally
2) people they follow aren't natural
3) their role models don't have actual jobs, rather film themselfs in gym
4) at some point you figure you need to get good at something else in life, things that will put food on a table, looking good isn't that in 99,9998% casses
In reality you should work out and find ways how to improve, but it should never be your only goal in life. One guy on youtube said something years ago and it stuck with me " be a guy who lives his life and just happends to lift".
Nowdays i see 17 years old boys on steroids... Faster you remove yourself from this "bro you don't train hard enough" mindset healthier your mental state it will be.
black piller
Great video as always 🦾🦾
slightly inspired by your advice I have stopped putting goal sets in my workout plan. Now i just have a rep range, and I continue doing sets to failure, until I can't get in the rep range without changing the weight. Hoping for some work capacity gains!
I been on a “low volume” training approach for the last year and it’s been good for me personally. I feel like I am able to push more on one set. Granted I work up to a top set, sometimes 2 sets depending on my energy level and the given exercise.
My question is, wouldn’t it be good for seasoned lifters to occasionally scale back the volume to resensitize the body to volume once more?
About a few weeks ago I started adding one more set to all my exercises, until last week it felt horrible and I was just always tired that I don't even feel like working out for some days and skipped 2 days. But suddenly this week I can do all my exercises no problem with the 1 additional set for all my workout days and it feels like I can even add one more set for everything. Tbh I'm not sure what happened at all but this feels amazing. Also I tend to go to failure on all my exercises except for stuff like heavy barbell bench presses because I don't have a spotter nor a safety catch.
For clarification this is into my fourth month of consistent training.
Good damn, look at his biceps. I want biceps like that.