How Many Sets Per Body Part Should You Do To Gain Muscle?
How many sets per body part per week should you do to gain muscle?
The answer to this question really depends on a lot of factors which makes it pretty hard to answer definitively.
As a broad answer it’s somewhere between 8-25 sets per week.
That’s super broad I know but it depends on the type of program you’re running and how intense it is (intensity meaning how close to your 1RM you are training) and what the goal of your current training phase is (what type of hypertrophy response you’re after)
No one training phase represents how many sets are optimal because it will vary as you go through different training phases geared at different ways of stimulating hypertrophy.
You may also have phases where you overreach and accumulate shit loads of volume and on the following phase back it right off to the minimal amount to recover and super-compensate. So looking at an average over a long period makes more sense.
Instead of looking at how many sets you need right now create a long term plan over 12-52 weeks with varying intensities, rest periods, tempos, progression strategies and recovery.
A 10x10 program is going to elicit a different hypertrophy response to a 3x6 program. Just like a program pairing agonist muscle groups will have a different response to pairing antagonist muscle groups. All are considered ‘hypertrophy’ training 🤔
Asking how many sets should I do per week is a question without any context.
Also take into consideration -
✅ Exercise selection (is a deadlift = to a leg extension ☝️)
✅ Genetics
✅ Stress levels
✅ Calorie intake
✅ Lifestyle
Optimizing these will allow you to do more sets and recover.
Plan out your training in phases or mesocycles each with adequate volume for the style of training.
If you are not progressing then you may not be in the sweet spot of sets per week ✌🏼✌🏼✌🏼✌🏼
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Personal Training Hawthorn, Melbourne