Intensity & Frequency - Part 3 of Anabolic Muscle Building Factors

In the previous article, we discussed the concepts of adaptation & progressive overload, and how virtually everything about building muscle revolves around these two principles...

Today, the topics are intensity & frequency, two other "concepts" that are highly "anabolic" in nature, meaning that they can have a significant impact on muscle growth.

Intensity seems to be a very hot topic over the past few years. Proponents of low volume, high intensity training swear by raising the intensity of your workouts, while reducing overall volume. On the other side, traditionalists prefer lower intensity workouts to higher volume.

What is workout intensity?

Intensity is defined as the amount of effort you exert in a given period of time. Another term for intensity is “perceived exertion”. This simply means how you feel while working out. If you feel like you are working out very hard, then your intensity is high. If you feel like you’re having a light workout, then your intensity is light.

Intensity can be measured by the amount of work that you complete within a certain timeframe. So, if you're lifting 200 lbs on the bench press, and you do 10 reps over a course of 30 seconds, then your intensity for that particular set is: 200 x 10 = 2000 lbs / 30 seconds = 66.7 lbs per second.

Many people argue that in order to elicit the greatest muscle building response, you should workout with 100% maximum intensity. Usually, what they mean by this is taking a set to complete failure.

Although working out at a high level of intensity is beneficial, taking a set to failure may not be. Basically, you don't HAVE to take a set to the point of failure, where you can't lift the weight anymore, to signal a muscle building response.

Intensity should be redefined as stimulation, to the point where the muscle feels a need to grow. By no means does stimulation mean annihilation. Annihilation means you take your muscles to a point where there's no energy left, and you fail. Stimulation simply means to feel enough of a challenge where the muscle feels worked.

In order to grow a particular muscle, you only have to effectively stimulate it. Any more is not only un-necessary but it can also lead to excessive muscle soreness and overtraining.

Frequency

Frequency is another hotly debated topic...Some say that a muscle requires 7 days to fully grow after a "tough" workout session, as if there's some scientific basis to validate this claim.

The truth of the matter is that the body in general elicits an anabolic response for 24-48 hours after a training session. Growth and recovery can go unabated even if a "fully unrecovered" muscle is trained again within 48 hours. There are well-established scientific studies to prove this, and contrary to popular opinion, it is much better to load a muscle group every 48 hours rather than waiting a whole week to train it again.

However, in order to train the muscle group within 48 hours, CNS fatigue must be kept to a minimum. CNS fatigue refers to Central Nervous System fatigue, and this is the sore, painful feeling you experience a day after a grueling workout session. Such type of soreness usually lasts for a couple of days, and science has now discovered that it is the central nervous system that is fatigued, and the nerve cells around the muscles that are swollen and painful.

Central Nervous System fatigue is usually brought about by high workout volumes and training to failure. Basically, if you're doing a lot of sets per muscle group, and taking those sets to failure, then its not the actual muscle tissue that's really fatigued, its your central nervous system, and it doesn't want you to train again until ITS fully recovered.

The key to building muscle is to fully take advantage of the 24-48 hour timeframe that a muscle is in an anabolic state following a workout. According to modern research, its best to train a muscle group 3 times a week while avoiding CNS fatigue that can prevent you from training frequently.

Bodybuilders that take 2-3 years to build their bodies can cut their times in half just by training more frequently and avoiding the "rocky" mentality of training til you can't move.

In the next issue, I'll be talking about optimal warm-up & stretching, which can give you definite muscle-building boost...stay tuned!

To a leaner more muscular you.