Although all forms of exercise offer health and fitness benefits, the best approach to building muscle strength and size is to work your muscles against resistance using barbells, dumbbells, resistance bands, or your own body weight – or all four. In response to training, your muscles grow and become stronger.
When you strength train, you can manipulate variables such as how much weight you use, training volume, the tempo of your repetitions, the recovery period between sets, exercise selection, and the number of repetitions you do to vary the stress your place on your muscles. Tweaking these variables helps you better accomplish your strength training and hypertrophy goals.
Another variable you can change is how often you strength train. Most people strength train to work their muscles against resistance 2 or 3 times per week. Studies show this training frequency is enough to increase strength and muscle size if you use progressive overload. Using progressive overload is a fundamental principle of strength training and is necessary for you to make consistent gains in muscle strength and size.
But could more frequent training boost your gains? And how does less frequent training affect strength and hypertrophy gains? There is surprisingly little research looking at whether more frequent training increase strength or hypertrophy gains. However, a 2018 study looked at this issue, comparing the standard 3 times per week of strength training with strength training 6 times weekly.
The participants were men of college age who regularly strength trained. The subjects trained either 3 days per week or 6 times per week with training volume equalized across the sessions. The participants who trained 3 times per week worked out for 2 hours per session while those who trained 6 times weekly, trained for an hour with each session. The guys performed a variety of exercises that worked all muscle groups, including the big lifts like deadlifts, squats, and bench presses.
The results? The gains in strength and muscle size were similar between the high-frequency and low-frequency strength training groups. More frequent training didn’t lead to superior strength or hypertrophy gains and there was some evidence that high-frequency training had other drawbacks. For example, almost half of the people in the high-frequency training group dropped out over the first six weeks of the study. So, it’s possible that the added stress or inconvenience of training more often was challenging for the participants, or they were more fatigued and less motivated with such frequent training.
What about Reducing the Frequency of Training Even More?
One study from the 1980s found that trained men and women who scaled back their strength training frequency from 3 days per week to either 2 days per week, one day per week, or no days per week, came to an interesting conclusion. Participants who trained only 2 days or one day per week retained strength while those who stopped training entirely lost strength. This suggests that, at the very least, you can hold on to your strength gains by training only one or 2 days per week.
This study shows you can retain strength with as little as one strength training session per week, but can you gain strength with such infrequent training? Another study found that older adults who strength trained only one or 2 days per week gained strength, but their gains were inferior to those who trained 3 times per week. This study suggests you can gain strength if you only train once or twice per week, but your gains may fall short of what you could achieve with training 3 times per week.
To confuse matters more, another small study of trained participants (12 men and 7 women) who trained either 3 times per week found both groups increased muscle strength and mass with no difference in strength or hypertrophy gains between the two training schedules after 8 weeks. This study, although small, suggests you can make similar strength and hypertrophy gains by working out only one day per week. But keep in mind that this is one small study, and it conflicts with the study previously mentioned where strength and hypertrophy gains were inferior with low-frequency training. (once day per week)
How Often Should You Strength Train?
Strength training three times per week appears to be optimal for strength gains. Although you can make gains by training only one time per week, your gains may limit your gains by doing so. However, there’s little evidence that doubling training frequency to six times per week will lead to greater gains in strength or muscle size.
Strength training each muscle group three times per week seems to offer the most potential for growth without running the risk of overtraining and limiting growth due to inadequate recovery and fatigue. A 2016 study also found that training two to four times per week produces faster muscle growth than less frequent training. Still, more isn’t necessarily better. When you train with this frequency, rather than more often, fatigue is less of an issue since your muscles get more recovery time.
The biggest problem with strength training too frequently is that you can overtrain your muscles by not giving your muscles enough recovery time between strength-training sessions. Over-training can lead to injury and loss of strength, which can set you back weeks or months of training time.
Conclusion
More frequent strength training, up to 6 sessions per week, won’t lead to greater gains in muscle strength and size relative to training the standard 3 times weekly when you adjust for total volume and intensity. However, dropping your training sessions to once per week may reduce the gains you get and slow your strength and hypertrophy gains.
But remember. We’re all a little different. Some people have a greater ability to recover from strength training sessions than others and age is a factor too. Keep a training diary and see how your muscles respond to various training schedules.
References:
- Colquhoun RJ, Gai CM, Aguilar D, Bove D, Dolan J, Vargas A, Couvillion K, Jenkins NDM, Campbell BI. Training Volume, Not Frequency, Indicative of Maximal Strength Adaptations to Resistance Training. J Strength Cond Res. 2018 May;32(5):1207-1213. doi: 10.1519/JSC.0000000000002414. PMID: 29324578.
- Int J Sports Med. 1988 Oct;9(5):316-9.
- Thomas MH, Burns SP. Increasing Lean Mass and Strength: A Comparison of High-Frequency Strength Training to Lower Frequency Strength Training. Int J Exerc Sci. 2016 Apr 1;9(2):159-167. PMID: 27182422; PMCID: PMC4836564.
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Related Cathe Friedrich Workout DVDs:
STS Strength 90 Day Workout Program
All of Cathe’s Strength & Toning Workout DVDs
