Episode 46: How Often Should You Strength Train Per Week?

06/21/23 • 72 min

Movement Logic: Strong Opinions, Loosely Held

Welcome to Episode 46 of the Movement Logic podcast! In this episode, Laurel discusses frequency, or how often to strength train per week. Laurel unpacks the concept of frequency its relationship to volume, as well as what research suggests is the “minimal effective dose” to get certain benefits from resistance training, like increased longevity and strength. By the end of this episode you will understand why workout frequency matters enormously, but why it cannot matter separately from weekly volume or the individual who is training.

You will also learn:

Why the common prescription for frequency—3x/week—is empty advice devoid of context to make it useful.
Why any amount of resistance training is better than none (according to research).
What the minimal effective dose of resistance training is for older adults (people over age 65), and what amount might be too much.
Why it’s important to control for volume when researching workout frequency and its role in strength.
Why there’s no right optimal dose of volume or frequency for everyone.
Why fatigue and recovery play an important role in determining optimal training volume and frequency.
That science still can’t point confidently to specific causes of delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS).
What types of individuals, muscle groups, and workouts might require more recovery time than others.
How to use frequency to increase volume in a safe way.
How maintaining strength is different from increasing it, and what research shows is enough volume to maintain the strength you've built if you have to spend time away from training.

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Essentials of Strength and Conditioning

Chris Beardsley Articles

What determines training frequency?

What is training volume?

How does training volume affect muscle growth?

What causes delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS)?

Stronger By Science Articles

Training Frequency for Strength Development: What the Data Say

What is the optimal dose of resistance training for longevity?

A Guide to Detraining: What to Expect, How to Mitigate Losses, and How to Get Back to Full Strength

Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) - General Physical Activity Guidelines

You will also learn:

Why the common prescription for frequency—3x/week—is empty advice devoid of context to make it useful.
Why any amount of resistance training is better than none (according to research).
What the minimal effective dose of resistance training is for older adults (people over age 65), and what amount might be too much.
Why it’s important to control for volume when researching workout frequency and its role in strength.
Why there’s no right optimal dose of volume or frequency for everyone.
Why fatigue and recovery play an important role in determining optimal training volume and frequency.
That science still can’t point confidently to specific causes of delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS).
What types of individuals, muscle groups, and workouts might require more recovery time than others.
How to use frequency to increase volume in a safe way.
How maintaining strength is different from increasing it, and what research shows is enough volume to maintain the strength you've built if you have to spend time away from training.

Get our FREE Bone Density Mini Course: Barbell 101

Essentials of Strength and Conditioning

Chris Beardsley Articles

What determines training frequency?

What is training volume?

How does training volume affect muscle growth?

What causes delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS)?

Stronger By Science Articles

Training Frequency for Strength Development: What the Data Say

What is the optimal dose of resistance training for longevity?

A Guide to Detraining: What to Expect, How to Mitigate Losses, and How to Get Back to Full Strength

Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) - General Physical Activity Guidelines

Previous Episode

Episode 45: Injury and Safety in Strength and Yoga

Welcome to Episode 45 of the Movement Logic podcast! In this episode, Laurel and Sarah talk about pain, injury, and safety in strength and yoga. We discuss what an injury is and how definitions of injury differ in research. We also discuss pain and how it is different (but also overlaps) with injury. Then we look at what research suggests about the overall likelihood of sustaining an injury in strength training and yoga. We’ll also discuss what safety is from a health standpoint, and about the relative risks to our safety that exercise versus being sedentary present. Toward the end of the episode, we offer you some valuable tips to “stay safe out there people” with strength training especially if you are just getting started.

You will learn:

The difference between overuse vs. a traumatic injury
How pain does not always indicate that there is an injury
How injury does not always mean that there will be pain
How the variety reasons it’s difficult to make conclusive statements about how injury occurs in exercise
The difference between acute vs. chronic pain
Why normalizing pain might be a more effective way to reduce pain than communicating that pain is abnormal and always something to avoid
How many people conflate the perception of effort with pain
Sarah’s experience working with clients with a team of doctors giving them contradictory advice about exercise.
How research unequivocally suggests that the benefits of exercise outweigh the risks of being sedentary
Why alignment in exercise is often less important than tissue capacity via adequate preparedness
The markers of physical fitness and which we target in yoga vs. strength training, as well as how neither improve cardiorespiratory fitness (meanwhile cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide.)
What “failure” versus “technical failure” is and how maintaining an appropriate distance from failure is important.
How to use RIR (reps in reserve) as well as RPE (rating of perceived exertion) to avoid pain and injury with strength training.

Get our Free Barbell Equipment Guide

Papers

Are Injuries More Common with CrossFit Training Than Other Forms of Exercise?

A 4-Year Analysis of the Incidence of Injuries Among CrossFit-Trained Participants

Relative Safety of Weightlifting and Weight Training

The Safety of Yoga: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

CDC - General Physical Activity Guidelines

Stronger by Science - The Science of Autoregulation

Next Episode

Episode 47: Our Oopsie Stories from the Teaching Trenches

Welcome to Episode 47 of the Movement Logic Podcast—our last episode of season 3!

In this episode, Laurel and Sarah reflect on their most cringe stories from the teaching trenches and the big and small lessons they learned from them. You will belly laugh at their mistakes, and also learn vicariously through them!.

DISCLAIMER: the language in this episode gets a little salty so you may want to listen when there are no children around.

You will learn:

That making mistakes is a crucial part of getting better at something, and in fact if you aren’t making mistakes, you probably aren’t learning as much as you could be.
Why Laurel dislikes the phrase “in the trenches” to describe teaching weekly classes or privates.
Why the only way to learn how to teach skillfully is to teach—and there will (or must be) mistakes!
The difference between people who are excellent versus mediocre at something often comes down to how many mistakes they made—people who are excellent at what they do have often made a lot of mistakes and have learned from them!
What Sarah’s oopsie taught her about what she was looking for in a studio to teach for, as well as what kind of teacher she actually wanted to be.
How the concept of somatic dominance helps both Laurel and Sarah better understand their mistakes in retrospect, and how much the yoga and fitness community has changed (and hopefully continues to change) on a systemic level since.
Mistakes often involve multiple different lessons, some of which can be learned immediately, and others that might take years or decades for us to realize.
That shame is a normal human emotion, we can experience shame while also not letting it shape our identity and prevent us from learning and growing.
The mistake that taught Laurel she was teaching people not poses.
How making big mistakes can sometimes fast track really important lessons that might have otherwise taken much longer to learn.
How story-telling can transform shame and help you process what happened in a healthy way.

Episode 36: Somatic Dominance

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