When To Know You're Over Training...?

wungun

Member
So, during my bulking over the winter, I was doing 4 sets of bench presses as my core chest exercise every other day (3 times a week). Also 1 or 2 sets of dips and alternately 1 or 2 sets of inclined flies.
So I've noticed good growth on my pecs compared to all my other muscle groups (except maybe lats, did extra work on this too).
I guess 12 sets a week per muscle group isn't too much for me on a bulk...?
So I wonder if more would be better yet, or if I could of maybe gotten the same gains with maybe 6 or 9 sets per week....

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More is always better until you start overtraining. This will manifest itself in a lot of ways, such as; getting sick, constantly feeling like garbage, repetitive use injuries, performance starts declining, totally unmotivated etc.

For instance, service dogs are typically trained to have the weekends off, where they get to be just dogs. Now dogs don't know how regulate and if the human is pushing them they will keep going, but what is found that the dog's career is much shorter without these breaks on the weekend (or whatever days).

Our body is similar, the more you train the better response you will get until all the support systems can't keep up with the stress of training. If you keep pushing them eventually you will crash somehow. Since our body's systems don't work at the same rates its always pretty common that one is adapting faster than another and you are building up a fatigue in another system where it cannot keep up with the rate of change, and you will need recover for progress to continue long term.
 
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More is always better until you start overtraining. This will manifest itself in a lot of ways, such as; getting sick, constantly feeling like garbage, repetitive use injuries, performance starts declining, totally unmotivated etc.

For instance, service dogs are typically trained to have the weekends off, where they get to be just dogs. Now dogs don't know how regulate and if the human is pushing them they will keep going, but what is found that the dog's carrier is much shorter without these breaks on the weekend (or whatever days).

Our body is similar, the more you train the better response you will get until all the support systems can't keep up with the stress of training. If you keep pushing them eventually you will crash somehow. Since our body's systems don't work at the same rates its always pretty common that one is adapting faster than another and you are building up a fatigue in another system where it cannot keep up with the rate of change, and you will need recover for progress to continue long term.
^^^^ this just about sums it up or you could always look into an app called HRV Elite and purchase the Polar H7 heart rate chest strap and use that as a guide, I still use it and find it useful but it doesn't govern how I train but if the trend over 4 or 5 days is downward then I 'may' build in a deload day or two, I believe that @adpowah gave up after a week or so
 
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Currently cutting, so I've dropped my volume down.... Just 2 sets of presses now, but trying to keep the weight high.
It's amazing how much food calories makes a difference in strength and stamina!
I'm doing a circuit-type exercise plan to keep my HR up and burn a few more fat cells...

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@mickc1965 lol yeah I gave up, I didn't see a correlation between my readiness rating and my strength performance. However at the time I was working on something super specific, so I think it has some merit but it wasn't for me.
@wungun good luck on losing weight. It sounds like a good plan. If you have time I find LISS out in nature to be pretty nice to supplement in too.
 
Liss for sure, now that the nicer weather is upon us. The dog will appreciate it as well.

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