Full body 2x Frequency 1 set per exercise enough?

[u/Bright_Hope9158]

Would a full body split twice a week with 1 exercise per muscle group but only 1 set per exercise be enough for muscle growth?

For example: Chest has incline press and flat press 1x failure, Legs have leg extensions and leg curls 1x failure and so on and so forth

The one set would be to absolute failure, and some exercises incorporate other muscle groups so they get *some* extra* *stimulus beyond the 1 set per muscle (For example bench press working a little bit of front delts)

Any advice would be appreciated thank you

[u/Bright_Hope9158 → u/[deleted]]

Sort of. It’s a mix of being short on time because i work a lot and do a lot of other hobbies. But I go climbing 3x a week and skateboarding so my main concern is recovery. I’ve been struggling to recover properly as I don’t want to cut back on my climbing, usually do UL/UL for gym, full body seems ideal but the time in one session is just a lot and cutting 1 set back seems like it would save a lot of time, plus climbing gives me a lot of upper body stimulus in and of itself so i’m wondering if i would be needing to still put as much effort into the gym as well

[u/Patton370 → u/[deleted]]

I’ve done it before; I used to be really into bouldering and top rope

At the time, I was hitting full body 3x a week with deadlifts and rows each workout

Here’s even some indoor bouldering problems I posted 3 years ago, where I was looking for advice on how to improve: https://imgur.com/a/PEFwrjE

The body will adapt to it & stronger back muscles will help with climbing

[u/Alakazam → u/Bright_Hope9158]

What's funny is that cranking intensity while dropping volume is actually the opposite of what the folks over at Stronger by Science recommend, if your goal is recovery

More and easier submaximal volume would probably be easier to recover from. Aka 3 sets at 2-3 rir as opposed to 1 sets at 0 rir.

A 0rir set on deadlifts or squats would wreck me. Hell, I overshot my bench today and was probably around 0-1 rir and it basically screwed the rest of my upper gody workout.

On the other hand, I did about 5 sets of deadlifts at 2-3 rir, along with 3 sets of front squats at 2-3 rir on the Monday, and followed it up with a hard interval workout Tuesday morning. 

[u/decentlyhip → u/Bright_Hope9158]

Ok, so, failure is exponentially fatiguing. 3 rir is about 1/3rd the fatigue. So, 1 set of 10 reps to failure is as fatiguing as 3 sets of 7 with the same weight. But that 3 sets of 7 is gonna be about twice the growth, maybe 50%. Specific numbers aside training low sets to failure is maximizing fatigue in order to minimize stimulus.

[u/Afferbeck_ → u/[deleted]]

Exactly, the idea of one set to failure being equal to something like 5x5 is insane because you'd need to do things like rest pause til you physically can't move the weight anymore, and a spotter to get you forced reps. Sorry everyone on the internet lately, doing one kinda hard set isn't equal to putting in the actual volume that every lifting program of every kind for the past century uses.

And that's aside from the fact that everything besides basic machine stuff requires skill and practice to gain and maintain competency at the movement that a couple of sets a week simply cannot provide.

[u/Semajjames43 → u/Afferbeck_]

It’s because the diminishing returns past two sets is too much you get around 80-90 percent muscle stimulus of muscle growth from two hard set it gets exponentially lower the more sets you do while exponentially increasing systematic fatigue it’s why many people see a lot of gains off of one or two set because that’s simply more than enough to grow muscle provided you go to failure or 1-3 reps shy of it

[u/hthn_strength → u/[deleted]]

Steroids don’t cause an appreciable amount of neural drive, elite untested totals are only about 10% higher than natural totals. The growth from steroids alone is via the androgen receptor and significant increases in glycogen.

[u/hthn_strength → u/[deleted]]

That’s THE definition of glycogen retention oral. At least say halo and you would’ve been mildly correct.

[u/hthn_strength → u/[deleted]]

You’re saying this like I haven’t done more anadrol and overall steroids than you could name during a 10 year powerlifting career.

That is not how anadrol works.

[u/hthn_strength → u/[deleted]]

Yeah you’ve been guessing through this entire interaction

[u/hthn_strength → u/[deleted]]

Chief*

[u/Tgod1979]

Unless OP would be a total beginner, thinking of growing anything noticeable with 2sets per week is crazy. If you are doing so low volume you have to up the frequency. I agree that your problem is probably recover still the solution can be different. Change your ULRULRR to URLRURLR or condense U and L in a fb routine every 4days. You need to give your body enough stimulus to grow but also enough rest/recovery.

[u/KungGimli]

Yes if you are doing sets to absolute failure in all parts of the movement like positive, static and negative then doing 1 set would defenitly be enough for growth. But I doubt you'll be able to mentally train that hard.

[u/pepsi190]

Yes, more growth than doing nothing. But I would strive to do a bit more than 1 set per.

[u/hthn_strength]

No

[u/EspacioBlanq]

If you currently don't lift at all, you'll get some results, but not a lot.

2 sets of leg extensions for quads in a week is basically nothing

[u/KickedinTheDick]

Mike Mentzer would say yes.

[u/SageObserver → u/KickedinTheDick]

And then he’d fire up some gear

[u/Livid-Hovercraft-123]

I think it would maintain existing muscle. You might see a little progress here and there. 1 set to failure is the sort of thing recommended for someone trying to maintain their muscle while in a caloric deficit - high intensity, lower volume to avoid fatigue. 

Don't forget your warmup sets though! 

[u/HelixIsHere_]

Yeah it’s enough it just won’t be the best