Chest 2 times a week?

[hanger319]

I've been lifting for 3-4 years...and usually do chest atleast 2 times a week. Today i was in the gym and someone told me it was bad to do chest more than once a week...and the same with every other muscle group. Is it ok to work the chest hard 2 times a week...lets say on Monday's and Fridays? I know this is a really basic Q, sorryy all

[nsa]

Your chest should be sore from the stress you put on it when doing chest. It should be a good tight/sore for a few days following your workout, in which case it would be ill advised to do chest twice in a week. Bottom line -- you need to do something in your training that will stimulate muscle growth (i.e. increase weight, decrease rest, increase sets and reps). If your not sore from your first chest workout towards the end of the week then your not lifting with proper form, theres something wrong with your exercise selection or rep-set schemes. Always try to train progressively by one of these alterations to a workout: increasing weight, reps, sets or decreasing rest everything

[MrMondodondo]

Body needs time to recover to get maximum growth. Most will agree that it is in the 5-6 day range. So I would only do chest 1 in every 5-7 days. Or any other group for that matter. Although my legs have had good results with alittle more activity.

[nathanw21]

i woould not work it more than once every five days. it does not grow when you are working out. it grows when you rest it.

[nsa]

I've been lifting for 3-4 years...and usually do chest atleast 2 times a week. Today i was in the gym and someone told me it was bad to do chest more than once a week...and the same with every other muscle group. Is it ok to work the chest hard 2 times a week...lets say on Monday's and Fridays? I know this is a really basic Q, sorryy all

How have the weight of your lifts changed over this time of using the training routine? Did you increase your lift weights or did you stay in the same general range? Because if you are having trouble increasing the weight of your lifts then you may be experiencing over-training and muscular catabolism. Which is the last thing any performance athlete would want, trying to work harder and with higher volume hoping you'll just bust through the platuae with strength will not work (in a significant percentage of cases) and you'll most likely sink deeper into the over-training state.

So my advice is to take it easy and try to alter your routine to hit every major muscle group once in a 5-7 day period, so as to increase the stress you place on each muscle by dedicating each workout to 1 muscle group instead of 2 or 3 muscle groups. The higher intensity lifting (we are able to do because of dedication to one muscle group instead of 2+ groups each session) is great for building strength and muscle mass, which of the two increases depends on the rest periods between sets and the rep-set schemes.

You can stimulate the sh!t out of each muscle fiber by working only 1 muscle group a session and i mean torch it, pumped so good that begin to fear the possibility of a trip to the ER when your back, chest, biceps, quads, triceps explode from the internal pressure of the engorgement of the given muscle with blood and nutrients to help repair the muscle in its depleted state.

Also really squeeze the muscles when you lift, you want to feel the signals going from your cranial/spinal nerves to the effector muscle and get a grip on what it feels like when each muscle is contracted and how to tweak the form on exercises to get a different direction of strees on the muscle. Another tip i've recently learned, is to go to almost lockout on almost all exercises but don't actually lockout. This forces all of the stress from the lift to be placed on the muscle belly worked instead of the nearest joint, i.e. elbow, knee & shoulder. Try it out for a lifting session and see how it feels, for me and most of those i know who have tried this we all come to the same conclusion; you can't do as much weight as if you were locking out, but you get a good (maybe even better) signal to stimulate new growth, and on top of all that it ends up being far more gentle on the joints than the 'go to full lockout' method. Also alot of power-lifters and especially bodybuilders use this technique to alleviate joint pain/problems, while placing more stress on the muscle belly, thus making the exercise more efficient and more gentle on the joints commonly plaqued by problems.