I Proved (Almost) Everyone Is Wasting Time In The Gym

What if half the time and effort you're spending in the gym isn't doing anything? What? I know. I know how that sounds, but I just ran an experiment on over 200 people and what we found went against everything I thought I knew about training. I'll break down exactly what we did, why most studies never catch

this, and how many workouts you need to get the best results. Ever since I got into lifting, I've always been someone who trains a lot. usually with six hard workouts a week. Because according to the latest research, the more sets you do at the

gym, the faster you grow. But most of these studies have only tested high volumes on one or two muscles at a time, not your entire body. So, was I getting more gains training 6 days per week, or could I have gotten just as good of results training with half of

that? To find out, I just need to run one of the biggest experiments of my life on 200 real people. That's Drew. He's one of 200 lifters we recruited as part of our 10-week

experiment where each lifter was randomly assigned into one of two groups. The first group, which Drew fell into, is training six days per week using a pushpull leg split. Pretty much the exact same routine I followed for years with around 20 sets per muscle per

week. Now, the second group is also doing a push pull leg split, but only three workouts per week. So, same general program, same muscles worked, but half the workouts and half the number of sets. Coming off of working out six days a

week, this is nothing. Like me and most of the subjects we pulled, Matt is predicting that the group training twice as much should build the most muscle. He's even worried if he'll be able to build any muscle at all in this plant. I don't know.

I hope I don't get fat. Now, to control everyone's nutrition, every subject followed a small calorie surplus with a minimum daily protein target, and everything was trapped in our Built with Science app. And so, if we noticed anyone wasn't consistent, we kicked them out of the experiment. We also made sure

both groups were balanced for gender and had an equal number of beginner and intermediates in each. And as for how we're measuring muscle growth, each week, participants are submitting circumference measurements of their flexed and unflexed muscles. And while you might think this isn't the most

accurate way to assess growth, a lot of studies, including some of your videos, Jeremy, you'll take a smaller group of people and do these really high-tech body composition measurements. But obviously, you can only do that with small groups of people. So, with this design, what we do is we sacrifice the high-tech body comp

measurements so that we can expand out and get a more, a larger, more representative sample. That's Dr. Eric Trexler, a statistician and muscle growth researcher who helped us design this experiment in the first place. After the 10 weeks are up, he'll

independently crunch the numbers and tell us exactly what happened. But so far, after just 3 weeks of training, the 6 day per week group are struggling to keep up. This week, I missed a few morning workouts. Had to do them at night after

leaving the office. I started to dislike the 6 day split a bit. This is where we quickly started to notice a big difference between our two groups. We asked all of our subjects to rate the difficulty of their program at the end of each week. Going into the gym only 3 days a week, I

am giving 110% rather than cutting corners here and there. I'm totally digging the program so far. I've done a six days routine in the past. But this program, it gives me energy. I wake up wanting to work out instead of dreading it. And in the first

four weeks, the three workout group consistently rated their workouts feeling easier and easier. Whereas in our six workout group, it's a lot. It's definitely tough to hit six days of the week. My muscles are still sore when I work out. Probably tougher than I expected.

They ranked their workouts as much harder and never really got any easier. But we also asked both groups to rank how much they thought their workouts were working. I had a massage this week. and she said that she could tell that my muscles were a lot stronger, a lot of definition and like the Vshape.

I will say that my progress has been explosive. If I look at week zero and now there is a huge difference. And while both the three and six day groups were confident their plans were working, the 6-day group repeatedly seemed to believe their program was

doing more to maximize growth. And it seemed like that confidence was helping them push through even the most challenging of their workouts. I feel nauseated which causes vomiting after the leg exercise a couple of days ago.

Now I can relate to people who like to skip the leg day. Meanwhile, some members of our 3-day group weren't sure if they were seeing results at all. My bellies was growing. The rest of me is staying the same. I do not feel any stronger nor fitter. So, at this point, I would say our sixth

workout group not only had over a decade's worth of research predicting they would win, but they also seem to have a clear advantage in confidence as well. Been telling myself to stop whining and wake up when the alarm is on. I'm enjoying the result of my discipline,