I strength trained 1x per week and 7x per week for 5 months each

iferexo

New member
I figured I'd share because I learned a lot.

The reason: Trying to save time and maintain strength during what I knew would be a relatively busy season of life: buying a house and 1st year as an in-person teacher (no mute button)

The methods:

Note: I am a 28 yr old male. 5”8’. 143lbs. I don’t know my body fat percentage, but I look like someone who works out because I do. My weight stayed the same through all of this.

Once a week routine (Referred to as “1x” from here on out):
Daily routine (Referred to as “7x” from here on out):
  • Influenced by K Boges but to a lesser extent than 1x was influenced by Mindful Mover
  • Over the course of one month, I slowly worked up to 7 one leg squats, 7 pull ups (4 wide, then 3 hammer), 14 push ups (2 sets of 7, occasionally combined), 14 resistance band rows, 14 OH presses (15 lbs).
  • Burnouts: If I felt like going hard, I’d choose a movement and go to town. I didn’t do another burnout session on the same movement until all the others had a turn. Sometimes, my run was the burnout. Sometimes, I skipped an exercise if I did a burnout on it the day prior.
Common to both routines:
  • Daily light exercise: 20 min jog (very slow), skydivers, hollow body leg lifts, general arm movement (arm circles, etc.). (sometimes I nixed all of this and just walked the day after a 1x workout.)
  • I did the routines for about 4 or 5 months each. 1x-August through December. 7x-January through May.
  • Lightly Stretch for 10 minutes before bed.
Comparisons:

In terms of saving time, both routines came out to about 60-90 minutes of strength per week. They each had their own pros and cons related to time efficiency. 1x requires more set up, but you do it less often. 7x is best done with minimal gear because the frequency is so high. 5 minutes of set up/tear down per session means 35 minutes a week. That’s non trivial.

Rest time between sets worked in a similar way: I needed more rest between sets with 1x, but I could afford to take it because of the low frequency. I didn’t need any rest between exercises for the 7x routine unless I was feeling really crummy. For both routines, I did exercises in pairs to reduce time spent resting.

1x requires more of a warm up or at least gradually increasing intensity before the working sets. The lower intensity of 7x meant I could tack it onto the end of my daily light exercise and not have to warm up.

I ended up maintaining strength and muscle with 1x, but 7x surpassed my expectations and made me a little stronger. The largest factor in this is motivation. Both routines take a different kind of personal discipline: 1x requires me to push through intense discomfort while 7x requires me to hold back when I want to do more. I personally have a natural inclination for the latter. I could see people with different personalities enjoying 1x more.

This is not to say that 7x is all about holding back: I had days where I got home and really didn’t feel like working out. Habits helped me stay consistent on those days: 7x quickly became a part of daily life. The lower frequency of 1x kept it from ever feeling like business as usual.

In fact, I didn’t really plan to switch to 7x after a few months of 1x. I just realized that optimizing for time reduction doesn’t capture the whole picture; I wondered what it might look like to optimize for effort reduction.

7x allowed for autoregulation. Sometimes, weeks passed and I never felt like doing a burnout so I didn’t. I suspect my body actually needed it. There were also weeks where I did several burnouts. To be fair, you can autoregulate by pushing a 1x session back a day or two if you’re not feeling it. However, that requires weekend warriors to do their session on a weekday.

7x afforded me more flexibility. Some days, I did skip my 7x workout because of time restraints or my personal discipline failed. It did not hinder progress in the same way as slacking off just a little bit during a 1x workout seemed to. I could also be flexible with the exercises themselves: For example, I don’t like high bear crawls as much as overhead press, but sometimes I really wanted to workout outdoors so I made the substitution and got right back to overhead press the next day.

It’s kind of satisfying being sore for several days after a 1x session, but I prefer being ready for unplanned physical endeavors in the way that 7x lets me. Even after a burnout session, I only feel a little soreness just because my body is more used to it. I also feel like the high frequency improved my general coordination-I’m simply more used to moving my body around in various ways so the physical tasks of everyday life seem easier.

There are also disadvantages to 7x: generally, I found it easier to injure myself, but YMMV. If I push myself too hard, it's just a matter of time, and I found it easy to push myself too hard. On the other hand, if I can’t muster up the grit to push hard enough through that accommodating resistance exercise with 1x, I just don’t make gains. (Edit: I gave more detail in a replies to comments about this but don't want to make this post even longer by including them.)

Also, while 7x worked better for me, it’s important to note the following: I had significantly more stress from work in the fall than in the spring, I am a sample size of one, I wasn’t rigorous in tracking results, and there may have been some user error with 1x. I’d like to know if any user error sticks out.

Commonalities:

Both methods improved my form in their own ways. I learned about accommodating resistance through the mindful mover, and it really is a beautiful thing. I absolutely love the arc row and continued using it as a burnout in my 7x sessions (it’s too tough on the elbows for every day, though). 7x simply gave me more non-fatigued practice. Also, I felt I was limiting my reps most days. That means consistently trying to squeeze all the juice out of each one, building really good form habits.

Both methods helped eliminate decision fatigue during a stressful season of life. For me, the 3 workouts per week that are typically recommended are harder to schedule in than either of the methods I tried.

Both methods taught me how little I can do and get away with it. There’s a certain faith I had to have to take 6 days off of strength work in between sessions. That’s a good mental exercise for life in general-wisdom gains. The same goes for that first month of 7x where I slowly ramped up from 2 pull ups a day to 7 without any burnout sessions. It often felt too easy.

TLDR:
  • They both worked well-each with its own pros and cons
  • 7x worked a little better for me in my particular situation
  • I learned I don’t need to work a muscle intensely nearly as often as I thought.
  • Go check out the Mindful Mover and K Boges. They ask good questions and raise good points.
 
@iferexo I have a similar story to offer. I've tried 7x and 2x, and found for me that 2x is more effective. This is exactly for the reason you stated - it fits my personality. I don't know how to take it easy, I'm always pedal to the metal. With 7x I kept getting burned out hardcore and couldn't recover, but with 2x I can push myself to my heart's content. Plus, I enjoy the workout so I kept slowly adding more stuff to do during 7x which is obviously not smart.

Other factors include the fact I enjoy having a total rest evening where I can dedicate myself to other things I'm working on, such as studying languages, and not be tired from my workout.

I've spent almost my whole life trying to do 3-4x but it's never worked out because I push myself too hard. I keep having to tone it back down to 2x which seems to be the most effective for me in terms of gains and recovery. I gain easy to begin with, losing is the hard part.

Just my N=1.
 
@dman2718281828 I started doing this.

I used to run and lift everyday.

I started to split up the week and run, then next day lift, then rest(which usually means disc golfing).

So I still get everything in but by splitting it up I'm getting more effective workouts in.
 
@wendysanderlin I play around with it, but right now I'm doing one day as 3-5 reps and the next day be more like 15+ reps. Training to both increase my muscle mass as well as how effectively I can use that muscle basically
 
@iferexo I love your experimental mindset. You basically ignored nearly everything the fitness industry said and tried both extremes! There's a lot that can be learned from experiments like that. Well done! 👏! And thanks for recording it for us!
 
@iferexo Oh man it is real and it can totally wreck your gains by making you do more than you should and taking you for a trip aboard the Pain Train! I'm happy it could help you get past that so that you're not vulnerable to it!
 
@iferexo I’ve gotta say, while he seems like a really nice guy, I’m incredibly skeptical of mindful mover and his whole bag. Knowing what we know about strength, that it is a skill and like all skills, it requires neurological adaptation. Neurological adaptation has one major requirement, time spent. No one, and I’m sorry if this is discouraging, will ever get good at say guitar if they only do it once a week. Play 15 min a day for a week, I guarantee you will be better than if you play once a week for 3 months.

I also know this from experience as a pottery teacher. I can always see the difference w my students who come in and practice even one extra day as opposed to just in our class time. Further more, students whose only practice in class almost always lose whatever progress they make if they miss a class.

Maybe this all sounds abstract, but it really isn’t when you consider all of these things are skills and there is ample research on what it takes to build a skill. It takes time spent doing that skill.

I follow mindful mover in insta and enjoy a lot of what he has to say. I could even see what he is saying being applicable to somebody w a significant training history. However, when ever he shows videos of his client “who’ve made progress w 1 workout week” I just keep seeing people doing the shadiest ring handstand push ups I’ve ever seen and they look like they’re gunna rip their fucking arms off.

I say all of this is in response to OP’s sentiment that the 7x was more likely for injury than the 1x. Maybe in this instance, yes? But if you were actually going to push hard enough to make progress at 1x, I honestly don’t understand how you wouldn’t eventually hurt yourself.

Just my 2 cents.
 
@eberzas This is a wise observation. But there is a significant difference between connecting neurons for learning and growing muscle tissue for strength. Neurons can link up in seconds, and (for the most part) pre-exist. New muscle takes days. A fine motor skill is basically a neuronal skill. Lifting heavy things requires muscle bulk and training. Check out Dr. Doug McGuff and Body by Science. Mindful Mover adapted the Big 5 from him as a bodyweight workout. It's a VERY efficient stimulus for muscle hypertrophy and hyperplasia.
 
@raymondrieger I’ve never read the book, but I have looked into Body by Science. Am I incorrect that it advises trainees following their protocol to use machines instead of free weights because of the exact reasons I mention above ie that one will not be adept enough at the big lifts at a level that’s challenging enough to make progress.

When you consider how skill based even the basic calisthenics movement are, it sound like a horrible idea to apply this concept to things like hand stand push ups or for that matter anything that has to do w rings. It’s also well documented that muscles grow much faster than tendons and again, partly why I imagine Body by Science has people using machines.

Honestly, it took me over two years to unlock the pistol squat. I knew I had the strength for it early on and that part of what held me back was that I was flat footed. But it took a number of different approaches, mainly greasing the groove w negatives and also incorporating it into my yoga practice. I really just can’t imagine that it could have just skipped all of that.

And for the record, I’m m not somebody who thinks your 3x work outs need to be an hour +. I’m a fan of Dan John and Geoff Neupert (I also train kettlebells) and I rarely work out for longer than 30 min w a 5 min warm up and some light stretching afterward.
 
@eberzas You bring up good points

Strength as a skill: I think that's likely the mechanism behind why I feel generally more coordinated with 7x even though hypertrophy was no different.

Dangerous Handstands: I was too scared to even do the pike pushups so I did what works for me: overhead press.

Is 7x really more likely to cause injury? I edited my post to emphasize that this is just my experience. This little self experiment doesn't have the rigor to say that "7x is generally more likely to cause injury". I detailed exactly what was behind that statement in another comment reply.
 
@iferexo Yeah, I agree. Once you dial it in, I don’t think 7x is more likely to cause injury than any other routine. Maybe easier to over for it if your pushing too hard.
 
@iferexo I was wondering what method could be better cause I’m a fan of both sides. It’s just weird to see someone tracking and testing these methods. Thank you for your contribution.
 
@iferexo This is awesome. During my college semester I was doing a 1x workout with a trainer and former client of the mindful mover. Mid may with no classes and more time I started body by rings which is 4x per week and I haven’t missed a workout since. I’m gonna try and finish the full 18 weeks but when classes start back up in August and I can’t find the time, I’ll go back to 1x.
 
@iferexo I have nothing to say, I only want to praise the effort for actually trying and sharing your results

thank you, many ppl will search and find this post in the future
 
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