Centaur

For advanced lifters who have trained in the gym for a long time and are ready to come in four times a week. Two strength days and two volume days, with the upper and lower body trained separately. Three stages: in Base the load rises, in Build it moves in a wave with a step back, and in Peak it drops at the end of the stage before the next round. The exercises stay the same across all three stages, and your maxes on them carry over from stage to stage.

The upper and lower body are each trained twice a week: once for 4–5 reps in the main lifts to build strength (isolation that day goes for 9–12), once for 8–12 reps to build size. Every muscle gets both heavy and high-rep work. Strength sets end with at least one rep left before failure.

Method: Upper/lower with strength and volume days.
The upper and lower body are each trained twice a week: one day for 4–5 reps in the main lifts to build strength (isolation that day goes for 9–12), the other for 8–12 reps to build size. This way every muscle gets both heavy and high-rep work while training twice a week.

What studies found:

• With equal volume the strength scheme gave more strength; muscle growth was the same (Schoenfeld et al., 2014)
• Muscle growth does not depend on the weight; max strength grows more with heavy weight (Lopez et al., 2021)
• With weekly volume equal, training frequency has little effect on muscle growth (Schoenfeld et al., 2019)
• For trained lifters, 12–20 sets per muscle a week work for muscle growth (Baz-Valle et al., 2022)

The studies tested the principles; the program itself has not been tested in this form.