Thanks in part to Instagram’s selfie-addicted glute girls, curvaceous buttocks are now the wish of many – including men. But how much and how often should you actually train those things for optimal curves?

TRAINING VOLUME AND FREQUENCY: THE GENERAL RULES

Nowadays we usually define training volume as the number of sets per muscle group per week. Although still subject to considerable debate,  some general guidelines have emerged from the evidence-based bodybuilding community for the optimal training volume, i.e. the volume at which you actually achieve maximum muscle growth (also known as the Maximum Adaptive Volume, MAV). Those guidelines are briefly as follows:

• beginners: 10 sets per muscle group per week
• intermediates: 15 sets per muscle group per week
• advanced: 20 sets per muscle group per week
• more advanced: 25 sets per muscle group per week
• per workout: 5-12 sets per muscle group

These guidelines assume that you train your sets to near muscle failure, but usually not to complete muscle failure. During your sets, you mostly stay 1-3 reps away from the point where you can’t do the next rep immediately (1-3 Reps In Reserve, RIR). If you were to train all your sets to muscle failure (i.e. with 0 RIR), you could do a lot less volume because of the much greater training load – maybe only half the number of sets stated above. As a result, you build muscle mass less quickly.

Because as a natural bodybuilder you can only build a fairly limited amount of muscle mass in a day , it makes little sense to do more than 10 sets per muscle group per session (or per day). Already after 5 sets the growth stimulus decreases, to stagnate around 10 sets. And under the influence of central fatigue, the quality of your sets also decreases the longer your training lasts. So limit your volume per training to 5-12 sets per muscle group, which usually comes down to two to three exercises per muscle group.

The optimal training frequency (how often you train a muscle group) depends on your volume needs and on how fast your recovery between two training sessions of the same muscle group. If you can grow a muscle group with 10 sets a week, you basically only need to train it once a week. If you need more than 10 sets, it is wise to divide them over at least two workouts. So ideally you do 12 sets in two sessions of 6 sets each.

Furthermore, you must ensure that there is at least 48 hours between those two training sessions. That’s how long it takes an average bodybuilder to complete muscle protein synthesis and recovery after a workout. Advanced people usually recover faster and can even train a muscle group again after 24 hours, provided the volume per training is small.

TRAINING YOUR BUTT LIKE A ‘FIT GIRL’

If you are an average natural bodybuilder (you have two to three years of training experience) you should therefore do about 15 sets per week for your butt (officially: gluteus maximus, medius and minimus). That seems relatively little if you compare it with what the fit girls of Instagram often rush through butt training. Often they torment their buttocks almost daily, with several exercises. And ostensibly without getting into trouble with their recovery.

Coach Bret Contreras, the world’s best-known expert in the field of butt training, also sees high volumes for the buttocks. In an interview, he revealed that he allows his clients (mostly women) to do as many as 30 to 40 sets a week ^[ i ] . Below you can see the result to which this can lead.

 

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Een bericht gedeeld door Bret “Glute Guy” Contreras PhD (@bretcontreras1)

30-40 sets for a muscle group is a lot and in principle not necessary. Although the gluteus maximus is the largest muscle in our body, that doesn’t mean it needs more volume. Small and large muscle groups probably need about the same ‘treatment’ in order to grow, whether in intensity, volume or frequency ^[ xiv ] .

The fact that many women achieve good results with such high training volumes is probably also due to other reasons.

RECOVERY

This explanation mainly lies in the fact that women often (almost) exclusively train their buttocks. Other muscle groups are often just an afterthought for them or are even deliberately spared. As a result, they have a much higher recoverable volume (Maximum Recoverable Volume, MRV) for their buttocks than if they would train all muscle groups at normal volumes, as most men do. You sometimes see something similar in powerlifting. There have been reports of powerlifters making the fastest progress on the bench press during times when injuries prevented them from squatting and deadlifting. And you sometimes see advanced bodybuilders doing specialization blocks, in which they train most muscle groups on maintenance, in order to give one muscle group the full blow.

In addition, physiologically speaking, women generally seem to recover somewhat more easily from strength training than men ^[ ii ] .

However, all this does not mean that men cannot handle high volume training. For example, there are studies, albeit controversial, in which experienced male strength athletes achieved muscle growth without any problems with 32 and even 45 sets per muscle group per week ^{[ iii ] [ iv ]} . However, whether someone can actually handle such volumes depends on many variables, such as training status, genetics, muscle group size and training variables (RIR, rest times, session volume, total volume). In any case, it is clear that doing 30-40 sets per muscle group per week is never possible with all muscle groups at the same time .

MUSCLE BUILDING

You may think that women benefit from high volumes because they need more training stimulus than men. It may surprise you, but women can probably build muscle mass just as quickly and as much as men. It is only because they are less muscular in themselves that they will ultimately not be able to become as muscular as men ^[ v ] .

It is true that women produce about 15 times less testosterone than men. But while testosterone is important for muscle growth in men, muscle growth in women is mainly fueled by IGF-1 and growth hormone ^[ vi ] . And they produce more than enough of that.

Given the many shapely derrières displayed on Instagram and co, at least women seem to have no problems growing their largest muscle, the glutus maximus. In that respect they surpass many male strength athletes. In addition, women may benefit more than men from metabolic strength training, which may also allow them to handle a somewhat higher productive volume. More on that in a moment.

RULE OF THIRDS: ONE SET IS NOT THE OTHER

High volume training always requires a well thought out training program, even if you only turn up the volume for one muscle group. One of Bret Contreras’ ‘secrets’ is that he applies three variables to his butt training, which are evenly distributed over the total training volume.

Those variables are: vector (the type of exercise based on the direction in which the weight moves), effort (the degree to which you train to muscle failure, also called relative intensity) and load (the heaviness of the weight, also called absolute intensity). Contreras also refers to this as the Rule of Thirds .

 

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VECTOR

Contreras divides his sets more or less evenly into three types of exercises:

• Axial loading (the weight comes from above), such as the squat, (Romanian) deadlift, and lunge. These give the greatest eccentric growth stimulus, have the greatest Range Of Motion (ROM), cause the greatest muscle damage and require the most recovery capacity. These exercises emphasize stretching and are therefore also known as stretchers .
• Anteroposterior loads (the weight is pushed forward), such as the hip thrust, glute bridge, cable pull-through, back extension, and kick-back. These have a smaller eccentric growth stimulus, a smaller ROM, and the peak tension occurs at the highest point, where the gluteal muscle is contracted and thus is at its smallest. All this causes less muscle damage than with axial exercises, allowing you to recover more quickly from anteroposterior exercises. These types of exercises usually have the largest gluteal muscle activity and are therefore also called activators.
• Lateral/twisting load (weight comes from the side and/or makes a twisting motion), such as hip abduction, band side walk, band side lying clam, and standing cable external rotation. These exercises have only a small ROM and a relatively low gluteal muscle activity, so you can recover quickly from them. They are usually performed with a resistance band, which creates an alternating tension on the gluteal muscle, allowing for a higher number of repetitions. Thus, this type of exercise lends itself to, among other things, the creation of metabolic stress (more on this shortly). This creates muscle pumps, which is why they are also called pumpers .

By doing each of these types of exercises, you ensure on the one hand that the gluteal muscle is fully trained from all sides. On the other hand, you can better dose the training load, because you are not only doing exercises with major muscle damage and a long recovery time. As you can imagine that 30 sets of just squats, deadlifts and lunges every week would do more harm than good.

EFFORT

By effort we mean the effort you make per set, regardless of the weight you train with. Officially it is that relative intensity. As you may know, you can basically achieve maximum muscle growth with any weight, as long as you train close to muscle failure ^[ x ] . The last five or so reps before muscle failure are the most tiring and provide the greatest growth stimulus, regardless of the total length of the set (i.e. whether you’re doing ten or twenty reps, for example). We also call them stimulating, or effective repetitions.

The effort or relative intensity is nowadays usually expressed in Reps In Reserve (RIR). 2 RIR means that you keep two repetitions ‘in the tank’, at 0 RIR you can no longer do a repetition and you train until muscle failure. Training to muscle failure is likely to provide a slightly greater growth stimulus than staying a few reps away from it. At the same time, it entails a (perhaps disproportionately) large training load. If you train all your sets to muscle failure, you need a lot more recovery capacity and you can do a lot less volume. Most experts therefore recommend using 1-3 RIR for most sets. In short, training with a few reps in the tank (1-3 RIR) provides a much better Stimulus:Fatigue Ratio (SFR) than training to absolute muscle failure (0 RIR).

The latter does not mean that you should never train to muscle failure. As long as you do it dosed. Bret Contreras therefore divides his training volume over three ranges of relative intensity:

• to muscle failure (0 RIR);
• to near muscle failure (1-2 RIR);
• quite far from muscle failure (>3 RIR).

The advantage is that you can do much more volume than if you would train only to muscle failure. This results in more effective repetitions and therefore on balance more muscle growth. Interesting here is the range where you stay relatively far away from muscle failure (>3 RIR). You may think that sets with such little effort give little growth stimulus. This is also true in mechanical terms. However, new research suggests that sets with a rather low relative intensity, combined with a relatively large number of repetitions, more sarcoplasmatic hypertrophy fueling ^[ xi ] . That is a form of muscle growth in which the muscle fibers do not grow larger (as with mechanical tension happens), but the plasma around those fibers expands. Sarcoplasmic hypertrophy is said to be mainly caused by metabolic stress, of which more shortly.

Anteroposterior exercises like the hip thrust and cable pull-though you can sometimes train to muscle failure. Large axial (vertical) exercises, such as the squat and deadlift, are best avoided because of the disproportionately large muscle damage and central fatigue that results. And also for injury prevention, because of the heavy weights you usually use for this type of exercise (see next point). You can train anteroposterior exercises to muscle failure, but they also lend themselves to creating metabolic stress through very repetitions, usually keeping you further away from muscle failure. Due to the increasing cardiovascular fatigue of these types of sets, this usually happens automatically.

LOAD

A third distribution of forces takes place in the weights, or the absolute intensity. Conteras uses light, medium and heavy weights, so you train in different rep ranges.

The use of different loads/repranges offers several advantages:

• it is better for your joints and tendons not to train with heavy weights alone;
• by training in different rep ranges, you train both type I and type II muscle fibers optimally (although this requires further research ^[ vii ] );
• by training in different rep ranges, you may be targeting different muscle growth signaling pathways, possibly building more muscle mass overall than if you were doing everything in the same rep range ^[ viii ] ;
• by also training in higher rep ranges you specifically benefit from muscle growth as a result of metabolic stress (sarcoplasmic muscle growth, as explained in Effort).

Heavy weights (5-8 reps) are best used for large axial exercises. Doing many repetitions in this type of exercise leads to great central fatigue, which can be at the expense of the relative intensity. High rep ranges (12+ reps) are best for the lateral/twisting exercises. You often create so much metabolic stress that you will have to stop the set quite long before muscle failure. But we have seen that in some of the exercises this does not matter. Anteroposterior exercises such as the hip thrust can in principle be done with all types of weight, although you will generally operate in the ‘classic’ range of 6 to 12 repetitions.

It also seems that women can benefit more from high rep ranges than men. Women have about 30% more type I muscle fibers than men ^[ ii ] , the type that are less prone to fatigue and could therefore benefit from many repetitions. In addition, women can handle more metabolic stress than men ^[ ix ] , making this type of strength training ideally suited to them. No wonder the ladies hold their own in metabolic group strength training such as body pump!

HOW DO YOU CALCULATE THE VOLUME?

By training volume we mean the hard sets, so all sets except warm-up sets, which you do for one specific muscle group, in this case the buttocks.

But what if you train multiple muscle groups at the same time with an exercise? After all, this is especially the case with axial exercises. And in some, like parallel squats and conventional deadlifts, the glutes aren’t even the primary muscle trained.

In our opinion, the most accurate way of calculating sets is to use fractional sets. You only count full sets for a muscle group if it is the primary target muscle of an exercise. Otherwise only half, or even less, depending on how large the muscle group is involved in the exercise. For the buttocks, we would calculate the sets for the most important buttocks exercises as follows:

3 sets of barbell squat (full) = 3 sets of quadriceps and 3 sets of glutes
3 sets of barbell squat (half) = 3 sets of quadriceps and 1.5 sets of glutes
3 sets of barbell deadlift = 3 sets of hamstrings and 1.5 sets of glutes
3 sets of barbell Romanian deadlift = 3 sets hamstrings and 2 sets glutes
3 sets dumbbell lunges = 2 sets quadriceps and 3 sets glutes
3 sets barbell hip thrust = 3 sets glutes
3 sets cable pull-through = 3 sets hamstrings and 3 sets glutes
3 sets standing cable hip abduction = 3 sets of glutes

We realize that you could calculate the sets differently. Some will find that you should count the sets of compound exercises more heavily, as they may provide greater stimulus (and require greater recovery). You can also completely remove the compound exercises from the quota, and only count the direct buttocks. That’s what coach Mike Israetel does, for example : he considers 4 to 12 sets as the MAV for the buttocks – the volume for maximum muscle growth – but that is on top of the complete range of leg exercises (squats, deadlifts, lunges, …) ^[ xii ]. If you translate that to our calculation above, you will probably soon end up with 25 sets of buttocks. If you count the leg exercises as a whole as sets for the buttocks, you come out above 30.

Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter how you calculate your volume, as long as you stick to a set method so that you can use a certain number of sets as a starting point for your progression.

SO, HOW MUCH VOLUME SHOULD YOU DO?

So how many sets do you have to use for your buttocks for optimal gains? Unfortunately, the central question of this article is difficult to answer. In fact, determining the most optimal training volume for a certain muscle group for you is, in our opinion, the most difficult aspect of natural bodybuilding. After all, training volume is very much tied to personal factors, such as training status, recovery capacity, gender and, last but not least, genetics.

Now, with regard to training volume in general, you will ultimately have to figure this out for yourself, just continue training at a certain volume (based on the guidelines at the beginning of this article) and monitor the results.

However, we also like to give some guidelines specifically for the buttocks. This is the MAV (Maximum Recoverable Volume), so the volume for maximum muscle growth. The volumes for maintenance (Maintenance Volume, MV) and minimum muscle growth (Minimum Effective Volume, MEV) are much lower. We also use the calculation method above. So the volumes include compound exercises with fractional sets. Finally, with these recommendations, we assume that you apply the described Rule of Thirds, so that you can do a little more productive volume than usual.

MAV men:
beginners: 10-15 sets per week
intermediates: 15-20 sets per week
advanced: 20-25 sets per week
more advanced: 25-30 sets per week*

MAV women:
beginners: 10-20 sets per week
intermediates: 20-25 sets per week
advanced: 25-30 sets per week
more advanced: 30-35 sets per week*

* probably only feasible as a specialization in connection with recovery

HOW TO DISTRIBUTE THE VOLUME?

The relatively high volumes are only effective if you spread them smartly over your training week. This can be done in different ways, but in any case stick to the following two rules of thumb:

• do no more than 5-12 sets per workout;
• use at least 48 hours of rest between two the same (type of) exercises, with squats and deadlifts at least 48-72 hours. Beginners are advised to rest for at least 48 hours between two buttock workouts, regardless of the exercises.

As you can see, we set the volume ceiling per workout slightly higher than normal (12 instead of 10). That’s because you can probably do a little more productive volume if you do the three different types of exercises in one session. Indeed, we saw that lateral and twisting exercises, in combination with a relatively low relative and absolute intensity, probably (also) stimulate a different type of muscle growth than axial and anteroposterior exercises performed at a higher intensity. However, if you limit yourself to only one type of exercise during a session, muscle growth usually stagnates after 6-10 sets.

Then you can actually put together your training program in two ways: either you do a ‘mixed’ training that incorporates all elements of the Rule of Thirds, or you focus on one type of exercise in each training. The latter is a must if you use a high training frequency, for example four or five times a week. Then you sometimes train your buttocks for two days in a row, which is only possible if the first training only contains exercises from which you recover quickly (so in principle within 24 hours).

Below are two examples of how you could put all this into practice. Both contain roughly the same exercises, but due to the different training frequencies (three versus four times a week) we have classified them differently and we have also slightly adjusted the rep ranges and RIR. For example 1 (3x a week) you see that every workout is a mix of all kinds of exercises, rep ranges and RIR. After all, you can always rest completely for a day. We did, however, take into account the load on the quadriceps and hamstrings when distributing the exercise. After all, there is a good chance that you will still feel your hamstrings on Wednesday due to Monday’s Romanian deadlifts. For example 2 (4x a week) each training is devoted to one ‘theme’: respectively metabolic, mechanical/intensive (hamstrings-oriented),

EXAMPLE 1: 3x a week (30 sets in total, approx. 25 for the buttocks)
Monday
Romanian deadlift, 3 sets / 8 reps / 2 RIR
barbell hip thrust, 3 sets / 10 reps / 1 RIR
abductor machine, 3 sets / 15 reps / 3 RIR
leg press (feet high and wide), 1 set / 8 reps / 0 RIR

Wednesday
dumbbell lunge, 3 sets / 10 reps / 2 RIR
frog pumps, 3 sets / 20 reps / 3+ RIR
standing cable hip abduction, 3 sets / 12 reps / 3 RIR

Friday
barbell full back squat, 3 sets / 6 reps / 2 RIR
glute bridge, 3 sets / 10 reps / 1 RIR
cable pull-through, 2 sets / 20 reps / 3 RIR
band side lying clam, 2 sets / 15 reps / 2 RIR (last set 0 RIR)

EXAMPLE 2: 4x a week (34 sets in total, approx. 30 for the buttocks)
Monday
abductor machine, 3 sets / 15 reps / 3 RIR
band side lying clam, 3 sets / 20 reps / 3+ RIR
standing cable hip abduction, 3 sets / 15 reps / 3+ RIR

Tuesday
Romanian deadlift, 3 sets / 8 reps / 2 RIR
barbell hip thrust, 3 sets / 8 reps / 1 RIR
cable pull-through, 2 sets / 10 reps / 1 RIR

Thursday
barbell full back squat, 3 sets / 6 reps / 2 RIR
dumbbell lunge, 3 sets / 10 reps / 2 RIR

Friday
frog pumps, 3 sets / 20 reps / 3+ RIR
cable pull-through, 2 sets / 10 reps / 1 RIR
abductor machine, 3 sets / 15 reps / 3 RIR
band side lying clam, 3 sets / 20 reps / 3+ RIR

IN SUMMARY

The optimal training volume for the buttocks differs per person and depends on various factors. For most, during a training career it progresses from 10 to 30 sets per week in men and even more in women. ‘Optimal’ means that each set is productive (creates growth stimulus) and that you can fully recover from that volume.

Training volumes of more than 25 sets are usually only possible if you specialize. Many women train almost exclusively their buttocks, which means they can train at maximum volumes without any problems (apart from the fact that women also recover slightly faster than men).

You should also try to distribute your training volume evenly over:

• different types of exercises: stretchers (squat, deadlift), activators (hip thrust, cable pull-through) and pumpers (hip abduction, band side walk);
• different relative intensity levels (both training close to muscle failure and further away from it);
• different weights and therefore different rep ranges.

Finally, make sure that you do not do more than 5-12 sets per muscle group per training and that you build in sufficient rest time between two training sessions (24-72 hours). How long you need to recover exactly depends on training status, gender, training variables and the type of exercise.

REFERENCES

• ^[ i ] https://youtu.be/zJ0bvky42s8?t=547
• ^[ ii ] https://www.strongerbyscience.com/gender-differences-in-training-and-diet/
• ^[ iii ] https://journals.lww.com/acsm-msse/Fulltext/2019/01000/Resistance_Training_Volume_Enhances_Muscle.13.aspx
• ^[ iv ] https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnut.2018.00084/
• ^[ v ] https://mennohenselmans.com/natural-muscular-potential-women/
• ^[ vi ] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21135066
• ^[ vii ] https://www.strongerbyscience.com/muscle-fiber-type/
• ^[ viii ] https://physoc.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.14814/phy2.14100
• ^[ ix ] https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.01342.2003
• ^[ ix ] https://www.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.01342.2003
• ^[ x ] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17461391.2018.1450898
• ^[ xi ] https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/596049v1
• ^[ xii ] https://renaissanceperiodization.com/glute-training-tips-hypertrophy/
• ^[ xiii ] https://youtu.be/_CtkOK1-Gng?t=2048
• ^[ xiv ] https://mennohenselmans.com/optimal-training-large-small-muscles/