Are numbers important in bodybuilding? Certainly. If you do only one set of curls, you will be loosing your time if you are looking for muscular size. If you do 37, you will end with your arms in plaster casts for six months because of the overtraining. Between those extremes we find the proper number of sets and repetitions for you. And those ideal figures do not end in curls. Discover your magic numbers to maximize the development, accelerate recovery, ensure the neuromuscular efficiency and even establish the basic heart rate.  

Generally, the numbers that are usually talked about at the gym concern the weights handled. However, I will talk about all the numbers related with your routine except the weights: sets and repetitions, and not only per motion, but the ones that constitute the session; the frequency of trainings and -the other side of the coin- the days you don't go to the gym. There are plenty possibilities that some numbers remain constantly, as 3, 5, 8 and 10 and perhaps 12. When you started in bodybuilding, you did three sets of 10 repetitions and trained three times a week. Then you read Arnold: the education of a bodybuilder and you started doing five sets of eight repetitions of exact four movements per body part (the magic 20 total sets) and training six days a week. You took the Sunday free. Why Sunday? Because it is the resting day par excellence. The birth of my brother, Peter, was to be on October the 1st, but it was one week delayed. One year later, I came to the world. My birth was also predicted to be on October the 1st but it happened one week before. Significant, right? No, it is not significant, but pure coincidence. It seems significant because of the repetition of the date. There is a pattern that makes most of the people who hear this story gets surprised, and I confess I tell it quite often because I have fun watching people astonished by nothing.

I stand for the theory that prays human being likes patterns, repetitive and regular; the round numbers. There is no scientific study which has proved that eight repetition sets are more efficient than nine. Then, why do we do eight repetition sets? Because Arnold did it? Do I need to say that is not a solid reason?

There are several ways to delimitate the most productive repetitions range for each person. So far the most difficult thing has been to calculate the number of sets. Two or three, as Mentzer? 20 or 30, as Schwarzenegger? An intermediate number? We have limited ourselves to other people's theories, looking for someone who seems reliable to us to imitate him. Needless to say it is a bad method. But I think I have discovered a more scientific method that may help to establish the frequency of trainings.

To determine the accurate number of repetitions, we should start with neuromuscular efficiency, I mean, the quantity of muscle recruited to make concrete efforts. Which percentage of the total fibres of a specific muscle you can activate simultaneously? While this figure depends on the strength that it may come to exert, it is not the unique factor. The resistance of tendons and ligaments, the insertions, biomechanics, the length of the extremities and the proportion between the different types of muscular fibres (both fast and slow contraction) also have a decisive function. I have seen men with low neuromuscular efficiency with incredible strength, but who would have had more if they would have had major neuromuscular efficiency. In short, which is the importance of neuromuscular efficiency and how is it determined?

We could think that a major neuromuscular efficiency implies major resistance, but that's not correct (forget for one moment the general strength. There are so many factors that influence it that the neuromuscular efficiency becomes an insignificant element). People with a higher level of neuromuscular efficiency will do fewer repetitions with a specific percentage of the maximum load. They are able to recruit more fibres, and that means they will have less available for the next repetition. Let's suppose we have 25 kilos for one of them and 50 for the other. It doesn't matter. Notice I haven't specified the exercise. It doesn't matter. The one with better neuromuscular efficiency will have fewer fibres as reserve and will get tired before. We can tell that the fewer the neuromuscular efficiency is, the better, and it could be true, unless you practice powerlifting or halterophilie. Have you ever competed with athletes that seem to never get tired despite giving their utmost? This could be due to a reduced degree of neuromuscular efficiency.

In bodybuilding, neuromuscular efficiency does not increase the muscular potential, but it can be used to fully develop it. If you have poor neuromuscular efficiency and you insist on doing sets with few repetitions, you will never use up your muscles completely. Due to the disability of recruiting a muscle to move a heavy load, there will be fibres that will not have received any sort of stimulus. And if you have great neuromuscular efficiency and do high repetitions sets, you also won't be getting the best results, but on the opposite sense. Due to your innate ability to recruit a high number of muscular fibres, you will notice that to complete high repetition sets you will need a quite light weight, useless to properly tire the muscle you are working out.

This does not mean other repetition ranges can be used. The occasional low repetition set to exercise the power, despite it is not the best one to stimulate the development, has a place in a routine. In the same way, a specific high repetition set can be the most efficient for you, but the capillary development derived from it will help the hypertrophy. The basis of the training program should be established by the set which better adapts your neuromuscular efficiency. By the way, it is likely -in fact, very likely- that you have different degrees of neuromuscular efficiency in different muscular groups. You will have to establish them all using the following method.

You can keep you actual routine. Use one day or two to determinate your max reps in all comprising exercises. Take your time. Perform each move when the strength is in its highest point. Go down between repetitions just enough to recover but without cooling down. Once you have determined your max repetition of an exercise, rest for at least five minutes and cut off the weight to the 80%. If the result of that calculation can't be transferred to the discs, round it off. Why the 80%? Because there are proofs that indicate it is the most appropriate margin for the muscular mass development, and is the one diverse eminences as Arthur Jones and Vince Gironda recommended.

Now, with the 80% or the 85%, complete the maximum number of repetitions with a refined technique. This figure will indicate you your relative degree of neuromuscular efficiency: between 8 and 10, middle; from 4 to 6, high; from 12 on, low. Although, the important thing is the number, the repetitions you have to do of each exercise. If you do multiple sets of the same movement, gradually decrease the weight to adjust them to the proper number of repetitions. Now you know how many repetitions you have to do for each exercise. How many sets do you have to do per training? I'm not talking about the number of sets per movement since, for the general development, it is irrelevant. Yes, to prove I'm wrong, you could do a training session comprised by 20 sets of inverted wrist curls. However, that session would be useless for the muscular development. Anyway, I trust you are more intelligent and that your common sense leads you to a program that works the body parts with balance. The most important thing is that each set damages the individual recovering ability and, to make the muscles grow, they must be re-established before training them again.

Strongly united to the total number of sets we have the frequency of the trainings. The crux is to exert the enough tension to stimulate the muscular development without overcharging the recovering processes.

How can we know if we are recovered? I'm glad to hear that question. One reliable and practically universal constant is that the cardiac rhythm, in resting state, is higher than the normal rhythm in overcharging states. You see? The Cardiac rhythm rises regarding the normal value. But, what is the normal value? No, seriously. What is it? Is your current resting heart rate? Do you work in an office or do you work as a courier and you ravel 50 km daily dealing with the city traffic with a bike? The ones who established this concept made no distinction because they considered the cardiac rhythm in the current resting state is the normal value. In other words, any additional tension (which surpasses the recovering capacity) would result in increased heart rhythm. Whether you work in an office or as a courier was not important. That attitude may be valid in some way, but I think the quantity of activity is what matters. From the muscular hypertrophy point of view, everything you do affects your ability to recover from trainings. Without proper recovery, the optimal muscular development is impossible. If you are a cyclist courier…ok, if you were a cyclist courier, it is likely you are not interested in huge muscles. But maybe you work in constructions, or in a post service and you do your route by walking. The thing is you have to consider that daily activity because of its effects on your recovering ability.

According to my judgement, you need to recover from your current state to precisely determinate the normal value. But for an office worker it can mean not training during 15 days. If you have a relatively active profession, maybe you should wait for your holydays, but do not go doing nothing in Nepal as a friend of mine did. Take things easy during one or two weeks. If you find absolutely unbearable to stay away from the gym for such a long time, try out the active resting. Do your current routine, but reduce sets and weights to the half. Yes, to the half. Is the most you can do. You'll see trainings will look a long warming up: they stimulate the blood supply, but they don't exert pressure -that's all about. Do it for at least two weeks before establishing the normal cardiac rhythm.

To do that, take your pulse in resting state daily for four or five consecutive days and calculate the average. By the way, in resting state does not mean sitting on a chair for a couple of minutes. Place a clock or chronometer next to the bed. When you wake up, do not get up. Stay lying for some minutes. When we wake up, the cardiac rhythm raises, but goes down again in a few minutes. Count the pulse during 15 seconds and multiply by four or during 30 seconds and multiply by two. Choose any of these two systems, but always use the same. Take note of the result and go on with your daily activities. Once you determine your normal cardiac rhythm, start training again. Keep taking your pulse every morning. Now you have an infallible tool to detect overtraining immediately.

If the cardiac rhythm in resting state rises in many pulses, the body has not recovered from the last training. Do not go to the gym until that rate is again close to normal values. If you need more than two days, you are exceeding in the sets, repetitions or any other thing. Evaluate your routine and make the appropriate changes. You can try improving your recovering capacity taking antioxidant vitamins, sleeping more, increasing the intake of proteins or going to a massagist. If this doesn't cause the expected result, you must immediately reduce the work load.

The combination of these methods will allow you to adapt the trainings to your own needs. Stop wasting time with other people's routines. Create your own and get the results you want.