Why upper body require more volume?

[perman]

A reasonable explanation is given in the book: You don't walk on your hands.

Also, upper body will respond differently to rep counts.

So basically, it's more important for the lower body to be strength adaptive than the upper body, therefore evolution selected for it, I guess...?

[MBasic]

One of my speculations were about total work as pointed out by Pawn. But to even match total tonnage (weight x reps x sets), upper body volume (sets x reps) needs to be significantly higher than lower body volume.

Regarding recovery I recall dr Mike Israetel saying that the bigger the muscle, the more recovery it needs. I don't remember his explanation for this, if he provided any.

Sorta make sense with what Izzy and some others have said about training SHW lifters. (less frequency, can only go 'heavy' so often)

Maybe just so damn much muscle takes so long to become "reconstituted" or recovered. . . . say even on a huge human being instead of a big muscle group.

Probably a slow wheel or cog in the MPS machinery somewhere. (as others have said).

I wonder if TUT has anything to do with it. Most people's bench reps happen much faster than a squat or deadlift rep. Leg levers are longer, take more time to move around.

[Igor]

Sorta make sense with what Izzy and some others have said about training SHW lifters. (less frequency, can only go 'heavy' so often)

Maybe just so damn much muscle takes so long to become "reconstituted" or recovered. . . . say even on a huge human being instead of a big muscle group.

Also higher total loads that cause bigger stress than those used by a lighter lifter.

I wonder if TUT has anything to do with it. Most people's bench reps happen much faster than a squat or deadlift rep. Leg levers are longer, take more time to move around.

That might explain why quick lifts are less stressful than slow lifts. At least better than the fact that they don't have the eccentric portion in them. I mean in the deadlift the eccentric part is almost non-existant yet it's the most stressful lift out there (its TUT is significant, especially when done heavy/close to failure). TUT seems to be a much larger factor than presence/absence of eccentric portion of a movement (taking into account much bigger loads used on a deadlift than on snatch or C&J, but not so much when compared to a squat usually)

[Pawn]

Need more data:

Age, height, weight, squat and press

Sorry,

7 weeks into linear progression.

32, 6'4'', 385 lbs (38%bf), Squat 350x5, Press 122.5x5

Currently losing ~1.5 lbs per week... and all lifts are still going up.

[Robert Santana]

In general the less muscle mass involved in the movement the more volume and frequency is necessary. Why? Simple: you are dealing with smaller muscles and lifting lighter weight and thus they recover faster. Simple enough.

[perman]

In general the less muscle mass involved in the movement the more volume and frequency is necessary. Why? Simple: you are dealing with smaller muscles and lifting lighter weight and thus they recover faster. Simple enough.

That logic explains why you CAN train them more often, not why you need to. Seems to me that the reduced weights also means a less powerful stimulus is possible, therefore more smaller ones are necessary. This however doesn't make complete sense, since I would assume a smaller stimulus would be enough for a smaller muscle.

[John Hanley]

Why? Simple: you are dealing with smaller muscles and lifting lighter weight and thus they recover faster. Simple enough.

Sweet! That clears things up.

[damufunman]

In general the less muscle mass involved in the movement the more volume and frequency is necessary. Why? Simple: you are dealing with smaller muscles and lifting lighter weight and thus they recover faster. Simple enough.

I'm inclined the believe this, though perman makes a good point. Presumably, the larger muscles are seeing roughly the same load normalized to muscle mass used. Maybe it's more of a systemic thing: squats put more stress through the whole system (body), while bench or press load either just the upper body (or the whole body with the press) more lightly. This might explain why assistance exercises are less stressful as well. Even done for say a max (I know, not really doable), I'm sure you'd recover much better from an RDL 1RM than a deadlift 1RM.

[John Hanley]

I'm sure you'd recover much better from an RDL 1RM than a deadlift 1RM.

I'm not sure you would. If you isolate and fatigue the fuck out of your lumbar erectors (using light weights) you will require quite a long recovery period (iow...the "small muscles/small load" thing falls apart if you do a high volume..and incur lots of lumbar fatigue...doing good mornings).

[damufunman]

I'm not sure you would. If you isolate and fatigue the fuck out of your lumbar erectors (using light weights) you will require quite a long recovery period (iow...the "small muscles/small load" thing falls apart if you do a high volume..and incur lots of lumbar fatigue...doing good mornings).

But can't we say the same here about bench/press and squats? ie, If you do a shit ton of pressing/squatting volume you'll take longer to recover? Wouldn't you be able to recover more quickly from the pressing at the same normalized volume (say %1RM times reps) as with squats?

For example, I can do bench and press each for 5x5 or 5x6 at about 85% in a week, wheres I'm pretty sure I can't squat 5x5 at 85% twice per week (plus intensity day for each). Then again, I haven't tried it, but I'm fairly certain I can't.