According to the Statista website, a January 2024 survey revealed the common fitness goals in the US. Not surprisingly, weight loss was the apparent leader with 43%, but when you combine gaining muscle with body composition goals, it accounts for 58% of the responses. Add “increase my general strength” with 43%, and the combination accounts for 101% of the responses. This result is possible when respondents can rank or combine choices.

Obviously, the School of Strength loves to see getting stronger as a primary goal, but body composition and hypertrophy are big parts of what students are looking for from their training.

So, how does StrongFirst approach training for hypertrophy?

Differently.

Typical hypertrophy approaches emphasize body part isolation and training to failure.

The thought is that you need to achieve “maximum” stimulation of the muscle fiber to create a combination of mechanical and metabolic stress. This necessitates a body part split approach due to the soreness and extended time required for an isolated body part to recover.

What if you could avoid failure and get better consistency, recovery, and results?

Well, you can with the StrongFirst approach.

Using Plan Strong™ principles and directing the design towards hypertrophy, Fabio Zonin, StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor and Maestro of programming, created Built Strong, StrongFirst’s hypertrophy and strength program.

In this article, Fabio details his approach to hypertrophy training and Built Strong, which can be summarized as a variable, high volume, no-failure, strength-based approach.

While you will have an average intensity of 70%, the volume you can achieve is much higher due to the built-in buffer of leaving several reps “in the bank” and resting long enough to have high quality every set.

The focus is on health, movement quality, and hypertrophy through strength—a winning combination.