Volume Landmarks

Volume landmarks define how much training volume (sets per muscle group per week) you need for different outcomes. HyperIron uses these to help you stay in the productive range — enough stimulus to grow, but not so much that you can't recover.

The four landmarks

Landmark	Name	What it means
MV	Maintenance Volume	Minimum sets to keep your current muscle size. Below this, you slowly lose gains.
MEV	Minimum Effective Volume	Fewest sets that produce growth. Below this, you're just maintaining.
MAV	Maximum Adaptive Volume	The sweet spot — best growth per set. Most training should be here.
MRV	Maximum Recoverable Volume	The most you can handle and still recover. Exceed this and performance drops.

Think of these as zones:

← Less volume                                    More volume →

   MV          MEV          MAV          MRV
   |            |            |            |
   Maintaining  Growing      Optimal      Too much

Why they matter

Without volume landmarks, you're guessing:

• Too little: 6 sets of chest per week when your MEV is 10 — you're maintaining, not growing
• Too much: 25 sets of chest when your MRV is 20 — you're digging a recovery hole
• Unbalanced: 20 sets for chest but 6 for back — imbalances develop over time

Volume landmarks give you a target range to aim for.

They're individual

These numbers differ for everyone and for every muscle group. Your quads might need 15+ sets per week while your biceps grow on 8. Factors include:

• Training experience — Beginners grow on less; advanced lifters often need more
• Muscle group — Some muscles recover fast (biceps, calves) and handle high volume; others are slower (lower back, hamstrings)
• Recovery capacity — Sleep, nutrition, stress, and age all play a role
• Individual genetics — Some people respond better to high volume than others

Discovering your landmarks

You don't need to know your exact landmarks to start. HyperIron provides sensible defaults, and your fatigue ratings reveal your true landmarks over time:

• Consistently rating +1/+2 → probably below your MAV, body can handle more
• Consistently rating 0 → likely in the MAV zone, optimal
• Consistently rating -1/-2 → approaching or exceeding MRV, scale back

Over 2–3 mesocycles, the auto-regulation system converges on your personal sweet spots.

Setting landmarks in HyperIron

You can configure MV, MEV, MAV, and MRV for each muscle group in your settings. These values are used to show where your current volume falls relative to your landmarks in the Calendar & Stats views.

General starting points

Use these as rough guidelines. Individual variation is large — adjust based on your fatigue ratings.

Muscle Group	MV	MEV	MAV	MRV
Chest	6	8	12–16	20
Back	6	8	12–18	22
Quads	6	8	12–18	20
Hamstrings	4	6	10–14	16
Shoulders	6	8	12–16	20
Biceps	4	6	10–14	18
Triceps	4	6	8–12	16
Calves	6	8	12–16	20

Effective sets per week — weighted by muscle contribution from each exercise, not raw set counts.

Volume in the calendar

The Calendar view shows your actual weekly volume per muscle group using HyperIron's partial-contribution model. A set of bench press counts as chest, triceps, and front delts — weighted by how much each muscle contributes. This gives you an accurate picture of total stimulus that you can compare against your landmarks.