Bodybuilding Hell Week: Work Out The Same Muscle Every Single Day

Please keep an open mind to what you’re about to read here. I work out in all different styles and throughout the years, I’ve experimented with a lot in the gym. The funny thing is that much of what I would have told you was pure nonsense years ago; I’d tell you the exact opposite today!

If you told me about full body routines performed three to four times per week, training the same muscle group daily, or implementing high reps for growth, I would have told you that you were crazy! But no, not anymore, because I had to figure some of these things out for myself.

Remember, it takes keeping an open mind to continue to break through plateaus and continue to get results. You cannot do the same thing all of the time and continue to see change.

Come With Me To Bodybuilding Hell Week

What is Bodybuilding Hell Eeek? Simple, it’s a week straight of the same muscle groups torched every single day. That’s right, if you did chest yesterday, then guess what? You’re doing it again today! You’re sore? Good… I don’t care.

This week of training muscle groups every day may not make much sense to you right now, but it will when you see the results a week or two after Bodybuilding Hell Week. Workouts will be performed in freestyle fashion, meaning you do as many sets and reps as you feel necessary to achieve a good pump.

Unlike other cookie-cutter routines, I’m not here to give you the perfect number of reps and sets, because there isn’t one. Think for yourself! Do what you feel and trust in yourself!

You will be hitting all muscle groups for seven days in a row. This means full body workouts for one week straight, no bullshit here! Now, here is the thing about this week of all-out-war: exercises and sets can change daily.

Let’s say I’m training my legs and yesterday I performed squats: today I may just perform leg extensions, lying leg curls, and calves, but no pressing if I’m just not feeling it.

Or let’s say I did some heavy chest presses the day before. I may just do several sets of cable flys the next day and continue to stimulate my chest, but ditch pressing that day to assist with my recovery ability to get back to pressing tomorrow.

This is totally a freestyle type of workout here, remember that!

There are days where I may do seven sets of dumbbell curls with 12 to 15 reps a set, and other days where I only do eight reps a set and three work sets. Maybe one day I’m doing dumbbell curls and the next day I’m doing barbell curls; I really just do what I feel like during this week of training brutality.

So we are covering the entire body here every single day for one week straight. Now, why would I do this to myself and expect results? I know all about over-training and I’m actually partial to infrequent high intensity training sessions geared towards maximum recovery. So why would I believe in this?

Change, Adaptation, And Stress

Okay, you know how I just said that I was partial to less frequent high intensity workout sessions? That’s precisely the reason I believe in Bodybuilding Hell Week! It’s a great shakeup for a week before going back to less frequent weight training sessions.

What I’ve found happening from Hell Week is that the body quickly adapts to the daily training (the same way a soldier would adapt to the same daily PT exercises) and you still perform and carry on. Also, here’s something else you probably won’t hear about anyplace else: soreness can help engage more muscle focus.

That’s right, so you may be sore from the day before. Well, now the next day when you perform that same exercise, you feel the muscle working right from the jump due to the soreness. What does that make you do? It makes you think about the muscle more because you cannot help it! After a set or two, that soreness doesn’t seem quite as bad, and once again you’re blasting through it with another pump!

Now, you may think I’m crazy here, but I’ve actually had days where I was stronger performing the same muscle group on the second day in a row! I know, crazy, right? But if you have never tried this, then you won’t know it.

Okay, so not only do we focus more on the muscle at hand since we are already sore from the day prior, but we are creating a new stress by training muscles daily. The body wakes up and says, “Whoa, what’s going on here? He’s making me do this every day? I better adapt!” Yes, it’s a week of constant stress and adaption.

Nutrition During Bodybuilding Hell Week

As far as nutrition goes during this intense week of training, I would recommend trying to hold to a regimented caloric deficit daily. For a female, this might be as low as 1,200 to 1,500 calories a day (it takes a minimum of 1,200 calories a day to even be considered a balanced diet, so I don’t recommend any lower), and for most males, this will fall between 1,800 to 2,800 calories each day.

It’s going to be natural to get hungrier since you are placing so many demands on your muscles every day, but be strict and stick to your diet. There is a reason sticking to your diet is important during this week of daily training.

I like to focus on a roundabout caloric intake per meal and six meals per day during this week of training. It’s far easier to do this and rotate through different foods that equal the same amount of calories than to eat like my dog does each day (the same Purina One food he’s sick to death of)!

If you’re a female weight trainer, then your breakfast may be something as easy as 100 calories from a banana and 250 calories from a low carb egg wrap. Then lunch may be another 350 total calories from something as simple as Greek yogurt and a protein smoothie shake.

Your other meals are simple meals that are focused around clean foods and hitting that caloric restricted number.

If you’re a male, then meals might be a little heavier, but still leave you hungry and in restriction. Something like four whole eggs and half a cup of dry measure oats would put you right at 390 calories. Now, put together meals that are each a caloric number that equals 500 calories below your TDEE for your daily caloric intake.

Women, aim for half a gram per pound of body weight in protein consumption; men, aim for one gram per pound of body weight. But do not obsess over protein more than daily caloric restriction!

Remember, This Is A Freestyle Workout That You Make Up

Do not forget that this is a freestyle workout that you develop. Be sure to challenge yourself, but there is no reason to spend over ninety minutes in the gym trying to do every single little exercise. Hit an exercise or two that stimulates a specific muscle and move on to the next muscle group.

You should be able to get through the entire body in ten exercises or less.

Also, there is no reason to blast a muscle into oblivion with the same exercises every day. Don’t constantly do the same flat bench press daily when you can mix it up between flat press, incline, machines, and flys.

I want you to clear your mind of all of the mainstream bullshit during Bodybuilding Hell Week and put yourself through the motions day in and day out… every muscle group every day for one entire week straight! This will be extremely demanding, but it can be done.

Look at how inmates work out. You’ll see that although the described routines in that link do split body parts up, some of those exercises are staples that have been used for probably a century now. Inmates routinely do the same physical activity day in and day out and are able to achieve impressive physiques, and that’s with nutrition that often isn’t up to par.

That tells me that if you took just one week to hit all of your muscles daily, then I think you’d get some quick results from it. I feel like your body would adapt to it and the fatigue wouldn’t totally set in 100 percent until the week was finished. By then, you’re back to training in a different fashion and giving muscles more recovery time.

I’m not talking about just a conditioning type workout here where it’s a daily routine of push-ups, pull-ups, and sit-ups (although that can get great results). I’m talking about traditional gym training weight exercises done in a daily pattern and intended to put the body under more demands than our bodies own resistance.

When And How Do The Changes Take Place?

Okay, here is the thing about Bodybuilding Hell Week: you’re going to see the changes taking place within the week or two after the week-long intense routine is complete. Your body will sort of play “catch up” after this week of training.

Not only will your body catch up to the extreme demands you’ve placed upon it, but it’ll use the next two weeks to grow from the added recovery.

Muscles will become more volumized-looking, pumps will become bigger, and you’ll probably even feel bigger just walking around. That delayed recovery is pretty much the basis on this routine: smash the body for a week and then watch it adapt the next couple weeks before its broken down too much. We wouldn’t want to do something like this longer than one week for the reason that we don’t want to catabolize muscles. But in just one week, you need not worry about that!

Here’s another key point I’d like to mention: changing up the diet after this week of added training intensity under a regimented number of restricted calories will get you results as well. It’s like your body won’t know what hit it. the next two weeks following Hell Week would be a time I’d increase my calories by about 500 to 1,000 calories a day and pay attention to what happens with my look.

I’m guessing that if you’re like me, you’re only going to volumize muscles and look bigger rather than slap on any fat. I know some of my methodologies sound way, way outside of the norm, but you know what training normal used to get me? Normal results! I don’t know about you, but I’m not doing this to look like the average Joe. I want more than that!

Would I recommend something like this to a beginner? No, I wouldn’t. I see nothing wrong with daily conditioning exercises, calisthenics, and some moderate weight training for a beginner. But what I’m talking about here is brutal punishment executed every single day beyond a level suitable for a beginner.

Think of this as a way to shake things up a bit once you’re seasoned and gains are harder to achieve, as I show on my Youtube channel and web site. Don’t knock it until you try it and if you do try it… go kill it! 

Read More: A Beginner’s Guide To Breaking Bodybuilding Plateaus

41 thoughts on “Bodybuilding Hell Week: Work Out The Same Muscle Every Single Day”

  1. That honestly sounds foolish unless you are on the juice or the SARMS. A more balanced workout to maximize protien synthesis is the , 2 day split 1 day rest.
    Upper body Monday, lower body Tuesday Wednesday rest. Repeat.

  2. There is insurmountable evidence it is very unhealthy and unwise to do heavy lifting every single day. Your always supposed to take a rest day in between full-blown gym sessions, or equivalent to 3-4 times a week. Not 7.
    Don’t let unhealthy and counterproductive advice like this slip through quality control.

  3. I have had days I work out really hard and even take and extra day off , the bodybuilder in me wants go, but then I am rewarded on the scale with more muscle mass because I ate lots of good food had a long sleep and let my body recover

  4. He is right. I know guys that do this exact training and swear by it. They are way bigger then me so they must know what they are doing. I’m more on the beginning level compared to them so I haven’t tried this yet. Logically this makes sense

    1. “They are bigger than me so they must know what they are doing.”
      You are such a retard.

  5. Same logic as vaccines. Your weakening your body and restricting your calorie intake for 7 days. Then boom back to your regular routine. You body will be stronger and healthier with a higher calorie diet and less abuse. Makes sense to me.

  6. Such a dumb idea. When you lift, you tear up your muscles and you need to give them time to recover.

  7. This is exactly how I believe you should train. My workouts are always freestyle and full body. I train based on experience and how my body feels. I like to throw in bodyweight excerises into the mix as well. Including yoga and callisthenics practice during rest periods.
    I’ve seen a lot of natural guys get rubbish results, when following these commercialised split routines. A lot of them also clearly have a combination of overdeveloped and underdeveloped body parts.
    The body should be trained as a single unit.

  8. Wear and tear on the body weakens in and then you find yourself at 60 years old with a bad back and a dick that don’t work. That’s what a friend told me.

  9. Im all for exercise, but I never saw the point of body building. Who wants to look like a side of beef, waddling around like a roided penguin, unable to put your arms down straight at the side of of your body? The muscle has no practical use, and how do you maintain it into old age without continuing getting juiced up?

    1. SOXMIS
      Most body builder who are successful are short. It is the short man’s compensation and women know it.
      I hate to say it-being 5’9 and stock myself-but women are into tall, wiry dudes.

      1. Dick Boner: Define tall and wiry, and tell me and Automatic Slim where are these chicks who are into that.

  10. I don’t advocate full body training for a variety of reasons.
    The body is so complex that it takes a lot of exercises to hit all the muscles properly and the longer the workout goes on, the less energy you have left; thus the quality of the sets gets worse and worse.
    Basic compound lifts do not work many important muscles at all so you’re setting yourself up for imbalances if you try to be lazy and do with the basics. A lot of guys also commit the fallacy of thinking that heavy weight ensures progress no matter how tortured their ROM and form is. It’s necessary to increase the weight over time but simply getting into an optimal leverage position is not going to grow your muscles better; always going for that leverage will do nothing but limit your imagination and movements, which in turn limits the stretch you put on the muscle and growth.
    You could lift tons with a crane but it’s not going to be better than lifting a pink dumbbell in a position that reveals your weaknesses you’ve ignored in favour of leverage. A lot of the ‘stimulus’ you feel when doing a heavy deadlift or squat is just your joints crying out for mercy and generalized fatigue from supporting the weight on your body; discomfort does not equate growth.
    If you decide to do tons of isolation and compounds in one full body workout, I cannot imagine the mental anguish of having that work load ahead of you time and time again. Even my split workouts are grueling because I hit the muscles from all imaginable angles with multiple exercises.

  11. Please.
    Men have been doing this for millenia. Lifting logs. Heaving boulders. Digging ditches. Etc. Day in day out 7 days a week somtimes, just to make ends meat. Do their muscle groups get a day off to synergize protien??
    Pfft. Narcisists make me puke. tattooed greased arms in yoga pants.
    Ill whoop the shit outta any freakshow “body builder” with my scrawny lil dick!

    1. NOBODY
      More women wanted John Holmes than any gym rat.
      Also body builders are usually short.

  12. Women are not attracted to stocky males anyhow.
    They like trim mesomorphs or naturally tall males (over 6 foot) who are wiry.
    Let us look at the short stocky guys with bulging muscles in Hollywood. Sean Penn has always been muscular and stocky (He’s only 5’8). Chicks don’t think he is hot. Mark Wahlberg? More women desired him when he was a slim young man in boogie nights. Harvey Kietel? He was naturally the most muscular (Ex-Marine) and women are not turned on by him.
    Let us look at James Bond-the original Alpha Stud.
    Prior to Craig the character was always played by a tall trim Mesomorph of 6’2 and 180 (Brosnan, Moore, Dalton, Connery, Lazanby).
    Women thought Connery and Brosnan were hot (None of you are old enough to remember that your Mom wanted to fuck Remington Steele in 1983).
    Daniel Craig is by far the most buff but he’s about 5’3 and short legged. Women don’t think he is hot. The women he is portrayed fucking would step across the street to avoid him in real life.
    Short buffed out males don’t do anything for women. I’m short and naturally muscular (18 inch arms and 44 inch chest and never seriously exercised in my life). Women don’t think I am hot. They thought I was okay when I was a trim cut mesomorph.
    If you are not long in height or penis then chicks just naturally are not that into you and working out 5 hours a day in the gym is not going to do it.

    1. Daniel Craig is about 178 cm.
      It’s the totality of how you look. It’s the face, height, hair, body composition, skin tone and hairstyle. The best things a less good-looking guy could do is to pack on some muscles but stay or become lean, dress well, have an optimal haristyle, and an impeccable hygiene. But that is also true for all guys, really, since it is about optimization and to maximize genetics.

    2. To Dick Boner,
      I like your stories but you’re just making excuses for not getting serious about fitness.
      It’s not that you have to do (natural) bodybuilding but it’s a tool in your arsenal just like anything else; it’s better to be strong and have an inspiring physique regardless of what your height is.
      Women would have liked Brosnan or Moore even more if they had been more V shaped and built. According to some studies women like wide shoulders even more than height. Other sources suggest that it’s doubtful but it certainly cannot hurt unless you somehow emanate an impression that all you ever think about is protein and gainz. Just because you have a good physique does not mean you’re like that just like knowing chinese does not mean you walk around speaking chinese to everyone but knowing chinese is still an advantage.
      Most people don’t know this but bodybuilding actually increases your sitting height because having bigger hamstrings and glutes work like ‘lifts’. Thus a guy under six foot tall can have the sitting height of a skinny 6’3 man.
      On a deep psychological level people also associate wide shoulders with responsibility; thus the saying about ‘shouldering responsibility’.

  13. I’ve been training at the local gym since 2007, not in a hardcore way, but I’m there at least three times a week. I’ve seen many guys come and go, and a few of them, even if they’re not the Mr. Universe type, keep going, and they have my respect.
    Of course, I wish I was at least six foot tall with a quarterback shape, but in reality I’m a balding 46 years old guy with a beer belly and man’s boobs standing 5 foot 8 and with a weight of 205 pounds. I can barely bench press my own bodyweight 8 to 10 times, but I can do it, and I think it’s not that bad.
    I definitely prefer my present state rather than being very muscular but only 5 foot 2, like on of the guys I see on a regular basis. Shape matters, but I think even red pill men underestimate how height is a game changer, sometimes.

  14. btw Hey Richard!
    This article is useful ONLY for those on very intense gear.
    There is NO way this is good for you if even you’re remotely natty.
    Tearing down the body everyday leads to a severe catabolic state, strains the kidneys and filtering organs, and increases injury potential exponentially,
    Blasting the whole body one day? Okay.
    Blasting individual body parts every OTHER day? Okay.
    Blasting the whole body every day. No. Insane.
    Mass monsters, like the Pro BodyBuilders, are Gymcels narcissistically in love with their own mirror reflections, or are gay.
    They are so blown up they cannot move very well and in street clothes they actually look silly, bloated and fat.
    Richard Boner nailed it above..
    Women just want a big dick on a taller dude with money.
    An aesthetically built tall man who looks like a Greek god is a THREAT to most women because they know that YOU KNOW that you actually have Chad options!!!! 🙂
    Chicks will then do everything to sabotage your training time, diet, and general good mood because with your success & health they then cannot fucking control you!
    ROK Cheat Sheet —
    Workout heavy three times per week.. no more.
    Eat well.
    Save your money.
    Rotate bitches or buy it.
    Never talk to a woman over 30.
    Do NOT date.
    Do not fuck girls at school/work.
    Do NOT let women know about your home or career.
    Do not watch TV.
    Do not give your money to charities, banks,govts or politics.
    Don’t socialize at pubs or clubs.
    Do not spend money on US Pro Sports.
    Enjoy life on your own terms and schedule.
    PS-
    If you say the list above leaves you with “nothing to do” then you are already dead and no one here can help you!

    1. WYATT
      Sir
      Reality bites.
      Chicks like the 6 foot plus lean and agile types (Bond, John Holmes) with a naturally trim physique whose long, lanky build suggests a long, lanky penis.
      When you are a 16 year old and muscular you can attract teen chicks but over the age of 21 when women see some gym rat swagger around the bar they know a) he spends most of his time at the gym and not making his mark in his chosen profession b) he has no chosen profession c) he hangs around homoerotic settings where mouth breathers whip one another in the ass in the locker room and mean it.
      Most intense body builders are short men trying to compensate and when a short guy (Penn, Wahlberg) is unnaturally pumped up it makes him look shorter and almost like a midget.

      1. Except that it’s almost quite the opposite. Short guys do compensate. A guy who is 170 with small shoulders does often have a hard time, while an athletic guy with the same stature can do well with girls between 155-173 cm. It’s about male-female polarity, and confidence. Of course not all girls prefer athletic, fit guys, but many do. So for instance a girl who is 170 and weighs 57 but fit quite well with an athletic 170 guy whose weight is 75 shredded kilos, at least if he looks kind of good overall. It’s not optimal height from the girl’s perspectives but it works.
        The mistake some shorter guys do is that they become too bulky, and become too obsessed about fitness, while neglecting dress style, making money, and whatnot. A guy who is totally committed to the gym will likely not do so well, unless he is famous on Instagay.

  15. Good points guys but as usual, an excersize article transformed into one about attracting bang tail. Fitness and health is very important for your own person first of all. Over doing it to excessive extremes to garner attention just screams insecurity. I stroll into the gym wearing blue jeans and a wife beater. Light up a smoke when im done and tear off on my Harley, leaving the image fanatics speechless.

  16. SO I guess the scientific facts that lactic acidosis build up in the muscles after a workout being dangerous if not allowed to be repaired with rest and all your muscle repair and mass building from a workout while you sleep is all just needless horseshit bunk.. Who knew?
    The thing about FAD workouts is, they are usually DESTRUCTIVE and in some cases fatal fads.
    A smart man accepts everything and does his own research to find out the truth first before jumping all in feet first. Glad some commenters are not taken in quickly with obviously dangerous advice. I’m glad Roush posts the stories so smart men may know the bullshit that is floating around out in the manosphere that is being used to directly lead men to injury or death and serves the feminist agenda to beat us men down ANY WAY THEY CAN.

  17. This is yet another article that I can respect that while all the posters may not agree, at least men will DISCUSS it and share their experience and opinions openly. If ROK is anything, it damn sure is not an echo chamber.

  18. I am a personal trainer. I train heavy sometimes all the way to 1 rep max 4 times a week and a fifth day only light weights for recovery. I’m 49 years old very muscular and lean. Muscles are maintaining themselves by burning calories. That’s what we call metabolism. More muscles more calories burned=higher metabolism=more health.Muscles also control your ability to move by moving the skeletal system. Everywhere I go I get women’s attention.There is two forces that human’s deal with. One is gravity that constantly pushes on you until six feet under. The other force is your own strength(muscles) that fights the gravity=longer life. So shut the fuck hit the fucking gym as hard and as often you can(considering enough recovery and food) and live a fucking longer and better quality of life. Big muscles means hard work and discipline. Women love that shit. Whoever says otherwise is a lazy dumbass moron making fucking excuses.

  19. More reasons to hit the fucking gym. The gluts (your fucking ass) is the evolution muscle, the most important muscle in the human body. Let me explain:if you look at the four legged animals they don’t have gluts(fucking ass).Long time ago we where some four legged monkeys. For some reason evolution decided to give us an ass and a brain(with some exeptions). Ass turned us into two legged dumb fucking humans. With todays lifestyle we sit (on our evolution) most of the time making them(gluts)softer and weaker including upper back (postural muscles)and lower back muscles as well. There for when we walk we look like a bunch of beat up monkeys looking for change on the floor. Solution:hit the fucking gym and focus on your posterior chain(hamstring,gluts,lower, upper back…)and turn into a strong and healthy human being. Don’t neglect your sleep and your nutrition.There is more vital reasons to be muscular and strong but right now I’m getting tired and I hate fucking typing ,,Long live the fucking strong”.
    PS.English is my fourth language and my grammar sucks. Cheers.

  20. Im on this kind of workout where I do the same muscles every day, with maybe 12 hours of rest, and people close to me have accused me of being on roids because my gains in the first two months were amazing. I have never had better results before and I am a nerdy gym goer. People need to be more open minded. A alot of stuff we accept as ‘this is the way’ can turn out to be wrong. Also, let every person find their own routine and not throw stuff down their throats. Lastly, regarding this routine, one downside to it is you get used to the weights fairly quickly, so you got to up the game a lot, but of course this is a benefit if you want to bulk up.

Comments are closed.