Jeff Nippard continues to draw praise in the fitness community for his comprehensive yet easy-to-understand exercise breakdowns. In his latest effort, Nippard examined and fixed bodybuilding influencer Sam Sulek’s training routine using science.
Fans’ ears always perk up when Jeff Nippard drops a video. As a natural powerlifter and bodybuilder, Nippard’s understanding of health, exercise, and nutrition has turned him into a prominent coach. He boasts over four million YouTube subscribers, and Nippard’s attention to detail and his scientific workouts are highly sought after.
Another thriving name in the fitness sector is bodybuilder Sam Sulek. At only 21 years old, he took the world by storm courtesy of his ripped physique, jarring strength, and laidback workout content. As with any emerging star, Sulek has received positive and negative feedback, ranging from his suspected steroid use to his diet. Now, Nippard is scrutinizing Sulek’s training style.
Jeff Nippard Fixes Sam Sulek’s Training Style Using Science-Based Tools
Nippard analyzed all of Sulek’s workout videos and discovered the following:
Level Up Your Fitness: Join our 💪 strong community in Fitness Volt Newsletter. Get daily inspiration, expert-backed workouts, nutrition tips, the latest in strength sports, and the support you need to reach your goals. Subscribe for free!
“Sam Sulek is by far the biggest fitness influencer in the world at the moment. So I decided to analyze every single workout he’s done this year. So far, he’s done 460 sets, 15 percent of those sets were for his chest, 20 percent for his back, and 16 percent for his biceps. Interestingly, only 11 percent of Sam’s total training was for his quads yet 25 percent went to his triceps.
One-quarter of Sam’s total training is triceps training yet anatomy research tells us that the triceps are less than four percent of total body muscle while the quads are by far the biggest muscle in the body at almost 30 percent of total body muscle. Also, Sam trains to failure 96 percent of time but almost all of his sets not taken to failure were forearms.”
Quick Breakdown
- Technique
- Progression
- Training split
- Intensity/Effort
- Rep ranges
- Enjoyment
Technique
Nippard doubts that Sulek’s tendency to perform cheat reps will lead to the best results.
“Sam is obviously a big proponent of what he calls ego lifting, which is when you simply try to move the weight allowing yourself to swing and sway rather than being really strict with your form. Sam definitely does more than his fair share of cheat reps, now I would say that I’m less of a technique junkie than most science-based coaches. I think that you can still get solid gains with so-called bad form as long as you’re pushing yourself hard.”
“I still doubt those gains will be optimal. In fact, I recently published a study on optimal training technique for muscle growth. We discovered that there are two main things to focus on when it comes to lifting technique. The main thing is that you need to use a range of motion that gets the muscle into a deep stretch.”
Nippard instructed Sulek to work on controlling the negative instead of letting the weights free fall.
“It’s important to control the negative rather than just letting the weight free fall,” said Jeff Nippard.
Progression
To enhance progression over time, Nippard advised Sulek to adhere to a more structured training plan instead of improvising gym sessions.
“The next thing I quickly noticed is that Sam more or less just completely wings his workouts. He doesn’t have a structured training plan. He hops in the car roughly maps out a workout in his head on the way to the gym and then he’ll even often improvise the workout in the moment.”
Training split
Jeff Nippard suggested that Sam Sulek’s traditional bro split results in muscles getting a disproportionate amount of volume.
“Sam uses a body part split or what many would call a bro split. This is where you train only one muscle per workout. So, he’ll do chest one day, then back the next day, then he’ll do an arm day, and then a leg day. There’s two main issues with this: first, as you can tell, it ends up being very disproportionate in terms of how much volume each muscle gets.”
“I guess it’s worth mentioning that probably 90-plus percent of IFBB Pros do follow the same split as Sam,” adds Nippard.
Intensity/Effort
Even though Sulek is known for his intensity inside the gym, Nippard is concerned that he goes to failure too often.
“Sam trains very hard. This is extremely important if your goal is to maximize muscle growth beyond the beginner stage. I do think simply training hard is more important than any of the other previous stuff I talked about.”
“That said, too much of a good thing can be bad. In this case, I think it might be. Sam goes to failure a little too much for my taste. Like I said, Sam has done 460 sets so far this year and 440 of them were all-out sets to failure.”
Rep ranges
Next, Nippard shared that studies support a variety of rep ranges for muscle growth.
“Sam uses smart rep ranges. When I analyzed the number of reps he did on every set, this was how it broke down: 11 percent of his sets were in the 0-3 rep range, 40 percent in the 4-7 range, another 40 percent in the 8-12 rep range, and nine percent was above 13 reps.”
“All rep ranges can in theory lead to similar muscle growth. However, doing too much high reps can be very exhausting, and doing too much low reps may give you unnecessary joint strain.”
“There are studies showing that using a variety of rep ranges is better than only doing one rep range but overall, this is pretty bang on for someone whose main goal is muscle growth,” said Jeff Nippard.
Enjoyment
Lastly, Nippard complimented Sulek on his enjoyment of exercise.
“Finding ways to make workouts more enjoyable is always a good thing and Sam clearly has that mastered,” said Nippard.
Nippard’s dedication to training science fuels his daily life. Whether he is offering fans a five-point checklist for a perfect squat or bench press, he never shies away from a scientific discussion about optimizing gains during a workout.
Given the fanfare and followers of Sam Sulek, perhaps Jeff Nippard’s latest training breakdown will provide insight for the aspiring bodybuilder. If not, Sulek’s fans can use the information to craft a more effective training routine.
RELATED: Sam Sulek Shares His 100-Gram Protein Pre-Workout Meal
Watch the full video from Jeff Nippard’s YouTube channel below:
You can also follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and
YouTube for even more content.
