Each muscle you train this week gets a ring. The ring fills with your hard working sets for that muscle, and it tells you whether the muscle got enough work to grow, the right amount, or more than it can use. You’ll find them under MUSCLES THIS WEEK on Home.
How a set counts
A set counts in full for the main muscle an exercise works, and half for each muscle that helps. Some exercises also touch a muscle so lightly that it counts for nothing there. A barbell bench press set gives your chest 1 set and your triceps and front delts half a set each.
Warm-up sets don’t count. A set also needs reps to count, and on most exercises it needs weight too. Bodyweight exercises count with or without added weight.
The layers
This week’s muscle rings on the Volume tab.
Every ring has three layers, and the target is the middle one.
- Minimum: the outer blue layer closes at your minimum effective dose, the least weekly work that keeps a muscle growing. Below that, the ring reads BUILDING.
- Optimal: the green layer closes when the muscle reaches its optimal range, and stays closed through the whole range. This is where most of your growth comes from for the fatigue you spend.
- High: the inner layer starts filling green once you reach the optimal range and turns red when you pass it. You’re near the most the muscle can recover from. It can be worth it for a muscle you’re focusing on, not for everything at once.
- TOO MUCH: past a muscle’s max, the ring dims. Sets past the max earn no XP, because more work there stops helping and starts eating into your recovery. Nothing you already earned is taken away.
Why every muscle is different
A calf and a chest don’t need the same work. Each muscle has its own numbers. Your chest reaches Minimum at 6 sets, Optimal at 12, High at 20, and its max at 22.
The numbers come from the volume landmarks published by Renaissance Periodization (Dr. Mike Israetel and colleagues). Treat them as informed starting points. People respond differently, so let your own progress have the final word.
How rings become your medal
Your weekly ring fills once for each session you complete. It closes one session short of your full plan when your plan is 2 or more sessions, so one busy day never costs you the week. Close it and the week earns a medal:
- Bronze for closing the ring.
- Silver when you trained at least 3 muscles and at least half of them reached Minimum or better.
- Gold when you trained at least 4 muscles, at least half reached Optimal or better, and none reached its max.
Leave the ring open and there’s no medal that week. Because the medal comes from your muscle rings, it reflects real training volume, not just turning up.
Cardio and conditioning blocks don’t fill muscle rings. They fill a separate conditioning ring, measured in effort minutes.
