Rest Days

Most people use a 4 day a week training schedule, but if you’re young(say early 20’s), couldnt you get away with working out 6 days a week with a 2 split program even if your goal is to build muscle? This way, you do both routines 3 times each per week with one day rest? ALSO MY NEXT QUESTION… If your goal is primaraly FAT LOSS, then does it matter if you train a sore muscle? Surely you wont gain or lose muscle, but wouldnt it help lose fat on a larger scale? Some people would have different views on this topic… what do people think?

In my early to mid 20’s I trained twice a day, 6 days a week on Optimum Training Systems ‘Big Beyond Belief’ program, and made great gains. To do this I had to eat a lot, and get good sleep EVERY night. If you are the kind that likes to go clubbing and stay out til 4am, forget this type of training.
When you are younger you can often tolerate higher volume. I read a comment, I am sure it was by Louie Simmons, saying younger trainess should take advantage of their capacity for higher volume. However I would advise such a routine only be undertaken with proper sleep,top nutrition and appropriate supplementation.
Nowadays I find I recover a wee bit slower- last year a friend and I were able to train twice a week for a short period and we modified the routine slightly (trained 5 days a week, only trained legs twice a week),and both were quite pleased with the gains we made in a short period ( My friend was 45).

Any experts on this matter?

There are many other factors besides just how often you go to the gym. How much sleep do you get? How is your diet? Do you use an appropriate post-workout drink? Are you using steroids? Are you counting sessions for the ancillaries only (calves, abs, forearms) as total workouts? Are you doing cardio?

I'm 20, and I tried the six days per week training about two years ago when I was first starting out because I felt that I had great recovery ability. However, I felt very overtrained after a couple of months, and wisely cut back. Now, unless I'm in a strength phase, I lift 5 days per week on a 3-on, 1-off, 2-on, 1-off schedule. I might throw in cardio on an off-day. I chose this split because I can't stand training delts with chest, and I wanted a quad and hip dominant leg days.

If you do try training with such a frequency, be sure to keep your w/outs to 45 mins. or less. I would also recommend that if you train 2x a day, that you do so for three weeks and then follow up with 1x a day for a few weeks.
And it should go without saying, decent post-workout nutrition is crucial.

Well - how about trying it for a little while and sharing your experience. There is really no way to tell how your body will react to this without trying. Some people just need to eat more when they increase volume, for other people the CNS seems to limit the training volume and a good night’s sleep is just not enough. Just a note here: It is not really necessary to wait for supercompensation before training a muscle group again although this seems common practice in bodybuilding. You could e.g. repeat training a muscle group intentionally before total recovery for a (short) period of time, then back off for some time to allow for supercompensation. The use of this could be as a special training for lagging muscle groups. (You know like shocking your muscles, but that sounds like a Weider Principle - talking about it , my favorite Weider Principle is the “Principle of Instinctive Training” :))), hmmm, I instictively feel I shouldn’t do heavy squats today… or this week… or…ever?!?)