Minimum effective volume (MEV)
Minimum effective volume is the smallest number of weekly sets near failure that still produces adaptation in a muscle. It sits below what is usually prescribed and it is individual: it depends on the client's level, how much they sleep and how much fatigue they carry from elsewhere. Below that threshold the work maintains, but does not build.
Minimum effective volume is the smallest number of weekly sets near failure that still produces adaptation in a muscle. It sits below what is usually prescribed and it is individual: it depends on the client's level, how much they sleep and how much fatigue they carry from elsewhere. Below that threshold the work maintains, but does not build.
Also written as: MEV · minimum effective dose
In practice
It is the number that saves a block when a client has three hard weeks. Cutting to the minimum effective dose holds the adaptation on half the time, and it beats the real alternative, which is not showing up.
The common mistake
Using it as a permanent target. It is a floor, not a plan: training always at the minimum leaves a client no room to progress when they do have the time.
