Modern Hypertrophy: From Physiology to Practice

Why this course exists

Reading the research and writing the program are two different skills.

Most coaches can tell you what the research says about volume. They've read the meta-analyses, they know the numbers that get quoted, and they can hold their own in a conversation about sets per muscle per week.

Then they sit down to write a program for a 44 year old client who trains three days a week, sleeps badly, and has a shoulder that complains. The research doesn't tell them what to do with that person.

Closing that gap is what these four weeks are for.

Some of it held. Some of it he'd now teach differently. The course is honest about which is which.

What appears to drive hypertrophy?
Which variables are worth manipulating, and which are preference?
Which methods add useful stimulus?
Which methods mainly add fatigue?
How should the training week be arranged?
How much training is enough, for this person?
What do minimum, general and maximal drug-free programming look like side by side?

A note from Tony

"Some of what I've held about hypertrophy for years has held up. Some of it I'd now teach differently."

The last 18 months have gone back over the same ground: the interviews I've done with researchers, the papers behind them, and my own programming, looking for the places where what I teach and what the evidence supports had drifted apart.

What I found is less dramatic than the feed would suggest, and more useful. A few things I was confident about don't hold the way I thought. A few things I'd have called old-fashioned have held up better than the newer ideas competing with them. And in several places the honest answer is that the evidence runs out before the programming question does.

This course is where I put the current version of that thinking together and show you how I turn it into programs.

Dr Tony Boutagy

Who this is for

Coaches first. Serious lifters welcome.

Coaches and personal trainers

You design hypertrophy programs for clients whose lives get in the way. Broken sleep, three sessions a week if the diary allows, an old shoulder, a job. The research rarely describes them.

Four weeks here gives you a way to get from the evidence to the program, and the reasoning to explain it to a client who asks you why.

Serious lifters

You've run other people's programs for years and you want to understand the reasoning behind effective hypertrophy programming well enough to build your own.

You'll get a lot out of this. Worth knowing up front: the teaching is pitched at the coaching decision, so expect the room to be mostly coaches.

It suits you if

You program for people who want to build muscle, and no two of them train under the same conditions
You keep up with the research and still find the jump from paper to program harder than it should be
You'd rather understand why a program works than collect another template
You get a different answer on volume, splits and advanced methods depending on who you asked last, and you want a way to work it out for yourself

What makes this different

A current framework, not a collection of disconnected tips.

Six positions run through all four weeks.

Mechanism versus outcome

The chain from recruitment to fibre tension to the growth signal has gaps that haven't been measured directly in human training studies. So when a mechanistic claim and an outcome trial disagree, the course teaches you to weight the outcome trial.

Methods must earn their place

An advanced method isn't good or bad on its own. It either adds stimulus at a fatigue cost you can accept, or it solves a time problem. If it does neither, it's costing you something.

The week is the unit of dose

Single sessions get argued about far more than they deserve. Set the weekly dose first, then arrange it around the days and the recovery the person in front of you has.

What changed, what held

Some long-standing positions have held up well. Some haven't. Rather than a list of new findings, you get an honest account of which is which, and what it changes on the page.

Minimum, general and maximal

Most clients need the least that works. Some need a strong general approach. A few want to push it as far as drug-free programming goes. You leave with a written program for each.

Evidence translated into decisions

Every module ends with a decision rule, not a summary. Something you can apply on Monday when you're the one holding the pen.

On how it's taught. The four-module structure is fixed. The examples and the evidence will reflect Tony's current review of the research, and the questions that come up in the room across the four weeks.

The four modules

One question, followed through four layers.

Each module hands a decision rule to the next. By week four you're building programs on top of three rules you've already worked through rather than starting from a blank page.

01

The physiology of hypertrophy

Understand what appears to drive hypertrophy, which variables matter, and where the evidence stops.

What's covered

The measurement problem in hypertrophy research
Mechanical tension and the current mechanistic account
Motor unit recruitment and the size principle
Heavy and light loads when effort and volume are matched
Damage, swelling and the pump against actual growth
Strength and size overlap, but aren't identical
How age, sex, training status and fibre type change the response
Why outcome trials can outrank mechanisms when the two disagree

You'll be able to explain the current mechanistic account at a practical level, understand recruitment and load, separate damage and swelling from growth, and point to where the evidence runs out.

Decision rule. Effort and weekly volume are the main levers. Load range, tempo and the pump are preferences or noise.

02

Methods and periodisation

Understand when advanced methods and periodisation add useful value, and when they mostly add fatigue.

What's covered

What the periodisation research shows
Whether periodisation outperforms, against why it might work
What changes when strength, hypertrophy, power or balance is emphasised
What's lost during detraining, and how quickly
Maintenance dose
Muscle memory and the limits of current human evidence
Parallel, emphasis and sequential models
A worked 16-week emphasis plan
Progression and autoregulation
RPE, RIR and velocity loss
Drop sets, rest-pause, supersets, pre-exhaustion and cluster sets
Eccentrics, tempo and velocity

You'll be able to choose a structural model, prescribe a maintenance dose, build an emphasis plan, and judge whether an intensity technique earns its place in a program.

Decision rule. A method earns its place by adding stimulus at an acceptable fatigue cost, or by solving a time problem.

03

Programming approaches, splits and fatigue

Compare common programming approaches through outcome research, then arrange the week around fatigue and real-life recovery.

What's covered

Where training splits came from
What frequency and split research shows when volume is matched
Why weekly dose matters more than isolated sessions
Hard sets, tonnage, and what tracks hypertrophy
Fatigue as several different things, not one vague feeling
Peripheral, spinal and supraspinal fatigue
The recovery time course
Session design and exercise order
Hard days and easy days
Sleep, life stress and concurrent training
Ageing, and sex differences in fatigability
Worked example: a week for a 44 year old client, three days, poor sleep, a shoulder issue

You'll be able to set a weekly dose, arrange a training week, describe the different types of fatigue, and adjust around real-life recovery without abandoning the structure.

Decision rule. Set the weekly dose first, then arrange it around the person's days and recovery.

04

Training dose in practice

Build minimum, general and maximal drug-free hypertrophy programs for different people and different goals.

What's covered

Volume dose-response
The minimum growth dose
Proximity to failure
Failure against one to two reps in reserve
Muscle length, range of motion and exercise selection
Free weights and machines as a transfer decision
Unilateral and bilateral training
Variation against variety
Dose for training status, age, sex and energy availability
Protein ceilings and distribution
What changed once drugs entered bodybuilding
Maximal drug-free programming

You'll be able to read a volume dose-response curve, set proximity to failure, prescribe a minimum and a growth dose, adjust for the individual, and write the three programs.

Decision rule. Dose has three dials: weekly volume, proximity to failure and load. Two of them matter a lot.

Module titles may shift a little as the material is built. The four areas won't.

In every module

Five questions to ask of any study.

Coaches get told what a study means far more often than they get shown how to check. Every module includes a short segment on reading the paper behind the claim, so that when the next one lands and your feed has already decided what it proves, you can work it out yourself.

Why it matters. A lot of hypertrophy advice runs on mechanism: this is how the muscle is thought to work, so this is what you should do. Several steps in that chain haven't been measured directly in people who train. So when the mechanism points one way and a training study shows another, this course backs the training study, and says so rather than treating the mechanism as settled.

Who was in the study, and how was it run?
What did they measure it with, and how accurate is that tool?
Did they measure muscle, or did they measure strength and call it muscle?
Were the people in the study anything like the person in front of you?
What result would have made the authors change their mind?

What's included

Ten hours live, and the materials to keep.

A teaching module every Monday and a live Q&A call every Friday, for four weeks. Every session is recorded, and the notes, slides and programs are yours afterwards with no expiry on any of them.

Your enrolment is confirmed by email as soon as you pay. The course portal opens in the week before week one.

Four live teaching modules 90 minutes each
Four live Q&A calls 60 minutes each on the Friday, questions submitted in advance
Course notes
Presentation slides
Three templated hypertrophy programs minimum, general, and maximal drug-free
Lifetime access to every recording the four modules and the four Q&A calls
Lifetime access to the notes, slides and templated programs
Direct access to Tony during the November delivery through the four live Q&A calls

The live November schedule

Mondays teach. Fridays answer.

A 90 minute teaching module every Monday, then a 60 minute live Q&A call on the Friday of the same week. Four weeks, ten hours live.

Week one
Mon 9 & Fri 13 November Module 1, the physiology of hypertrophy. 90 minutes live on the Monday. Live Q&A, 60 minutes, on the Friday.
Week two
Mon 16 & Fri 20 November Module 2, methods and periodisation. 90 minutes live on the Monday. Live Q&A, 60 minutes, on the Friday.
Week three
Mon 23 & Fri 27 November Module 3, programming approaches, splits and fatigue. 90 minutes live on the Monday. Live Q&A, 60 minutes, on the Friday.
Week four
Mon 30 November & Fri 4 December Module 4, training dose in practice. 90 minutes live on the Monday. Live Q&A, 60 minutes, on the Friday.

Times for the Monday modules and the Friday calls will be confirmed before enrolment closes, so they work as well as possible for the Australian and US-based audience.

How the Q&A works

You send the question before the call.

Questions go in ahead of each Friday call. That gives Tony the week to prepare a proper answer, with the research or the case examples behind it, rather than working from memory on the spot.

Send your question in

Bring a client, a program, or something in the module you want pushed further. Questions are collected before each Friday call.

Tony answers it prepared

Having the questions ahead of time means he can bring the study, the data or the case example the answer needs, instead of recalling it on the spot.

All of it is recorded

Every session is recorded, modules and Q&A both. If a Friday doesn't work in your timezone, send the question in and watch the answer back.

Worth being clear about what this isn't: four live calls across the four weeks, not ongoing coaching, and not individual program review.

Who's teaching it

Dr Tony Boutagy

Exercise physiologist and strength coach. PhD in Exercise and Sport Science, and Industry Fellow in High Performance Sport at the University of the Sunshine Coast.

Tony still coaches in the gym three days a week, and reads 20 to 30 research papers a week. Both matter for a course like this one. The reading is where the material comes from. The coaching is where he finds out which parts of it survive contact with a real person.

The evidence base for this course is the expert interviews on Stronger With Time, the background reading that sat behind each episode, and the major studies and reviews across each of the module topics.

30+: Years coaching
72,000+: Programs written
50,000+: Coaches and lifters educated
33: Sports, Olympic to Masters

Student feedback

What coaches say about Tony's courses

From students of Advanced Program Mastery and other BFI courses.

"I've had the pleasure of learning from Tony since 2011, both as a student and as an athlete. I've done multiple courses from Tony, often repeating them as new science and evidence comes out. Tony has this way of educating his students without it being overwhelming, or biased. He simplifies things so well."

Hattie Boydle
Student since 2011

"I've just finished Advanced Program Mastery and I'm absolutely blown away. The content was fantastic, and the enthusiasm with which Tony delivered it and answered any questions we had was amazing. I've graduated with a sports and exercise science degree and I got so much out of the program."

Matthew Bird
Sports & exercise science graduate

"I've been in the fitness industry for over 25 years. If you want to learn how to write truly great programs and understand the process properly, from beginners right through to advanced trainees, and you care about getting your clients the very best results, I highly recommend it. Even after 25 years, I learned a great deal."

Alex Flint
Trainer

"Tony has made the structures of program design so accessible that I not only feel very comfortable designing a good training program, I've also decreased the time I need to do so by half."

Anath Alonie
Personal Trainer

The investment

Enrol now, start in November, pay it off in between.

What the price covers:

Four live 90 minute teaching modules
Four live 60 minute Q&A calls
Course notes and presentation slides
Three practical templated programs: minimum, general, and maximal drug-free
Lifetime access to every recording, plus the notes, slides and programs

Enrolment closes at the end of October. Enrol today and the payment plan runs across the weeks before the course opens, so you walk into week one with it already paid for.

Paid in full

$797 AUD

Pay in full, $797

Or 2 payments of $449 AUD, a fortnight apart, both falling before the course starts if you enrol now.

Use the payment plan

Need the payments split a different way? Email [email protected] and we'll put a plan together with you.

The reason to enrol early

The payment plan closes 17 October.

Two payments of $449, a fortnight apart. Enrol on or before 17 October and both are taken before the course starts, so week one begins with it already paid off.

After that date the plan comes off sale and it's pay in full only, because a second payment would otherwise land in the middle of the course.

Questions

Before you enrol

When exactly does it run?

Teaching modules run on four consecutive Mondays: 9, 16, 23 and 30 November 2026, 90 minutes each.

The live Q&A calls run on the Friday of each week: 13, 20 and 27 November, then 4 December. 60 minutes each.

Times for both will be confirmed before enrolment closes, so they work as well as possible for the Australian and US-based audience.

Are the Q&A calls recorded?

Yes. Every session is recorded, the Monday modules and the Friday Q&A calls both, and the recordings are yours for life.

Questions are submitted before each Friday call, so if the time doesn't suit you, send yours in and watch the answer back.

What do I keep when the four weeks are over?

All eight recordings, the four teaching modules and the four Q&A calls, plus the course notes, the presentation slides, and the three templated programs.

No expiry on any of it.

I coach on Mondays. Can I still do it?

Yes. Everything is recorded, so a Monday clash costs you nothing you can't watch back.

The same goes for the Friday calls. Because questions are submitted in advance, you can send yours in whether or not you can be there live, and watch Tony work through it afterwards. Turning up live is a bonus, not a requirement.

I want in, but not all at once. Can I spread the cost?

Yes. There's a two-payment plan at $449 each, taken a fortnight apart. Enrol on or before 17 October and both fall before the course starts, so week one begins with it paid off. After 17 October the plan comes off sale and it's pay in full only, up until enrolment closes at the end of October.

If splitting it two ways still doesn't suit, email [email protected] with what does work for you, and we'll put a plan together. We'd rather sort out the payments than have the cost be the reason you sit this one out.

I've paid. When do I get into the course portal?

Your enrolment is confirmed by email straight away, and your portal login comes through in the week before week one.

That gap is deliberate. The notes, slides and templates are built alongside the teaching, so opening the portal early would hand you an empty shell. You get it when there's something in it.

How does this fit with Advanced Program Mastery?

They sit alongside each other. Advanced Program Mastery is the deep dive into program design: ten weeks, two to three lectures a module, across goals, populations and the structure of a training year. This is four weeks on hypertrophy specifically, taught from where the research sits now.

If you've done Advanced Program Mastery, treat this as the update. You'll recognise the foundations, and the work here is what's moved since, applied to hypertrophy. If you haven't done it, you can take this on its own, and Advanced Program Mastery is where you'd go afterwards to cover more ground.

Is this for coaches or for lifters?

It's built for coaches and personal trainers who design hypertrophy programs. Serious lifters who program for themselves and want the reasoning behind it do well in it too, and they're welcome. The teaching is pitched at the coaching decision.

How technical does it get?

Technical enough to be useful, and explained as it goes. The physiology is there because it tells you which variables are worth moving, not as an end in itself, and every module finishes on a decision you can apply.

You don't need a research background. You do need to want the reasoning rather than just the answer.

What if I'm not sure it's the right fit?

Email [email protected] with a bit about who you coach and what you're hoping to get out of it, and we'll get back to you before enrolment closes.

How much volume.
How close to failure.
How often.

Reading the research and writing the program are two different skills.

Coaches first. Serious lifters welcome.

Coaches and personal trainers

Serious lifters

A current framework, not a collection of disconnected tips.

Mechanism versus outcome

Methods must earn their place

The week is the unit of dose

What changed, what held

Minimum, general and maximal

Evidence translated into decisions

One question, followed through four layers.

The physiology of hypertrophy

What's covered

Methods and periodisation

What's covered

Programming approaches, splits and fatigue

What's covered

Training dose in practice

What's covered

Five questions to ask of any study.

Ten hours live, and the materials to keep.

Mondays teach. Fridays answer.

You send the question before the call.

Send your question in

Tony answers it prepared

All of it is recorded

Dr Tony Boutagy

What coaches say about Tony's courses

Enrol now, start in November, pay it off in between.

The payment plan closes 17 October.

Before you enrol

Program hypertrophy with reasons you can defend.