Muscle Balance

Muscle Balance is a Home widget. PumpIQ picks the saved workout that does the most for the balance you want today: it catches up the muscles that are behind and have recovered, and holds off on the ones you trained hard lately. It names the muscle that workout helps most, like “Hamstrings are due,” with a short reason, like “Rested 4 days, and behind the balance you want.” Beside it, a front and back body is shaded by your last 30 days of training, with that muscle in violet.

1. On Home, hold any empty space, then tap Add to Home at the top left, then Add Widget.
2. Under Progress, tap Add next to Muscle Balance.

Under the reason, a button names that workout. Tap it to open it. When none of your saved workouts trains a muscle in your balance, PumpIQ names the muscle most due and there’s no button. Tap anywhere else on the widget to open the Muscle Balance page. Swipe it down to close it.

The Muscle Balance page

• PumpIQ’s pick and its workout, as on the widget.
• The whole body, front and back. Tap a muscle to open it.
• Aim for has a slider for each muscle. Each starts at Even. Slide right for More or Focus, or left for Less. A slider only changes its own muscle. PumpIQ raises or lowers that muscle's goal, and its picks follow.
• Most worked and Least worked list the three muscles you’ve trained most and least for their size. Tap one to open it.

One muscle

Tap a muscle on the body or in a list. Its sheet shows when it was Last trained, and What hit it: the exercises that worked it most. Tap one to see that exercise’s history. Turn on Leave out of balance, and PumpIQ won’t suggest that muscle. It shows fainter on the body. Forearms and calves start left out. Turn the switch off to bring one back.

How it’s measured

• Every set you log counts toward the muscle groups its exercise works, by how much it grows each whole group: fully for the main ones, in part for the ones that help, and in part for a move that works only part of a group, like a rear delt fly for your shoulders. Warm-ups never count.
• Each set counts against your usual set of that exercise: the weight you usually lift on it, a typical number of reps or how long a typical hold lasts, and its RPE when you rate it. A heavier or longer set counts for more. A hard set of flys and a hard set of bench press count about the same for your chest.
• Recent sets count more. A set counts half as much every 10 days, and sets older than 30 days drop off.
• Muscles recover, too. What a muscle got wears off by half about every day and a half, so one you trained hard yesterday waits a day or two, and a big session takes longer to come back from than a light one. An exercise that only steadies a muscle or works part of it, like your core on a row or your rear delts on a face pull, barely tires it.
• Each muscle is scaled for its size, by what it gets in a standard balanced program, so a body you train evenly reads even. A muscle’s full share is about 10 hard sets a week for its size.
• Pump’s Library exercises already know what they work. Your own exercises are read automatically after they sync.