Know where your muscle stands — then build it, one steady step at a time.
Muscle is the most expensive tissue you own, and the one that quietly protects you as you age. This is where you find out how much lean mass you're carrying, whether to hold it or build it, and exactly how to ramp your strength training from the weekly floor up toward a real training habit — without leaping past what your body can recover from. The goal here isn't to lose weight. It's to gain lean mass.
Created by Dr. Justus Kauffman · Founder of Auxoma
This closes the Movement set. Your CARs keep the joints healthy, the strength guide teaches the 8 movements, the zone ladder builds the engine — and this tells you how much muscle to carry and how to build it.
Lean mass is everything that isn't fat — muscle, bone, water, organs. Get your lean-mass percentage from a body-composition scale (most gyms and supplement stores have one), or a DEXA / underwater weigh for the precise version. Track the percentage, not the number on the bathroom scale.
Don't have a number yet? That's fine — read the four tiers below to see the landscape, and grab a body-comp reading when you can.
Find the tier that matches your number. These are practical guideposts for deciding whether to hold or build — not a diagnosis. Your individual number is what matters, and it moves with training.
| Age | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| 20–30 | 82–88% | 72–78% |
| 30–40 | 80–86% | 70–76% |
| 40–50 | 78–84% | 68–74% |
| 50–80 | 76–82% | 66–72% |
| Age | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| 20–30 | 74–80% | 64–70% |
| 30–40 | 72–78% | 62–68% |
| 40–50 | 70–76% | 60–66% |
| 50–80 | 68–74% | 58–64% |
| Age | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| 20–30 | 66–72% | 56–62% |
| 30–40 | 64–70% | 54–60% |
| 40–50 | 62–68% | 52–58% |
| 50–80 | 60–66% | 50–56% |
| Age | Men | Women |
|---|---|---|
| 30–40 | under 64% | under 54% |
| 40–50 | under 62% | under 52% |
| 50–60 | under 60% | under 50% |
Muscle trains on the same rule as everything else: a little more than it's used to, recovered from, repeated. Here's how to ramp from the weekly floor up toward a real training habit — gradually, so you build the base instead of breaking it.
When movement isn't your focus this cycle, you still keep the muscle you own. That's the strength-guide minimum: the 8 movement patterns plus two core sessions, at maintenance effort. Enough to hold the line — not enough to wreck you. This is where you live when another pillar is your plot.
When you decide to build — move up a tier, or climb out of the At-Risk range — frequency jumps from your floor to 3–6 days a week, and you build volume gradually toward roughly 2–3 hours a week. Don't leap there. Add one day, then another. Add a set before you add a session.
Maintenance is RPE 4–6. To actually grow, the working sets on your target patterns climb to RPE 7–8 — real, intentional effort, a few reps left in the tank. Hold everything else at maintenance so you're not redlining every lift.
You don't have to push all eight at once. Pick the pattern that's lagging — your squat, your horizontal press, whatever tested weakest — and give it extra sets, extra frequency, and the higher effort. Bring up the weak link, then rotate to the next.
Progressive overload is just "slightly more than last time, recovered from, repeated." Add a rep or two before you add a set; add a set before you add load; nudge the weight, don't jump it. Let RPE be your governor — if a working weight starts feeling like a 5, it's time to nudge up.
Hit your goal? Set a new one, or drop back to the floor and rotate to another pillar. Miss your goal? The input was too light — add input (more frequency, more sets, more effort), not more frustration. Re-check your lean-mass % every one to three months and watch the direction of travel.
Log your baseline and come back in one to three months. You're watching the trend, not chasing a daily number — a slow climb is exactly what building muscle looks like. Saves on this device.
Find your tier — your honest starting line.
Building? Movement's your plot: 3–6 days.
Content with your tier? Hold the floor, RPE 4–6.
Every session is a vote for more lean mass.
Re-check in 1–3 months. Build or hold.
If you're training consistently and the muscle still won't come — or a joint won't let you load the pattern that would build it — there's usually a movement or recovery reason underneath it. Here's where to keep going:
Join the free Auxoma community for the ongoing mobility and strength work — with a low-cost membership when you want the full follow-along. Local to Wichita and stuck on a specific pattern? Our team will find where your body's holding you back.
That closes the Movement set — now go build.
These tiers are practical, non-diagnostic guideposts derived from body-composition norms, not a medical assessment. Body-composition readings vary by method and device. If you're concerned about muscle loss or where to start, talk with a qualified professional.