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Blast Furnace

Home Dumbbell Workout for Mass, 3 Days a Week

A blast furnace keeps its heat up around the clock while the ore melts down into iron. “Blast Furnace” keeps building muscle at home with the same dumbbells and bench: six exercises a workout and long sets that end close to failure. Start with the intro week.

  • GoalMass Gain
  • LevelExperienced
  • WhereHome
  • Workouts24
  • One workout~55 min
  • ForEveryone
Start it in the appThe app calculates the weight of every set from your 1RM

Who it’s for

  • You’ve finished “Unplugged” or “Metalwork”
  • You want to keep building muscle at home
  • You have dumbbells and a bench

How it works

  1. 013 workouts a week, 6 exercises each; chest, back and legs work in every session, 12 sets a week each for chest and back
  2. 02Base, 4 weeks: weighted exercises for 15 reps, with the load rising week by week
  3. 03Build, 4 weeks: 12 reps, with the load moving in a wave and a step back in week 3; isolation exercises are taken almost to failure
  4. 042 minutes of rest between sets, and the exercises stay the same in both stages
Method

Light weights close to failure

Dumbbell weight at home is limited, so the load comes from long sets that end close to failure. In Build, isolation exercises are taken almost to failure. The exercises are the same in both stages, and your maxes carry over from stage to stage.

Weekly volume

Counts sets where the muscle is the main target of the exercise

  • Chest12 sets3 workouts
  • Back12 sets3 workouts
  • Shoulders6 sets2 workouts
  • Quads6 sets2 workouts
  • Hamstrings & glutes6 sets2 workouts
  • Arms6 sets2 workouts
  • Abs6 sets2 workouts

In the Build stage, some sets go to failure

What the research shows

3

  • Light and heavy weights produce the same muscle growth; heavy weights build more strength

    Schoenfeld et al., 2017

  • The closer a set ends to failure, the more muscle growth; the link with strength is weak

    Robinson et al., 2024

  • Resting longer than a minute between sets gives a small edge in muscle growth

    Singer et al., 2024
The studies tested the principles; the program itself has not been tested in this form.

The program has no vertical pulls; bent-over dumbbell rows work the back.

Workout A

6 exercises · ~55 min

The whole first workout. Tap an exercise to open its technique with photos and video.

  1. 01Dumbbell SquatQuads3 × 15weight from 1RM
  2. 02Stiff-Legged Dumbbell DeadliftHamstrings3 × 15weight from 1RM
  3. 03Decline Dumbbell Bench PressChest3 × 15weight from 1RM
  4. 04Bent Over Two-Dumbbell RowMiddle Back3 × 15weight from 1RM
  5. 05Arnold Dumbbell PressShoulders3 × 15weight from 1RM
  6. 06Air BikeAbs3 × 15bodyweight

All workouts in the program

24 sessions over ~7.5 weeks, 3–4 per week. Workouts A, B and C repeat in a loop, 8 times each. The other workouts and the weight for every set are in the app.

Workout intensity

The load of each session: higher means harder. average per round A–C

hardereasierWorkout 1 (A)Workout 2 (B)Workout 3 (C)Workout 4 (A)Workout 5 (B)Workout 6 (C)Workout 7 (A)Workout 8 (B)Workout 9 (C)Workout 10 (A)Workout 11 (B)Workout 12 (C)Workout 13 (A)Workout 14 (B)Workout 15 (C)Workout 16 (A)Workout 17 (B)Workout 18 (C)Workout 19 (A)Workout 20 (B)Workout 21 (C)Workout 22 (A)Workout 23 (B)Workout 24 (C)Round 1: averageRound 2: averageRound 3: averageRound 4: averageRound 5: averageRound 6: averageRound 7: averageRound 8: average

Workout number

AtletIQ app

Program weights — from your 1RM

1RM is the weight you can lift once. Enter it for the base exercises and AtletIQ will calculate working weights for all 24 workouts of “Blast Furnace”.

  • The weight of every set comes from your 1RM
  • All workouts of the program in order, with rest between sets
  • Progress for every exercise
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