Every program stalls after a few weeks. Stagger different programs. Louie Simmons does this with his powerlifters in Conjugate training.
Louie Simmons lifters are all on the gas. A natural bodybuilder can put on about ~30 pounds of muscle in his lifetime. There was a longitudinal study years ago of non drug using college athletes and how much muscle they could put on. 40 pounds was in the 99.99% percentile after 4 years. The average person put on 20 and then it stalled out. You can cycle through all the routines in the world and that isn't going to change.
I went from roughly 160 to 190 using HIT over 3 years (sophomore to 1st year grad school in college). It definitely works. My typical routine ended up being 1 warm-up set, 1 heavy set just short of failure, 6-10 reps. Twice a week. I stuck to the basic movements and got reasonably strong for my body type (moderately ectomorphic then): 255 bench/405 dead lift/405 squat. My goal was never to be a power lifter. I just wanted to build up because I was sick of being a skinny geek.
Going to failure was too much for me- my nervous system fried. Every 4th week I would go very light or take it off. I then ramped up again the next 3. I think it is pointless to do volume training, but that's me. I'd much prefer to exercise outside than in a gym. My goal was to become a national level bicycle racer and I hit that target.
I'm well aware of the General Adaptation Syndrome and Hans Selye. I became a 4:20 miler in college because I knew how to cycle intense periods with easy periods. Hormonal exhaustion is real.
I am also aware of the PED syndrome, where people think you can get stronger and bigger indefinitely, haha. At my college gym there was a Junior Mr America and a number of monstrous guys who had trained also with Pete Grymkowski and Danny Padilla. Of course they used drugs- duh.
At the end of the day some people like lots of volume and some people like short and intense. It's all personal preference. But to say HIT doesn't work is inaccurate.
