Programming Clients

You have three ways to put a program in front of a client: let MuscleBuddy generate one from their onboarding, deploy one of your own templates, or start a program from the catalogue. Each lands in your review queue first. On top of any of them, your per-client settings override what MuscleBuddy would do by default.

Templates and the block builder

The Program templates card on your dashboard lists your templates, how many clients each has been deployed to, and any shared by coaches at your gym.

• + New template saves a name, description and length in weeks. Press Build program on its row to add the workouts. A template with workouts shows Edit / Deploy instead.
• Build block opens the block builder at /coach/block-builder, the full editor.

The block builder walks four steps:

1. Details: the block name, a description, and Conflicts with, where you tick the client accommodations this block does not respect. Deploying it to a client whose profile sets one warns you first; you can still deploy. Share with my gym lets other coaches at your gym deploy it to their own clients. Only you can edit or delete it.
2. Methodology: Goal, Duration (weeks) and Default progression.
3. Workouts: each session's day and exercises, with Sets, Min reps and Max reps. Show per-exercise advanced options adds rest, RPE and a per-exercise progression method.
4. Client settings: values the block sets on a client who has no setting of their own yet: Deload every (weeks), Flag a missed check-in after (days), Weekly sets per muscle, the volume ramp, Refeeds, Carb cycling and Auto-adjustments. Tick Use these settings for every new client and every client who starts with you begins on them. One block can hold that at a time.

Press Save block. A template shared with you by another coach opens read-only as Shared block: you can deploy it and not change it.

Deploy a template

To one client

Under Deploy to a client at the bottom of the block builder, pick the client and press Deploy. Tick Replace settings this client already has with the block's if the block's client settings should win over the client's own. The program arrives as pending review: approve it under Programs awaiting review on your dashboard to make it live.

If the block conflicts with the client's accommodations, the conflicts stay on screen with a Review the client's program button.

To several clients

Deploy to clients on a template row opens a list of every client who gave you training access. Tick the ones you want, decide on Replace settings these clients already have with the block's, and press Deploy to N clients. Each client gets their own program, each pending your approval. The toast tells you how many were deployed and how many had no active plan yet. A client needs an active plan before a template can be deployed to them.

Catalogue programs

The Training tab of a client's page has Start a catalogue program. Pick one of the hand-built programs from the program library and press Start for client. It is built into the client's current plan and waits in your review queue like any other.

A coached client cannot start a catalogue program on their own, because their program is yours. The library tells them to ask you, and this card is the answer.

The season planner

Season plan on the Training tab opens the client's season timeline with Open season plan, or Create a season plan if they have no plan yet. The timeline lays out their mesocycles and phases across the season: you can reorder phases and plan toward a competition. You need training access.

Per-client overrides

Everything below lives on the client's Overview tab. Leave a field empty to hand it back to the client's own setting or MuscleBuddy's default. Press Save configuration at the bottom when you are done.

AI access and monitoring

• AI coaching chat for this client: Allowed, Scoped (the AI sends them back to you on anything inside your access) or Off.
• Flag a missed check-in after N days, from 1 to 14.
• Review automatic adjustments before they apply.
• Draft a weekly check-in summary for me to review, when you hold check-ins access.

Training methodology

Needs training access.

• Default progression method for every exercise you have not overridden. Leave it on Follow the client's program to keep the method their program was built on.
• Warm-up exercises: whether their workouts open with the plan's warm-ups. The ramp-up sets on each lift stay either way.
• Deload every N weeks (4 unless you set it), Taper weeks before a show and Deload protocol.
• Exercise progression overrides: a different progression method for named exercises.
• Volume landmarks (MEV/MRV): this client's volume landmarks per muscle. Your numbers win over MuscleBuddy's.
• Weekly volume: working sets per muscle per week each generated block fills toward, for every muscle or per muscle, plus how much volume rises each week and its ceiling. These apply on the next program generation.

Nutrition prescription

Needs nutrition access.

• Protein ratio, Carb ratio and Fat ratio (%). They take effect when all three are set and add up to 100. For a client under 18, MuscleBuddy refuses a split outside the range set for their age.
• Adjust calories automatically from weigh-ins. Off, you set their targets by hand: weigh-ins are still tracked and shown to you, and the plan stays as you set it.
• How the weigh-in adjustment behaves for this client: Priority macro, the weekly rate band that triggers a change, Adjustment step (kcal) and Days between automatic cuts.
• Refeed scheduler, Refeed every N days (7 to 21) and Refeed calorie increase.
• Diet breaks, which you can switch off for this client, and Diet break length (days) (7 to 14). When MuscleBuddy proposes a break for this client, it waits in your review queue like any other adjustment. Approving it raises their targets to maintenance for the break, and the break ends on the date it carries.
• Carb cycling pattern and Carb cycling for this client. Force on applies your pattern over theirs; force off switches carb cycling off and stops the client turning it back on. Carb cycling is not offered for clients under 18.
• Contest prep rate of loss (% of bodyweight per week). In a prep, each weigh-in aims for your rate instead of the one MuscleBuddy works out. Leave it empty to let MuscleBuddy decide.
• Reverse dieting: the weekly increment, target calories and the macro ratios each step uses.

Condition adjustments

Shown when the client shares health data and their health profile sets an accommodation. Each one shows the client's own value beside yours. Your value replaces theirs for how the program adapts. Each field needs the access it belongs to.

Advanced feature access

Switches that unlock Periodization, Carb cycling or Contest prep tools for this client early, before they reach the usual point in the app. These save immediately.

Where to go next

• Your weekly review
• Understanding your program and progression
• How nutrition targets auto-adjust