ShapeFit.com

[Natan]

Hi

At the moment Im on a one day on one day off routine (one week 3 days next week 4 days)lower body and upper body split on 2 alternated workouts... all compound movements except for the forearms and the calves press...I do abs at home 2 x week

Im enjoying it and will finish this year with that split...but I was wondering what is the relation between rest and intensity...in one word which one si better:

A) one muscle group(back, legs, chest, delts, arms) (3 or 4 timeas a week as in one day on one day off)so u exhaust properly said muscle group and give it 10 days rest till next time or

B) body part (lower and upper)(3 or 4 timeas a week as in one day on one day off) in which u dontt manage to exhaust your muscles as much as in example A but you come back to them every 5 days

on both examples u r working one day on one day off (monday, wed, fri, sun, tue, thu, sat) 7 days every fortnight but on example A is only compound exercises since u dont have time to cramp isolation exercises into one workout given the many diferent muscles u r working.. but u come back to hit it in 5 days

On exmaple B u wil add isolation exercises to post-exhaust the muscles really working them hard in one section and giveing them 10 days rest

I'm currently doing example A but maybe in a few motnhs would want to change it to the example B and I was wondering what the difference is... which one is best?

thanx a lot for your help

[swanso5]

if training every 2nd day religeously than i'd go with b assuming it lloks like this;

mon - lower
wed - upper
fri - lower
sun - upper
tue - lower
thu - upper
sat - lower and so on (i assume that's what your talking about)

full body 4/week is probably a bit much unless you have strategically worked up to it albeit Chad Waterbury's Final Frontier Program (i think that's it)

either the way the volume would be roughly the same just all done over 2 days instead of 4

a good idea may be to alternate the different set ups monthly???

also i'm not sure if either plan is sustainable for a long period of time either but we'll find out i suppose

are you including deloading weeks??? i think you should

[Natan]

hi swanson
thnx for the advice iam actually changing the set-up every 4 weeks as u suggested but at the moment Im not doing any upper body excercise,,, i have taken 3 weeks off cos i injured my right shoulder and dont want it to get worse ...hopefully 3 weeks should be plenty to recover

many thnx

[swanso5]

you should still be able to do some back and arm work though...

[Natan]

biceps is ok ,,,, but last nite I was doing some close grip bench press for triceps and i couldnt finish a set... triceps overhead extension also hurts my shoulder

Im worry now that my rest mite be too long and i will start loosing too much muscle?

[swanso5]

as long as your still going heavy for lower body you'll be alright and even if you do lose some you can always gsain it back later pretty quickly...just don't lose strength though, that's worse

[Natan]

thnx ... do u know of any tricpes move that wont affect my shoulder for the time being?
thnx again

[Natan]

wot's the story with the deloadin weeks?.. I have only been training hard and seriously for 6 months so I have always just keep addin and addin weight whenever i can cos i think i'm a newbie and not need to deload yet

i mite be wrong,,,how does it work?

[swanso5]

well you can't continually increase wt everytimer you train...initially you will but they'll come a time when you can't...if you've reached that point already than you should use them...the less expercinced you are the less often you'll need to do it...basically you drop volume and intensity 20 - 50% depending on what type of program you've just come off...another way is to cycle strength and mass phases every 3 - 4 weeks where the mass weeks acts a deload type phase but you should still do some sets heavy to maintain strength from phase to phase or you'll increase, lose it, increase, lose it etc

[Natan]

thnx swansow5

From next year I will include deloading weeks to c how it goes .

On another note: my right shoulder is still tender ....it has been a month now without doing chest properly!...I like the close grip for triceps but Im not using it rite now ...any triceps move that wont compromised my shoulder?

many thanx

[swanso5]

tiger bend push ups
bodyweight tricep extensions
diamond push ups

try benching with db's maybe but with db's and with palms facing rach other

[Natan]

cheers m8

BTW I have been lookin for that bodyweight triceps ext but can find nothing ...any other name?

thnx

[Natan]

I found it!... I will give it a go it looks like a lot of fun ...lately I have been doing weighted bench dips and is such a good feeling!... i will introduce this bodyweight triceps extension to alternate with the bench dip every few weeks

thnx again swanson man