i am getting slaped in the face for this >.>

[romiel]

hi all.
as the title says, some will hate me for this lol

i am thinking of doing a split, not full body or upper/lower.
it is not because splits are better blah blah, but for a change, i kinda got bored from fullbody workouts.

questions are:
would i benifit from splits if done correctly?
how to do splits for mass gain? back/biceps, chest/triceps, legs/abs?
also can i train 6 days a week? (yes i know most of you will say 6 days is too much)

but i am in last week of waterbury high frequency training, i am doing 8 sessions a week and still got some very nice results, how come doing 6 sessions would be bad?

thanks.

[Patrick]

Splits are benificial as are full body workouts different people respond different ways to workouts. I mean you dont see msot of the body builders doing total body workouts... but you probably dont look like on either i know i dont haha, I did waterbury and then i did his summer program for awile, but now im doing OVT optimum volume training by CT its crazy but ive noticed some nice changes its a split instead of the full body. A change in routine now and then is good and will only help growth. I like total body better so i will go back after OVT is done which is 8 weeks im in week 4. But as for 6 times a week man dont lift any more then 4 if your splitting only 3 if your doing full body. You may not be sore or anything but the time off is when your going to grow so take advantage of it maybe some light cardio!

best of luck man give the split a try

[swanso5]

it's not so much the 6 sessions but if your usingmuscle splits then there's a lot of ineffective shit being done where your just as better off sitting on the couch (arms, abs, shoulder raises etc)...i just don't see the point in doing 6hrs of work instead of 3 or 4 for the same if not better results

[romiel]

i think the more you read about this the more lost you get lol.

here is why i want to try a split:

1: for a change.

2: to use more variations of exercises so i dont get bored.

3: i read that you must train the muscle enough to force it to grow.
isnt this happen better in splits?
for example: in full body you do 1 chest exercises (bench press) is that enough to make it grow?

4: when i do for example bent over row, isnt body system automaticaly puts the most work on the sronger muscle aka back and less on biceps which means i must do some biceps isolation?

5: 3 days/week sounds little for good results, i have alot of time everyday that i could train twice a day everyday lol, so maybe train more than 3 days/week better?

i read alot online that i decided to stop read anymore, everyone say things i cant even understand, they use terms i dont know. so i decided to try diffrent ways myself and see whick works better.

perhaps someone can make this clear using simple words i would appreciate it^^

thanks in advance

[DianaB]

You think too much LOL.
Seriously, a BB split is not a bad way to train.
But before you decide on any program, you need to ask yourself where you are right now. If you are a skinny kid, then a BB split isn't going to benefit you much. If you have a fair amount of mass gained from strength training and want to add in some isolation work, then fine. Or maybe it's a particular body part that is lagging (i.e chicken legs) that you feel needs extra attention.
You can change your program without doing a full split as well by adding in isolation work after your primary and secondary lifts.
Change is good, but be sure the change you make isn't a waste of time and will help you meet your goals, not stall them out.
Start by posting some stats age, weight, 1RM on your squat, dead and bench.

[vamp]

you know its funny, when I was younger 1RM weights were so much a part of me figuring out programs and a bragging right and all that. Since starting back in May, I haven't done a single maximum lift. I work soully on feel.

The mentally shift is wo-hooo, I can max .... ibs in the bench press, to wo-hoo, working weight is ... lbs. I guess now I find actual working weight more important and impressive than what I can do once on a good day.

I know all these percentages and everything for calculating how much you should be doing for so many reps, blah blah blah. But honestly, going by feel and logging lifts, how they feel and the weight each workout and then determining wether to increase the weight on the next workout seems to work really well.

Just a thought..
Cheers

[DianaB]

That's not why I asked.
If someone is 19 years old and squats 140lbs max, that tells me he needs to focus on building strength over physique training.
Bringing up your numbers adds mass. Then you have something to work a BB split on. Doing isolation on skin and bones is a waste of time.

[romiel]

thanks for clearing it.
and after being honest with myself... yes i have a chicken legs lol >.>

legs strength is waaaay behind the rest of body and i should have made the post "help me out on legs please"

i am 23 years , 73kg and 172cm height and i have long legs and kinda short upper body.
for lefts as D asked:

the numbers below have been done 4x3 and 1-2 reps before failure (sorry D i did not try 1rm)

squat: 75lb

deadleft: 176lb

bench: 145lb

after looking at the numbers i agree that i should focus on strength rather than size hehe.
so now i should focus more on legs?

any advise is welcomed

[swanso5]

- you don;t need to train the muscle "enough", you need to train it properly which with the perfecrt balance of stimulations (training) then recovery (food/rest) and then dial in the frequency perfectly so you're never in a catabolic/atrophy stage
- need a change, donlt get bored?? i use the same 30 exercises max all the time...i don't get bored because i get results with training...it's amazing how many people stay in boring jobs because the rewards are so good ($$$$)...it seems you could be training/eating better to get these types of results
- if you lift more wt for the saem exercise each time you do it then the muscle will grow...it's a proven fact that a muscle doesn;t grow any bigger with 2 exercises rather than 1 meaning anymore will probably lead to "reversability" where it's so stimualted it's going backwards
- don't get too inticate with this...the more wt you lift the bigger you'll get it's as simple as that...if you can bent row 50kgs and only curl 20kgs, curls are obselete
- training more doens't mean you're training getter...it gives people too much time to do shitty inefficient exercises and they quickly lose track of what they are in there to do
- i don't like the going by feel thing...if you lifted 100kgs last week then you must lift more the next week for the same reps or something to that effect...too much oppurtunity to go backwards without knowiung...i have everything written out (sets/reps/wt) before i start each session so i know exactly what to do regardless of how i'm feeling

[vamp]

Swanso, by going by feel I meant when going back to an exercise I haven't done in awhile starting at a known capable lift and working up until I find the proper weight for me to be working at rather than calculating 85% of 1rm (100lb) means I do 85 lb.

As you stated above "i have everything written out (sets/reps/wt) before i start each session so i know exactly what to do regardless of how i'm feeling."-this is me as well.

If I can't hit say 10 reps for all 3 sets then the next time I lift I use the same weight but increase the reps for that weight. When I hit 3 @ 10 then the weight goes up. This way every time I lift something is increasing and therefore I am increasing overall weights lifted each workout.

cheers and sorry for the misunderstanding.

[vamp]

Sorry Diana, misunderstood where you were coming from, and yes I definately see your point.

Cheers

[swanso5]

if you wanna make real progres then start back with the wt you lifted last time you did the exercise...i re did a 12 week program back to back so it was 8 week sbtw doing the same exercises and i started back where i left off (sometimes heavier) and it worked an absolute treat

[DianaB]

thanks for clearing it.
and after being honest with myself... yes i have a chicken legs lol >.>

legs strength is waaaay behind the rest of body and i should have made the post "help me out on legs please"

i am 23 years , 73kg and 172cm height and i have long legs and kinda short upper body.
for lefts as D asked:

the numbers below have been done 4x3 and 1-2 reps before failure (sorry D i did not try 1rm)

squat: 75lb

deadleft: 176lb

bench: 145lb

after looking at the numbers i agree that i should focus on strength rather than size hehe.
so now i should focus more on legs?

any advise is welcomed

Something really wrong with that squat/DL ratio, they should not be that far apart. You are doing one or the other wrong for sure. I suspect the squat, 75lbs doesn't make sense. You would need to get a video or seek advice from a strength coach, because without seeing it I can't really help you.
Definitely make your legs a priority. They are the largest muscle groups in the body. Stimulating growth in the legs has carry over to the rest of the body. Stonglifts.com or deepsquatter.com are good reference points to start. Go with one of the basic strength programs. Westside has some great stuff too, but for later. Get the basics down first.
T-Nation ran an article recently outlining the Bill Starr 5x5, look into it, I think the article is called Starting Strength, which is Rippetoe's version of the old Bill Starr program.
And eat! Don't get caught up in the BF dilemma right now. You have youth on your side and now is the time to get big. You can cut fat for the rest of your life.

[romiel]

ok got it now.

going to try the 5x5 program where i do squat every session. it is in the stronglift.com site so if you can look at it and tell me if it needs changes that would be great.

also i ended waterbury hight frequency program, do i need a deload week or just jump to the new program?

thanks

[DianaB]

ok got it now.

going to try the 5x5 program where i do squat every session. it is in the stronglift.com site so if you can look at it and tell me if it needs changes that would be great.

also i ended waterbury hight frequency program, do i need a deload week or just jump to the new program?

thanks

The only thing I would change about this program is for you B/A/B weeks, only do the full ROM deadlift on one of those days. On the other day, pull partials either from the knees (rack pulls, you can move a lot more lbs from the top of the lift) or to the knees. If you know how to do a power clean (from the just below the knees) then you could change up the A weeks and alternate power clean with the barbell row, but it's not a necessity.
No need to -load, your not moving that much weight right now
You'll do well with this program. Follow up and let us know how it's going.