My name is Turk Fickling and I’m a personal trainer at the Xtreme Edge Gym in Beaverton, Oregon. I’m going to take you through a high intensity back workout today and the training style that I will be showing you is one that I developed. I call it “Turk’s Training Principles” which includes a combination of many different programs such as Mike Mentzer’s HIT (high intensity training), Joe Weider’s principles, and a lot of my own training beliefs and viewpoints. This workout routine is high intensity which means we will be going to failure for every set. We will be doing one main set and adding an additional set for any of the hardcore athletes out there that still have some gas left in the tank. This is super high intensity, so it will be a short workout with back-to-back exercises to really hit the back muscles and stimulate growth. The first set will consist of 3 different back exercises with multiple training principles included into the routine. These 3 exercises will include rear deltoid flyes, followed up with stiff arm pulldowns and then finishing up with seated rows. All of these exercises will be taken to absolute failure. After each exercise, you should take only enough time to catch your breath before moving onto the next exercise. This short rest period should be between 30-60 seconds. Lets get started!
High Intensity Back Workout – 1st Exercise (Set #1):
Exercise:
Rear Deltoid Flyes
Workout Advice:
Your repetition range is determined by the weight you will be using. In this giant set workout routine, you will be going from one exercise to the next with very little rest between movements. Take 1 of the 3 exercises and make that your heavy lift, then take the other 2 exercises and do mid-range to high-range repetitions for these.
High Intensity Back Workout – 2nd Exercise (Set #1):
Exercise:
Stiff Arm Pulldowns
Workout Advice:
Your repetition range is determined by the weight you will be using. In this giant set workout routine, you will be going from one exercise to the next with very little rest between movements. Take 1 of the 3 exercises and make that your heavy lift, then take the other 2 exercises and do mid-range to high-range repetitions for these.
High Intensity Back Workout – 3rd Exercise (Set #1):
Exercise:
Seated Rows
Workout Advice:
Your repetition range is determined by the weight you will be using. In this giant set workout routine, you will be going from one exercise to the next with very little rest between movements. Take 1 of the 3 exercises and make that your heavy lift, then take the other 2 exercises and do mid-range to high-range repetitions for these.
I wanted to point out a few things. If you watched the video, you noticed me doing “partials” during the exercises. “Partials” refers to “partial range reps” and it’s a training principle that consists of doing repetitions in a specific range of motion. Although some might disagree with partials, let me give you my theory on them. If you’re doing an exercise such as tricep pushdowns with a straight bar and you stop your range of motion at the bottom, that is technically failure. However, on a single joint exercise you have the luxury of going to failure beyond the initial point of failure. If you fail at the bottom, you have all of the rest of the range of motion in the movement to benefit from because it’s basically still in play. You can still exercise in this range of motion and I’m sure that the muscle fibers that are operating in that specific range want to experience failure too, wouldn’t you think? Then why allow just the muscle fibers that are involved in the area slightly less than full range, to get all the benefit. Really try to take it to absolute failure, especially since you’re only doing 1 main set for the muscle group (and maybe 2 full sets for the hardcore athletes). That is the main point in doing only 1 set, so that you can completely stimulate the muscle every time you go to failure and you feel that after your first intense set, it’s truly your last set!
Stay tuned for part 2 of this high intensity back workout where we will cover the 2nd set of this routine for the advanced athletes that need some extra stimulation to utterly destroy their back muscles and grow big time!
