advice on a 4 day muscle group split

jasonking92

jasonking92

Member

Hi guys seem to think I have stalled on growth possibly due to over training muscle groups. So looking for advice on putting muscle groups together for best results. I do 4 days a week m/w/f/s. I want to hit each muscle group twice a week so i want to spit it mon/fri  and wen/sat . I want to spit the following (arms, back, chest, core, legs, shoulders.) in to 2 groups of 3. what would be the best order to group them together.  example: back legs core mon/fri and arms chest shoulders wen/sat).

Hope that is not too confusing.

 

 
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strong

Member

When I was younger and I worked 2 jobs I had no real time to hit the gym every day...   I did chest, shoulders,tri's Monday and thurs.  Legs, back and bi's tues and fri...  The workouts are long and grueling but plenty of time for rest...

 
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Griz

New member

Wait. You've stalled on growth due to overtraining muscle groups and your plan is to train every muscle group twice over 4 days?

What are your goals? What exercises do you like doing? What kind of volume are you currently reaching per each body part?

 
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SemperFi

Well-known member

It doesn't fit your requested schedule but a proven old school split would be-

Chest/Tri's

Back/Bi's

Shoulders/Abs

Legs

If you believe you are over training you might want to reconsider working every muscle group twice a week. Rest and recovery are key to muscle development. 

 

SEMPER FI

 
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BobbyO190

Moderator

Please answer. I am just realizing I personally have a lot to learn here!  I work out upper body three times a week minimum and legs twice a week and core/abs every day.  It sounds like I am doing to much....interesting.  So you guys only lift once a week per body part??  Man that doesn't seem enough but again I am extremely open to learning.

 
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SemperFi

Well-known member

There is always more than one way to skin a cat. Trial and error combined with knowing your bodies needs. Sometimes you have to think outside the box and sometimes its better to stay in the box. ;) Do not overlook the importance of R&R. It is a huge key to muscle development.

 

SEMPER FI

 
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Griz

New member

Bobbo, the answer depends on a lot. If you're training upper body 3 times a week and legs 2 times a week and you're making great gains, then it's definitely not too much. There is no right way to coordinate a training plan. There are many streams and they all lead to the ocean.

What I would auggest is monitoring everything and making adjustments every 6 weeks or so.

The thing that's really important when discussing how frequent to train body parts is volume. You're hitting back 3 times a week. How many sets total in a week? What exercises? When we examine training volume from a scientific standpoint, we are aware of a maximum recoverable volume which is basically the most amount of sets you can do per muscle group per week before your ability to recover is hindered. Bigger body parts have a higher MRV than smaller body parts. Also there is a genetic component which will be different for everyone i.e. some people can get away with doing 35 sets for chest a week while most people will hit their MRV somewhere around 24-28 sets per week.

Knowing how much volume each body part needs per week is essential in building a training routine. Once you decide how many sets to do per week, then you can choose to separate them into different days to increase the frequency. But keep in mind that some body parts need more time to recover than others. And all of that is dependent on the volume per session, genetics, diet, supplementation and most importantly, sleep.

Writing training programs is one of my favorite things to do. I recall helping one of our prestigious Gurus turn his pixie sticks into drum sticks ;) I'm more than willing to help anyone write out a training program to reach their goals. I've been writing at least one a month for the last ten years and too few of them are ever executed.

 
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SemperFi

Well-known member

Those pixie sticks are now tree trunks. A valued asset the bear was in making it happen!!!

 

SEMPER FI

 
jasonking92

jasonking92

Member

Ok Guys I am going too try out doing the following.

BACK MON/FRI                       . RACK PULL (MON). DEADLIFT (FRI) - V BAR ROW - CLOSE GRIP LAT DOWN

ARMS (BICEPS) MON/FRI       . EASY BAR CURLS. - REV D/B CURLS. - HAMMER CURLS

SHOULDERS MON/FRI           . MILITARY PRESS (MON) SMITH MACHINE OVER HEAD PRESS (FRI) . B/B UPRIGHT ROW . BENT OVER CABLE LAT RAISE. 

---------------------------------------------------

LEGS (WEN/SAT)                      . SQUAT . LEG PRESS . SEATED ONE LEG CALF RAISES (WITH D\B WEIGHT WEN) . SEATED TWO LEG  CALF RAISES (WITH BARBELL SAT)

CHEST +(TRICEPS) (WEN/SAT) . BENCH . CABLE FLYS . INCLINE BENCH (WEN) DECLINE BENCH (SAT) . CABLE TRICEP EXT.

CORE (WEN/SAT)                      . HANGING LEG RAISE . SIDE PLANKS (WEN) CABLE CRUNCH (SAT) . PALLOF CABLE PRESS.

 

This will hit all muscle groups twice a week which gives between three and four days rest for each muscle group was thinking four sets of each on bigger muscles three on smaller and five sets on legs. Then change all the exercises every five weeks to hit at different angles except the main staples like squat. deadlift. bench etc.

I have just started (2 weeks in) a 600mg test e / 300mg Deca pw split pin sat/wen cycle. got cals running at approx 4000pw  so I am hopeful of some new (slow and steady) gains in mass looking for mass over strength so 6-12 rep range .

will of course keep my gym brothers informed along the way. 

P.S Thanks again for your in put as always its very much appreciated 

 
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strong

Member

I have not stuck with a routine for more than 2 weeks for about a year now. I've made some of my greatest gains this year... My current gains are BF loss.. Yes, I consider BF loss a gain : ) ... Like Griz and really any experienced BB says. You have to find out what works for you... It takes time..

Jason, I would think you need more rest. You have made great gains this past year.. It seems like you're set on Each muscle group twice a week. Try it and see. The other option would be more rest. You can get great gains pumping a muscle every 7/8 days as long as the intensity is there during workout... Good luck..

 
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Griz

New member

Strong I agree. If someone has been doing the same thing for awhile, the easiest way to start making new gains is to do the opposite thing. If they're doing high volume, switch to low volume. If they're doing low volume, switch to high volume. 

That said, I don't think this new solit is a bad split. What I don't like is say, doing legs and chest in the same session. I always say if you can do chest after legs, you're not training legs hard enough. However, I think if yourey training with more frequency and less overall volume per day then it's perfectly fine.

An example of what that looks like for someone who wants to increase leg frequency would be this:

Monday: Chest/Shoulders/5 sets Leg Extensions

Wednesday: Arms/6 sets Squats

Friday: Back/4 sets of Calf Raises/5 sets SLDL

Saturday: Abs/4 sets Leg Press/4 sets Hack Squat

19 sets for quads, 5 sets for hams, 4 sets for calves every week. But training legs 4 days a week. It's when we try to train everything more frequently and more vokume that we inhibit our ability to recover.

 
jasonking92

jasonking92

Member

Thanks Strong and Griz both sound advice that I will take on board.  I may well be going back into security work in a few weeks (13hr nights with travel time) so I may well have to spit it up over 5 day shorter sessions. in which case I will hit each muscle hard once a week.

Again thanks for every ones input :)

 
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siegmund

Moderator

This is just my opion  , and what worked and works for me ,WE ARE ALL DIFFERNT ,  but i have got my best SIZE , from  a heavy bench day ,meaning sets of 4 to 6  , followed by shoulders ..., then a back day heavy reps 4 to 6 AGION   , dreads being the major focus ..then pull ups  ...a strictly arm day  with of course 4 to 6 reps  using only stright bar , to top it off with finially a squat day  , focusing on squats  as major 

NOW when i do this routine  , in no way is this focusing on definition of small muscle group , the goal here is strenght and size  ,I'm a firm believer heavy weight more bulk  and strenght  

NOW I know ppl that can develop on medium weight  and gain ., this is not 1 shoe fits all  , this is what works for me   

Then after i get or reach my goal and i have the size  , i focus on the stabilizers and definition  , but also once that starts for me i loose some core strenght as im sure most do   ...

SO focus on 1 goal at a time and if it were me and i was worried about size and strenght id do the routine above FOR ME ... 

 

 
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blastthru23

Moderator

It's nice to see someone else referring to MRV... Its a great reference point to use to ascertain effective training volume. A little tricky to determine with great accuracy, and it takes a little focus, but, so long as one is keeping a training journal, it shouldn't be too hard to figure out, at least a mean. The more difficult one for me to find is the MEV (minimum effective volume). Both take a bit of time, and both can change from time to time... Good to have you back, man.

 
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blastthru23

Moderator

If you're into podcasts, Mike Israetel digs deep into volume training for hypertrophy and spells out almost exhaustively the notions of MRV and MEV and other benchmarks for training (I believe there are two more, but i focused on the aforementioned). Mike appears on a lot of podcasts by Revive Stronger (that one focuses mostly on natty bb-ing, but they touch on enhanced here and there. At the end of the day, however, the approach is pretty much the same. When I had to endure long commute times, I would listen to podcasts (unless there was an Oakland A's game on the radio); learned a lot...

 
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