Doing Traps before back workout.

[Kaytime]

I was curious to know if i could train my traps first before my backworkout on the day. The reason being is my traps dont grow as fast as everywhere else so i try my best to get them growing and i had this idea.

Week 1
Barbell shrugs 3 sets
Dumbbell Shrugs 3 sets
Rack pull 3 sets
Lat Pulldown 3sets
Yate Row 3sets
V bar Pull Down 2 sets

Then week 2
Pull ups 3 sets
T bar Row 3 sets
One Arm Dumbell Row 3 sets
Deadlift 3 sets
Behined the back shrugs 3 sets
Hammer Strength machine shrugs 3 sets

vise versa

is this a good idea?

 

[ghettostudmuffin]

Traps respond best to 3 things.

1. Heavy weight.

2. Explosive movement.

3. Decent amount of frequency.


I don't see anything wrong with your exercise choices other than redundancy. It is ok to train traps before lats imo and actually preferable because they require heavy weight/explosive speed to fully develop which means they are physically more taxing to train properly than the lats IMO.

I don't know how you perform your shrugs, but if they are anything like typical form then you are lacking the explosive element needed to fully develop them to their max. I also don't know how heavy your deads and rack pulls are so it's difficult to say how well they are being worked isometrically.


I would recommend doing 5x5 power shrugs with some hang cleans 1 week and power shrugs with high rep(25-30) dumbell shrugs for 2-3 sets the other week.

This is a great article on how to do power shrugs by Bill Starr(fantastic strength coach and lifter from the past):

Traps Make The Man
Traps Make the Man ... [Archive] - ProjectCOVO.com Global Forum

Generally when training back I like to work from biggest to smallest so deadlift, power shrug, power clean, chins, rows in that order.

Hope this helps.

 

[Kaytime]

mate i gotta say i have had soo many help from members on this website and i appreciate all of it but your post is seriously one of the best i have ever read. Thankyou very much and i actually think you are right

 

[die faster]

how much are the traps involved with overhead presses? if i do alot of shoulder work and/or overhead presses one day, then hit deadlifts and back/bis the next day, will i be working my traps 2 days in a row?

 

[_cato_]

Shoulder work hits them to a degree. You should be fine doing it like that though. It shouldn't interfere with your deadlifts if that's what you're worried about.

 

[Kaytime]

They hit them to some degree like cato says but it doesnt really play a big role in my shoulder day. I concentrate to just hit shoulders and i dont go higher then shoulder level for any raises. ill give you a highlight of my training split..

Monday: Legs/abs
Tuesday: Shoulders/Tri's
Wednesday Back/traps
Thursday off
Friday: Chest/bi's

Only reason i dont train on a thursday is because thats the hardest day for work for me as i do long hours on that day. This split has worked for me very well tho i love it..

 

[die faster]

thanks cato and kaytime, im just gonna not worry about it since i never got sore in my traps from shoulder work. and ive always done it like this and didnt really slow down my traps so i guess thats the answer

 

[Kaytime]

Traps respond best to 3 things.

1. Heavy weight.

2. Explosive movement.

3. Decent amount of frequency.


I don't see anything wrong with your exercise choices other than redundancy. It is ok to train traps before lats imo and actually preferable because they require heavy weight/explosive speed to fully develop which means they are physically more taxing to train properly than the lats IMO.

I don't know how you perform your shrugs, but if they are anything like typical form then you are lacking the explosive element needed to fully develop them to their max. I also don't know how heavy your deads and rack pulls are so it's difficult to say how well they are being worked isometrically.


I would recommend doing 5x5 power shrugs with some hang cleans 1 week and power shrugs with high rep(25-30) dumbell shrugs for 2-3 sets the other week.

This is a great article on how to do power shrugs by Bill Starr(fantastic strength coach and lifter from the past):

Traps Make The Man
Traps Make the Man ... [Archive] - ProjectCOVO.com Global Forum

Generally when training back I like to work from biggest to smallest so deadlift, power shrug, power clean, chins, rows in that order.

Hope this helps.

I did it your way starting from biggest to smallest and now my back is sore as along with traps. Thanks for the great info.

Also i want to do it once a fortnight starting from biggest to smallest because the following week i want to concentrate on heavy weighted pullups and heavy ass rows