Please Scroll Down to See Forums Below I was wondering how or if you guys change up the frequency of your workouts when cycling and if so by how much. For example if you've been weightlifting for a year and a half and you work each muscle group once a week would you increase that or continue with the same workout regimen. If this has already been covered somewhere else I apologize in advance. Thanks!
workout frequency when cycling??
- Thread starter phx
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silver_shadow
New member
whether you're on cycle or off cycle, the frequency per week doesn't change. what changes is your intensity measured in terms of actual weight lifted, whether for a single, a double, triple, five, or whichever rep range you chose to get stronger in.
having said that, as marcell mentioned 2-3x per week is more efficient for muscle gain.
having said that, as marcell mentioned 2-3x per week is more efficient for muscle gain.
T
The Shadow
Guest
Well......I do disagree - if you are "on" you can revocer fatster - its one reason why gear work so well....one of the reasons anyway.
If you ramp up frequency - you lost the enhanced recoverability.
As far as 2-3 times per week.
Not for me.
I train one bodypart DIRECTLY per week - they also get worked INDIRECTLY at least once - usually twice.
I hit arms on Monday...and they are so sore that there is NO way I could train them directly again.
If you ramp up frequency - you lost the enhanced recoverability.
As far as 2-3 times per week.
Not for me.
I train one bodypart DIRECTLY per week - they also get worked INDIRECTLY at least once - usually twice.
I hit arms on Monday...and they are so sore that there is NO way I could train them directly again.
hey thanks for the input guys. I used to do a 2x per week routine, but felt like in many cases my muscles never fully recovered and I started to plateau. I've been hitting my muscles twice as hard since trying the once a week plan. Is it safe to say that once my muscles no longer feel sore that they are recovered and ready for another workout?
There's no real easy answer for this stuff. To arrive at a good answer you'd need to understand a whole lot more about programming and really have a handle on where you are currently.
Just to be clear, in trained lifters protein turnover baselines within 72 hours (muscle repair complete or the vast majority of it - often it will baseline sooner depending on what exactly was done). The uber long recover periods that Mentzer quotes are all on untrained lifters. Once you start training your muscles get conditioned due to repeated bout effect.
The real limitation in overtraining faced by most people is the nervous system. Think about the symptoms - disruption of sleep pattern, slowed reaction times, general performance decrement of up to 15%, inability to concentrate. That stuff is not at the muscle. Overtraining is all about the nervous system. Given that the muscular system and nervous systems cover and decay at very different rates, people will exploit this. Basically fatigue is accumulated (that high volume workout that rocked for 2 weeks and by week 6 almost killed you) but can be dissipated quickly. The decay ratio is generally around 3:1 so you could tolerate a much higher volume over a short period (say 3-5 weeks) than could be tolerated over a very lengthy one (8-12 weeks+) and then a week or maybe 2 of lower workload (weight might still be high but volume might be low) would allow recovery. What you wind up with is much higher average workload (stimulus) over longer periods thanks to the undulation and taking advantage of the recovery relationship. And for the record, the stimulus at the muscle is mechanical work. It needs to be decently heavy (measured by the variable intensity as a percentage of 1RM) and you need to do enough work with it (volume or total number of reps performed).
Now back to training, thinking about fatigue accumulating, start thinking about stimulus not just workout to workout but as a block of workouts. Frequency is not an absolute - it distributes workload over a period. So take your 6 sets of 5 reps at 85% 1RM in the squat on Monday - you can only manage that once a week. Well, what if you did 3 sets of 5 on Monday and 3x5 on Thursday. That's equal workload and 2 sessions. There won't be additional fatigue and in actuality most find that they can start raising workload again for a higher average. Frequency is not in isolation, too many people try to do 2x per week and double weekly workload by doing the same workout twice. Even if they could eventually tolerate that, unless they are sandbagging you won't be raising it 100% instantly without additional accomodation.
No thinking about Repeated Bout Effect (RBE), conditioning, and delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) - what happens when you do a brand new exercise? You get really sore. What happens when you take an exercise where you do 2x10 and all of a sudden do 8x10? You get really sore. Why? Because you aren't conditioned to the stimulus being applied. What happens when you take that new exercise and do it 1x per week for a while? You get a little sore for a day or so but nothing much (you are more used to or conditioned to) the stimulus. Ask any of the people in this forum who squat 3x a week how sore they get? Answer will be that they don't. Yet they get bigger and stronger, most at rates far faster than what they did before. In other words, DOMS is a self fullfilling prophecy and isn't a good indicator of when it's okay to train again (the less you train, the more DOMS you have, the less you train). Your muscles don't even need to be fully recoverd at all times to benefit from another dose of training. Think about tanning, do you bake hard once for a long time, burn, go back to pasty white and then tan again or would it be more efficient to tan a reasonable amount but with more frequency and not insist on returning to pasty white?
So those are some of the issues in programing and organization. There's simply more to this than going into the gym, doing some stuff, and hoping to become better for it. The further you progress the more planned the stimulus will need to be (or alternatively many just keep jacking their drug dosages to get decent results from a crappy stimulus - this is possible in bodybuilding because hypertrophy and hormones are so tightly linked, in sport with a performance criteria growing muscle isn't enough).
To your original question. Anabolics help with recovery. To varying degrees they are also active on the nervous system (i.e. many experience improved concentration when supplemented with testosterone). So you will no doubt be able to handle more that you normally would. How much is impossible to say and how you should optimally structure your training to get that "more"...you'd have to know a lot about yourself and programming to begin with as well as how you react to a given dosage and how much "more" you can typically tolerate.
That's a long answer but that's the best answer you are going to get even though it's not what you were looking for.
If that type of stuff interests you and you didn't fall asleep, you might also read through this document: http://www.geocities.com/elitemadcow1/Topics/Training_Primer.htm
Just to be clear, in trained lifters protein turnover baselines within 72 hours (muscle repair complete or the vast majority of it - often it will baseline sooner depending on what exactly was done). The uber long recover periods that Mentzer quotes are all on untrained lifters. Once you start training your muscles get conditioned due to repeated bout effect.
The real limitation in overtraining faced by most people is the nervous system. Think about the symptoms - disruption of sleep pattern, slowed reaction times, general performance decrement of up to 15%, inability to concentrate. That stuff is not at the muscle. Overtraining is all about the nervous system. Given that the muscular system and nervous systems cover and decay at very different rates, people will exploit this. Basically fatigue is accumulated (that high volume workout that rocked for 2 weeks and by week 6 almost killed you) but can be dissipated quickly. The decay ratio is generally around 3:1 so you could tolerate a much higher volume over a short period (say 3-5 weeks) than could be tolerated over a very lengthy one (8-12 weeks+) and then a week or maybe 2 of lower workload (weight might still be high but volume might be low) would allow recovery. What you wind up with is much higher average workload (stimulus) over longer periods thanks to the undulation and taking advantage of the recovery relationship. And for the record, the stimulus at the muscle is mechanical work. It needs to be decently heavy (measured by the variable intensity as a percentage of 1RM) and you need to do enough work with it (volume or total number of reps performed).
Now back to training, thinking about fatigue accumulating, start thinking about stimulus not just workout to workout but as a block of workouts. Frequency is not an absolute - it distributes workload over a period. So take your 6 sets of 5 reps at 85% 1RM in the squat on Monday - you can only manage that once a week. Well, what if you did 3 sets of 5 on Monday and 3x5 on Thursday. That's equal workload and 2 sessions. There won't be additional fatigue and in actuality most find that they can start raising workload again for a higher average. Frequency is not in isolation, too many people try to do 2x per week and double weekly workload by doing the same workout twice. Even if they could eventually tolerate that, unless they are sandbagging you won't be raising it 100% instantly without additional accomodation.
No thinking about Repeated Bout Effect (RBE), conditioning, and delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) - what happens when you do a brand new exercise? You get really sore. What happens when you take an exercise where you do 2x10 and all of a sudden do 8x10? You get really sore. Why? Because you aren't conditioned to the stimulus being applied. What happens when you take that new exercise and do it 1x per week for a while? You get a little sore for a day or so but nothing much (you are more used to or conditioned to) the stimulus. Ask any of the people in this forum who squat 3x a week how sore they get? Answer will be that they don't. Yet they get bigger and stronger, most at rates far faster than what they did before. In other words, DOMS is a self fullfilling prophecy and isn't a good indicator of when it's okay to train again (the less you train, the more DOMS you have, the less you train). Your muscles don't even need to be fully recoverd at all times to benefit from another dose of training. Think about tanning, do you bake hard once for a long time, burn, go back to pasty white and then tan again or would it be more efficient to tan a reasonable amount but with more frequency and not insist on returning to pasty white?
So those are some of the issues in programing and organization. There's simply more to this than going into the gym, doing some stuff, and hoping to become better for it. The further you progress the more planned the stimulus will need to be (or alternatively many just keep jacking their drug dosages to get decent results from a crappy stimulus - this is possible in bodybuilding because hypertrophy and hormones are so tightly linked, in sport with a performance criteria growing muscle isn't enough).
To your original question. Anabolics help with recovery. To varying degrees they are also active on the nervous system (i.e. many experience improved concentration when supplemented with testosterone). So you will no doubt be able to handle more that you normally would. How much is impossible to say and how you should optimally structure your training to get that "more"...you'd have to know a lot about yourself and programming to begin with as well as how you react to a given dosage and how much "more" you can typically tolerate.
That's a long answer but that's the best answer you are going to get even though it's not what you were looking for.
If that type of stuff interests you and you didn't fall asleep, you might also read through this document: http://www.geocities.com/elitemadcow1/Topics/Training_Primer.htm
Tweakle
New member
I hate this topic.
If you have a good natural recovery ability, maybe. If you don't, no. AAS isnt some magic potion with suddenly allows you to train like arnie.
There are NO ABSOLUTES.. some natural guys can train everything 2 x weekly and make good gains, some ppl can take several grams a week and still burn out training on anything other than a M-W-F template. You need to regulate your intensity and volume if you want to increase frequency, you cant just jump in and expect AAS to double your work capacity and CNS recovery.
No way dood, I read on the AAS forum that you can train chest n bicepts 3 times a week when yor ON
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=516447
If you have a good natural recovery ability, maybe. If you don't, no. AAS isnt some magic potion with suddenly allows you to train like arnie.
There are NO ABSOLUTES.. some natural guys can train everything 2 x weekly and make good gains, some ppl can take several grams a week and still burn out training on anything other than a M-W-F template. You need to regulate your intensity and volume if you want to increase frequency, you cant just jump in and expect AAS to double your work capacity and CNS recovery.
No way dood, I read on the AAS forum that you can train chest n bicepts 3 times a week when yor ON
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=516447
Tweakle said:
Well, I'd definitely go by what they say then and disregard what I wrote above.
It is always very obvious that their training knowledge is supperior. I especially liked the two people yesterday who called the training board here "weak" - one guy forgot what muscles upright rows worked and the other asked if squats were bad for your knees.
Not sure if you saw my response: http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?p=6771964#post6771964
(and this was a supreme effort of holding back as I think I likened it to Jeffrey Dahlmer seeing a guy wearing linen 2 days after labor day and calling him a psycho)
BiggT
New member
What if I use spot injections of Winstrol in my bisepts in addition to drinking my normal Winny does?? Would it be overtraining if I did 8 sets of bis after every workout, except legs cause i don't do legs because I played soccer in 6th grade and my legs are already too big from that.
BiggT
New member
On a serious note, madcow, that was an excellent post.....It really should be stickied by someone with some clout around here, lol......this topic comes up all the time, and the reason it isn't maddening is because the answers in the AAS forum are so freaking entertaining, lol.
My personal belief is that if you have to ask a basic, general, vanilla programming/frequency question, then you have no business using anabolics. (Not meant as a slam to the guys asking these Q's as they are going out and trying to gather info.....just a notion on how ass backwards, and in some cases totally non-existant, most people's concepts of training are).
My personal belief is that if you have to ask a basic, general, vanilla programming/frequency question, then you have no business using anabolics. (Not meant as a slam to the guys asking these Q's as they are going out and trying to gather info.....just a notion on how ass backwards, and in some cases totally non-existant, most people's concepts of training are).
BiggT said:
For the most part as we've discussed is reflects the info that is available on the news stand. They don't even have any idea stuff like this or any type of planning or programming exists - and the whole world uses it for their athletes and lifters. Eventually it's going to have to change. They can't keep people in the dark that long. I mean, there is a fucking method beyond going in the gym, blasting a bodypart, and praying (or just upping the dosage until something starts working). Understanding variables, how to manipulate them for progression, how progression is best achieved at various levels of experience - hell that progression is even necessary (most people don't even understand that, it's as if the muscle they carry has nothing to do with the loads they are subjecting themselves to in the gym and that training should revolve around more load for adaptation).
Even for those on an AAS cycle. Understanding the parameters will help them put more muscle on (holding dosage constant) and maintain their muscle coming off. Long before PCT became the norm, there was one constant. The guys who trained around big lifts and knew to cut volume and frequency in assistance work while maintaining core lifts at relatively high intensity (%1RM) under tolerable post cycle workloads are the ones who kept their muscle (or most of it) with ease even without PCT while the guys in commercial gyms were on a viscious cycle of gaining and then dropping a significant portion of muscle with no idea how or why, waiting and praying for it to stop. Yet you don't hear crap about that on any AAS board and it would really help out.
BTW Practical Programming is supposed to be out by the end of the month. At $15 for 200 pages I'm really hoping this is the book that presents this stuff clearly and ties a lot of the more advanced theory in for people. All under a good multiyear plan to use for an example, taking someone from total novice to a fairly advanced lifter. I have high hopes that the presentation of quality info and a workable example/roadmap to learn by might actually move things along. Lots of people are excited.
T
The Shadow
Guest
Let me ask this then:
All of the folks here answer:
How many times a week do YOU hit each bodypart(in general of course) - I seriously doubt its 3 direct session a week.
All of the folks here answer:
How many times a week do YOU hit each bodypart(in general of course) - I seriously doubt its 3 direct session a week.
It can be anything. Frequency can be all over the map. It's really better to think about total workload goal and how to get it in. It's less about a stimulus and then wait for the response but more about how to most efficiently apply the stimulus to get from point A to point B in the most expeditious manner. It's probably better to take more frequent small steps than it is to try to make a big jump.The Shadow said:
Sort of like getting accustomed to higher volume on a stereo using the nob, yes you can turn it up to current threshhold and then turn it off, then try again, or you can increase is steadily backing off a tad as needed and just moving it higher and higher systematically where the highest volumes might take very minute adjustments and require a long time to get to that next increment (let's not consider going deaf).
Plenty of off-season squatting programs based on 3-4 sessions per week - probably all the best ones. Just from being on this site, it's pretty obvious that anyone can tolerate 3 squat sessions a week as long as you bring the volume/intensity in line with the lifter it can even go as low as 1 light set if you want but you can still get your 3 sessions. Westside takes a different angle but that's probably not the norm strength wise. Lots of higher volume bench and pull specialty programs.
For strength or expertise, IMO, you really want to do the movement a lot. That's how you get good at things and they become 2nd nature and automatic. And even if the goal is pure hypertrophy, that enhanced neural skill is going to potentiate the progressive loading that is so important to that goal (just like newbie gains which is the same thing). This is also why you don't see complete weeks off in advanced training unless they are planned. Every bodybuilder on the net seems to talk about these random weeks off and if you've developed skill in a lift, this is just not a good kneejerk reaction to fatigue. Lower the volume, raise the intensity - whatever but don't stop doing the lifts or you give back a portion of your work (and sometimes it's quite significant).
A good example is in OL which around the world probably has the most astute planning (and you aren't left with PL style equipped squats, and max pulls or deadlifts which are different beasts and can be unweildly). It's nothing to see 12 sessions a week all with some kind of snatch or clean pull varriant. All or most sessions will contain some form of squatting even if it's just recovery from the full lifts.
This was WFW's program to prep their lifters for Nationals last year. It's their Deloading period so volume was lower although frequency was still high.
You are looking at 3 heavy backsquat and 3 heavy frontsquat sessions a week, 6 heavy snatch and clean sessions, and then 3 moderate days in snatch and clean along with assistance. So that's 9 sessions all of which are pulling, 6 of which are squatting. And this is going on in what is probably one of the most crucial deloading periods of the year.
EDIT - since you wanted to know personal - I don't put much time or effort into training these days but in general I squat and pull every time I do any kind of lifting. So over the last few years, when I'm lifting it's 2-4x per week. If I'm not pulling or squatting, it's not lifting and I don't bother.
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phx said:
Lift big, eat big, get big. It's just a question of how to go about it in the most expeditious manner and at some point it gets a lot harder to lift bigger. What works best for a novice is completely ineffective for an advanced trainee. What works for an advanced trainee is either agonizingly slow progress or a surefire why to break a novice lifter. But in the end, it's as simple as lifting bigger, eating bigger and getting bigger. After that it's all aesthetics and diet for BF level.
silver_shadow
New member
this is a really good point you bring up and one i'm actually hearing for the first time anywhere. it's something i've suspected to be the case for a pretty long time and something i've noticed to be beneficial personally. yet everywhere i look, guys are talking about diet (most notably the debate on whether to drop cals, increase cals or maintain at the level they were on cycle) but mostly talk about some miracle drugs to maintain size and strength.Madcow2 said:
It's huge, just as you suspected. Tolerance is low afterward and the goal is to keep the big lifts up without crushing yourself. It's an efficiency proposition. So that generally means lower volume, maybe lower frequency, and relatively high intensity. Certainly less assistance work and major focus on the big lifts.silver_shadow said:
The problem is that most people don't understand how they got more muscle in the first place (other than doing some stuff), no less how to best alter what they do in the gym to preserve it. I also have never once seen it mentioned on any anabolic board or even any real general reference to alteration in training post-cycle (except generally lower than what someone can do while on). The fact that it's never even considered is a giant red flag.
silver_shadow
New member
in fact i've seen recommendations to lower intensity! quite bizarre!
here's a thread where they seem to be overlooking this part of the equation as usual:
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=516580
here's a thread where they seem to be overlooking this part of the equation as usual:
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=516580
Well the issue there is "what do they mean by intensity" - typically it's training to failure and snarling like a wolverine. Psyching has a pronounced effect on the nervous system and even without lifting any weights at all can impact fatigue very significantly (think about increased levels of stress). I will say that this is well known and people specifically working up to a daily max in OL will specify lifting to an "unpsyched max". I've done my own tinkering and it blew me away how much of an impact it has on levels of fatigue over time.silver_shadow said:
Anyway, when I say raise intensity I'm talking just keeping a good amount of weight on the bar. Something like 3x3 in the periodized 5x5 program would work well but certainly other rep ranges could be used (I would not lower the weight much though - maintaining significant loads but cutting volume is the key)). Basically you are keeping tension on the muscles and neural training higher on the important lifts but allowing for lower levels of systemic fatigue and stress but cutting out the garbage and lowering volume (possibly frequency). In a sense, you are deloading but it may not be deloading because your normal levels of tolerance are lower - you are just matching the resouces available.
This is a good strategy along with gradually raising volume again say 4-5 weeks after everything has cleared and recovery rebounds some. To a degree it's common sense and an obvious strategy but if you don't understand training parameters or something like dual factor theory it's pretty hard to approach this intelligently and you wind up with just a general backoff. Invariably that's not going to be optimal, it's like throwing darts at a board with a blindfold on - which is usually what passes for training in most cases anyway.
Protobuilder
New member
Wow. Great thread here. I didn't click it earlier b/c I thought cycling meant bicycling. LoL
People get pissed w/ the constant 5x5 recommendations, but honestly, IMHO, it's the best thing you can do for your lifting career regardless of your goals b/c it TEACHES you programming and you LEARN how the variables work and interact. That ALONE is worth the price of admission. There are other ways to learn it of course, but the 5x5 as spelled out by Starr or on Cow's geocities site is idiot-proof.
Shadow: don't know if it matters, but I train each muscle directly probably 2-3x/wk depending on the muscle. Legs get hit every session.
People get pissed w/ the constant 5x5 recommendations, but honestly, IMHO, it's the best thing you can do for your lifting career regardless of your goals b/c it TEACHES you programming and you LEARN how the variables work and interact. That ALONE is worth the price of admission. There are other ways to learn it of course, but the 5x5 as spelled out by Starr or on Cow's geocities site is idiot-proof.
Shadow: don't know if it matters, but I train each muscle directly probably 2-3x/wk depending on the muscle. Legs get hit every session.
T
The Shadow
Guest
Protobuilder said:
In all seriousness.......if you take 5 days off....and then go to a program of one direct hit per week...I can almost guarantee a jump in strength and size.
I used to train just like you - 2-3 per week...and we have similar pre-workout physiques.
Try it for 4 weeks
Protobuilder
New member
Maybe I"ll take you up on that at some point. I"m not completely adverse to it (well, OK, I probably am. LoL). A guy I know and respect swapped back and forth between traditional strength training and bodybuilding/once-a-week stuff and made good progress. I think it could work well, depending on your goals.
Actually, what's going on there is programming and load variation just through a single variable. Typically when someone cuts frequency like that it is almost certain that workload is decreased (think 5x5, no one is doing 15 sets of squats in one day and that's why it gets spread to increase workload). Generally this type of change is made by someone when they reach a plateau and need to change something. What's happened at the plateau is that workload has been held constant but progress has ceased which tends to mean guys are pushing hard for that extra rep or another weight increase and are getting hammered.The Shadow said:
All of a sudden they drop workload using simple frequency as a proxy and WHAM - you deload and get the delayed adaptation coming back bigger and stronger. This is exactly the mechanism used by Arthur Jones in the 1970s to promote HIT where he'd take a highly trained bodybuilder, rest him, and switch to a much lower workload for a period. All of a sudden the guy's strength levels shoot up and you start seeing growth. Of course, Jones then takes credit for all the sudden growth but in reality it was the previous higher workload state that was the stimulus and Jones resting them that allowed for adaptation (welcome to dual factor theory in action and the rebound). The point I make is that if you understand the relationships this can be done more intelligently and you understand why this is happening and what changes to make short term (this is periodization) rather than believing you've discovered a supperior long term strategy, changing your workouts and then wondering where those seemingly quick gains went after 4-6 weeks.
Incidentally, this was the same shit Mentzer pointed out and promoted in the early 1990s that got everyone down to 1x per week splits. Previous to that the 3on/1off split with 2x per week frequency (also AM/PM sessions at times for some) were fairly common in BBing. He pointed out what everyone knew, that if you are well trained and take some time off ,you frequently come back stronger and get bigger more easily enjoying a sudden spurt. His answer was that training was too volumous and too frequent so it should be unilaterally reduced at all times for a long sustainable linear model (which was obviously supperior because look at the short term gains people were dependably experienceing after a period of lower volume and frequency). This is when the whole "overtraining" thing really got a kick in the butt and it produced the more common workouts you see today of 1x per week frequency and a tendancy to lower volume and failure (believe me, when HIT came out and argued against Volume or HVT, those workouts looked nothing like today, it's just that modern HITters have no frame of reference for what was going on in the 1970s marathon pump sessions so anything and everything is HVT to them if it isn't stamped as HIT - fucking retarded).
Now in the 1970s, that whole lower frequency, minimal volume, failure as stimulus thing made some scientific sense in the Western 70's understanding of adaptation along with some logic and philosophy (remember great logic can be build off false or misunderstood premises so garbage in = garbage out). But we've known for a long time it's wrong as balls, and better understanding of fitness/fatigue allowed us to explain why that old model broke down so dependably and why delayed adaptation occured. That said, it is freaking criminal that Mentzer was able to come out in the early 1990s and using the same 20 year old retired science pull the wool over the entire commercial fitness community with that crap (this is what total dependence on escalating drug dosages and "it's 90% diet" get you - ignorant). But that's basically what happened as concepts of workload, fatigue, and overtraining are only now starting to be better understood by the public.
EDIT: the periodized 5x5 model on my site is setup specifically to ellicit this response and thereby teach people about workload variation and planning (blocks of higher and lower workload where the fatigue relationship and delayed adaptation are purposedly exploited). This is basically the core mechanism used when basic linear progress in one's lifts becomes a non-reality. It isn't set in stone and certainly there are a lot of ways to do it, but it's a good way and it's intuitively easy to understand and grasp because it has few moving parts (and that's what makes it probably the best template available at teaching this concept - I certainly haven't found any better and it was neither a hasty nor arbitary decision on my part). Even Kelly Baggett used the same example, which incidentally was a word for word copy of one of my old writeups a few years ago (and all are taken directly from Glenn and his work so that's where the credit goes).
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super_rice
New member
I have tried repeatedly to go into the gym and do "conditioning workouts" or "bodybuilding workouts"... pretty much recovery stuff and de-stressing stuff - no full lifts/variations, pulls, or squats.
No happy...
The workouts are just so boring and retarded. Last time I went in for this "workout"...
Snatch Grip BTN Press 5x5
Bent Over Rows 5x5
RDL 5x5
Chinups 5x5
Back extension 3x10
Dips 3x10
Hamstring curls 3x10
Barbell curls (in the curling rack, of course)
I was done in 45 minutes and it felt like I was masturbating by the end.
No pulls, no squats = no workout
No happy...
The workouts are just so boring and retarded. Last time I went in for this "workout"...
Snatch Grip BTN Press 5x5
Bent Over Rows 5x5
RDL 5x5
Chinups 5x5
Back extension 3x10
Dips 3x10
Hamstring curls 3x10
Barbell curls (in the curling rack, of course)
I was done in 45 minutes and it felt like I was masturbating by the end.
No pulls, no squats = no workout
silver_shadow
New member
i'm refering to intensity the same way - i meant that i've heard guys say to lift light for upto 2mths after a cycle!Madcow2 said:
gettnlarge01
New member
I lift every other day.day1 back,traps,day3 bis,tris, day5 chest shoulders,day 7 legs calves.
super_rice said:
Back in college sometimes we'd head over to the large student facility with the express purpose of doing a fufu workout and hanging around with the girls (and sadly the fufu pump boys with their bandanas and new tribal band tatoos - probably dating myself) in the machine and nontraining area i.e. no racks or barbells - they were in another room separated by a wall. These workouts had no purpose other than girls, fun, and entertainment. Okay, possibly making fun of the fufu pump boys and their mega drop sets of curls requiring 3 guys.
I tell you, every single time we tried to do this (and there were a number of attempts over the years), we'd last about 10-15 minutes with 25 being the record, look at each other, sigh, and head to the racks. As excited as we were, and as hot as the girls were, it just sucked balls. Invariably after the first set of cleans or pulls, we'd have a smile on our faces again - it was like coming back into the light after committing horrible sin. I still laugh about this. Most college guys would do anything for trim, but this was so counter to what we loved and why we lifted we just couldn't gut it out.
I'm not espousing any perfect way to train and obviously a lot of things work. But for me, if I'm not squatting or pulling in some fashion - I won't go.
BiggT
New member
I was going to do a little bit of extended recovery work this week, so I had the workouts split into presses on 2 days and squats/pulls on another 2 days......and I feel mildly gay on the days I don't squat or pull, so I may have to adjust that.....when you get conditioned to squats/pulls/presses on one day multiple times a week, sometimes squats 2 days in a row, it is tough to feel like you're doing anything at the gym when you cut back.
Acually, SR, the sample workout you listed would be hardcore for most gym goers, lol.....hamstring curls bring up the gay factor, lol, but seriously, compared to what i see most people doing, that is hardcore as hell.
I do dumb things to look at girls sometimes too......I like an 'extra day' to come in and curl so my arms get swollen, then I will go for a stroll on the treadmill or do some HIIT on Saturday at 11 AM, lol.
Acually, SR, the sample workout you listed would be hardcore for most gym goers, lol.....hamstring curls bring up the gay factor, lol, but seriously, compared to what i see most people doing, that is hardcore as hell.
I do dumb things to look at girls sometimes too......I like an 'extra day' to come in and curl so my arms get swollen, then I will go for a stroll on the treadmill or do some HIIT on Saturday at 11 AM, lol.
gettnlarge01 said:
Without delving to deep, you have legs and back on consecutive days (and that is not every other day). Those are the two largest muscle groups in the body and most good back workouts involve the legs to some degree. If you are going to do something like this, drop the dedicated arms day or at least make it:
1) legs
3) chest
5) back
6 or 7 or just fit it in the other 3 days) fufu arm day
This way you get 3 days between legs and back and then 2 days following back before legs.
Now before anyone remarks about the total inconsistentcy between this and the frequency variable I've spoken about - all I'm doing is arranging the stress most evenly within the context it was given (rather than have a taxing 2 day block followed by 5 days of laxity).
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