Hey all, I’ve been reading the old discussions between MODOK, C_C and others and I’m just wondering how anyone who uses their style of training sets up their weekly schedule. I’ve been using a Chest/Arms, Back/Delts, Legs, repeat 6x a week with minimal volume and have been having great success with it(eating like an animal as well, lol). Just wondering if anyone still follows the type of training they used to use and share thoughts on it. Thanks
A lot of people do 2x a week training, or even 3x a week. Myself included.
I like hitting everything at least 2 times per week. The only body part I’ve made noticeable progress on only hitting it once a week is legs, and that’s because legs are something I’m very good at destroying. I’d still prefer to hit them 2x a week though.
No matter how hard I hit my other body parts I’m always ready to hit them again a couple days later, so it makes sense to do so.
I’m the same way. It never made sense, mentally and physically, to wait a whole seven days to hit the muscle again. What kind of split do you prefer with that setup? That’s the only thing I’ve noticed that is tricky with this style of training… setting up the week to allow recovery.
I tried chest/back and then delts/arms but trying to do any kind of heaving tri pressing the day after benching or incline wasn’t working. Vertical pressing the day after horizontal pressing seems to work out nicely though.
Push/pull/legs/push/pull/legs/off is common. If you only workout 5 days a week then just rotate (push/pull/legs/push/pull/off/off. Next week legs/push/pull/legs/push/off/off).
I’ve also done that rotation where I workout 5 days and only hit legs once. Right now I do upper/lower/u/l/u/off/off repeat, so there upper days a week.
A basic upper/lower/off/upper/lower:off/off works great too.
If you have time to train 5-6 days a week and like hitting everything twice a week, the push pull split works well. Recovery isn’t an issue really there.
I’ve never like chest/back then shoulders/arms like you outlined, never seemed like enough break
I think Push/Pull/Legs is an excellent way to facilitate frequent training without putting undue stress on the joints. However, it does create a dilemma–where should you put Delts? After all, some staple Delt exercises are Push (eg, OHP), whereas others are Pull (upright rows, SGHPs, lateral raises, face pulls). So where do Delts fit in to a Push/Pull split?
My solution has been to perform Push delt exercises on Push day, and Pull delt exercises on Pull day, like this:
- Push day (Chest, Tris, and some form of OHP for Delts)
- Legs
- Pull day (Back, Bis, and some or all of lateral raises, SGHP, face pulls, etc)
- Off
(repeat)
Note that this split lets you hit Delts every other day, but allows plenty of recovery time between specific delt movements. Everything else is worked twice every 8 days.
I like the way you have set that up… however I personally just enjoy doing all my direct shoulder work in the same workout. I really have no idea why lol.
The thing that stood out the most to me when reading those old forums (especially MODOK’s “Bodypart Once Weekly?” thread) was his insistence on progression and choosing exercises that YOU can progress on. That seems so simple but it never hurts to be reminded. I finally decided to ditch standing OHP for awhile as I was stalling majorly on the lift; somehow I had been convinced that it was required for its manliness factor or whatever lol. I can really feel the delts working on smith high incline presses and db presses so these have replaced the barbell presses for now.
Training to get stronger in the mid- to high- rep range on, say, two big key movements a session is extremely simple and is now definitely my favorite way to train. In three weeks I’ve taken my dumbbell rows from 7510 to 1059 (I know, still extremely week) but pushing the numbers and intensity is much more enjoyable than lots of volume IMO.
Probably biased as I did Olympic lifting for years, but strength-wise I do better hitting lifts everyday, or at least every other day