Hi all, I’m looking for a little advice on my routine. I’ve been working out on and off for 4 years. Originally weighed 140 pounds, now I’m 160 at 5’10. My basic routine is something like this:
can anyone please critique this. I realize that exercises need to be rotated etc… but I’d appreciate if someone could point out any obvious flaws in this particular routine.
I’m wiry and basically all muscle but I have a small amount of fat in the abdominal area that I’d like to get rid of. Ultimately I’d like to gain another 20 pounds or so of LBM.
Needs more leg work. The only hamstring work you have is done on back day. Some people can get away with only three sets of squats for quads, but you said you’re a newbie, so I doubt that you have the mind-muscle connection needed to work at that intensity. Also, are you training calves, abs, lower back (other than deadlifts), or doing any rotator cuff work? I assume you do both flat and incline chest work? What are your rep ranges and time under tension?
I can’t see an basic flaws in your routine, really. It looks like you have a three-way split, repeating once per week. Is this correct?
You appear to be working each body part only once per week. This may not be enough frequency of training for you. More importantly, judging from your height and weight, and the comment about wanting to BOTH lose that last bit of abdominal fat AND gain 20 lb mass, I’d venture a guess that you probably just need to eat more.
You cannot shred your abs AND gain serious mass at the same time. Keep training hard, possibly increase your training frequency, and start eating more. If you keep obsessing over fat covering up your abs, you will never allow yourself to eat enough to grow.
I’m only 1 inch taller than you, and was stuck at 185 for the longest time. I discovered the great articles here at T-mag and now, at 40, I made it to 205 lb, near 10% bodyfat. Once I put the right eating habits together, good things really started happening! Good luck.
20 pounds in 4 years? I gained that since i discovered t-mag 6 months ago. Besides what was already told to you about your rotine ( more legs,etc…) the problem is probably your diet. Give us some details, calories, macro breakdowm, meal frequency, then maybe we can help.
thanks for the responses guys. yes I think eating more would help. I don’t scrutinize my caloric intake but a typical day of eating goes like this: 2X500mL milk w/40g whey mixed in. A large plate of pasta w/tomato sauce, veggies and grated cheese. Intermittent snacking - ex. cup of yogurt, a few fruit. Another meal - maybe a salad, chicken breast and some rice.
I usually aim for 4-8 reps/set increasing the poundage incrementally each set.
Damn!! Your meal plan sucks big time!! If it wasnt for the chicken breast it would be a vegetarian meal plan! You need a lot more protein, from animal sources( meat, eggs, fish) and a lot more good fats ( olive oil, fish oil, wallnuts, etc…). i Have at least five solid meals a day, and 2 liquid ones, it’s hard to even know were to start, you have a lot of reading to do. I used to think i was a hardgainer until i understood that i was waysting my time with six two and a half hours workouts a week, and eating high carb low everything else. You can make it but its gonna take some dedication. Good luck
Too many foo-foo movements and too much “hitting groups from all angles” type stuff. You cannot concentrate on everything. Pick a goal over the next, say 6 weeks and pick exercises and a workout that will accomplish that goal then reassess. If mass is your goal, then stick alomst entirely to basic compound movements: (1) squats and their variations (i.e., front squats, overhead, zercher); (2) Deadlifts and their variations (i.e., SLDL, RDL); (3) Presses (i.e, Bench, Incline, Overhead); (4) Pulls (i.e, upright, bent, pullups); (5) Core (abdominal and lower back). You might want to pick only a small number of accessory exercises for extra work for whatever your weakpoint happens to be and rotate to another weak point during the next 6 weeks. When you have the mass, and you are concerned about the aesthetics of have it look just right, then perhaps more “foo-foo” type movements would be appropriate. As far as the training split goes, personally I like doing full-body workouts (varying the intesity and volume so as not to overtrain) rather than a split routine, but splits are used very successfully by many bodybuilders and powerlifters so you may need to experiment a bit to find out which split you feel the most comfortable performing. Just my thoughts.
cool, I read the article suggested above. it’s helped focus me a bit more. I realize that I need to concentrate on mass since that’s my primary ‘deficiency’ I’ll eat more and scrutinize my routine more carefully. Shredding can wait 'til later.