CT I know you have written articles on the subject, and even written the I, Body Builder routine based on spec principles, I was just wondering if your current philosophies and new knowledge since writing that stuff would influence how you would spec a body part.
I’m interested in bringing up my shoulders/traps and maybe my back after that, was wondering how you would go about doing that now a days, or is it the same as it used to be?
I actually was about to ask CT the same question. I loved the spec/monthly focus to different body parts.
Yeah, As mentioned I know he has written articles about it, and 2 full training systems based on it (HSS100 and I,BB) but those are many years old and I’m curious if his experience has lead him to any new conclusions about Spec’ing
Interested in this as well. After I get my base I’d love to bring up my chest and shoulders. Even as a beginner, I feel like those will be my weak points. Though maybe I’m just self conscious because I went through high school slumping around with man boobs.
It depends on the muscle.
If it’s a complex muscle “group” (region) like the back then I would train different portion of the back for the 3 weekly workouts (1: lats, 2: rhomboids/rear delts, 3: traps/lower back).
For chest I like one overall chest session based on strength, one focused on the upper chest which includes one heavy lift, 1 main assistance and 1-2 isolation and the third session focuses on the sternal portion of the chest (biggest portion of the chest) which would use the same format at the upper chest but with different movements.
For legs I like to use the same basic lifts but using different training techniques
For shoulders I like one heavy/basic session and one isolation workout (not 3 sessions since the delts get hit elsewhere)
I think you also mentioned something like exercise selection, to have overlap for focused muscles.
[quote]AbsoluteBoxer wrote:
I think you also mentioned something like exercise selection, to have overlap for focused muscles. [/quote]
Not overlap… but picking exercises that can involve the weak muscle even if it’s not the primary mover. For example, the IFBB pro I’m training wants to bring up his upper chest. So when we do shoulders instead of doing regular overhead presses, we use a very high incline… still mostly a delt exercise, but also involves the upper chest to some degree.
Thanks for the info CT, appreciated as always.
How would you go about training the other muscles? 5x5 once a week or something?
Thats what I was thinking. (Overlap may have not been the correct word.)
Lonnie I was wondering that also… like putting the “maintenance” muscles closer to the strength spectrum and the focused spec ones with more hypertrophy. (Assuming we can only grow at a certain rate drug free this would shift it more towards the lagging group)