I didn’t think my questions were all over the place, nor have I really done anything different.
Since I started lifting seriously (early June), I’ve stuck with a single routine, 2-3x a week. Started at 3, moved more toward 2 as the weights went up. This is the same 20rep squat program I’ve described in a few places… I can repeat here if you want.
The intentions of that program are to put on a fair amount of mass in a fairly short period of time, mostly via a combination of progression, and stimulating GH, IGF and T production by starting each workout with high-rep squats. I put on 15 lbs in about 8 weeks, and then did an unintentional recomp simply by not eating enough for a couple weeks.
The only experimenting I’ve done is trying two different protocols for direct arm work. The only arm work in the original program is indirect through ohp, rows, sldls and bench. Given that my arms are more of a weak point – relatively – I decided to add some direct arm work after everything else.
I’ve not really done any program hopping at all here. Just tried two different approaches for training arms.
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I’m still seeing progress with it. I asked a few weeks ago in the bb forum to get an idea when it’s a good time to change up my program, and the answer was pretty much unanimously: if it’s still working, keep doing it.
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However, I’m trying to find a way to squeeze even more results out of it. I already have 48-72 hours between training muscle groups; I want to keep that, since my body is still growing on it. I don’t see a need to move to 1 week between muscle groups yet, such as with a standard split.
One option I’m considering is to simply increase the volume. I have one condition: to keep progressing on the core lifts, just as before, with the same set-rep scheme. If those aren’t going up, then this approach is a failure.
In terms of increasing the volume, I would do the regular lift as my first workout. Then, later, I’d continue to add in the volume, taking advantage of the recovery a few hours break can give you.
For an actual example, I’m currently doing 3x12 for bench press. I would do that in the first workout. Later in the day, I’d do more work for the chest… whether it be 3x12 with a lighter weight, or flyes/pec-dec, or whatever. Just keep hammering volume into that muscle group. Then, give it 72 hours to rest, and do it again.
This is the idea at least.
Doing a fullbody workout then adding volume to every muscle group is probably too much, so I’m looking at splitting it up across 3 days, and working 6 days a week. I’ll still hit each muscle group only 2x a week though, just for more volume than before.
So, hence this thread, to figure out what I should look at – supplement-wise – from a recovery, sleep, energy standpoint.
If I see outstanding results, that would be awesome. I may just drive myself into the ground… because it’s simply too much volume. In which case, I’d either make some changes, or go back to what I was doing. I.e., it’s an experiment.