I know there’s a lot of talk about recovery being important in a successful and injury-minimizing regimen, but if I feel like I can train through the soreness, is it really counterproductive to lift, say, 5 back to back days a week, alternating lower and upper body work?
Also, I hear a lot of trainers saying that you should not train the same muscle twice in a week. Is there a special reason for that? Why is it frowned upon to bench Monday, Wednesday, and Friday?
[quote]xtreme_plato wrote:
I know there’s a lot of talk about recovery being important in a successful and injury-minimizing regimen,[/quote]
Do you realize how stupid this sounds? It’s not just talk. It’s a proven fact.
Yes
[quote]Also, I hear a lot of trainers saying that you should not train the same muscle twice in a week. Is there a special reason for that? Why is it frowned upon to bench Monday, Wednesday, and Friday?
[/quote]
Some people can train the same muscle twice in a week. But if you are still sore from your first workout the next time you train that body part I’d have to say you are not one of those people. It is frowned upon to bench that much because it is not doing any good because that is not an adequate amount of rest for the muscles to return to normal working capacity. Please don’t tell me that you are the type of person who actually benches that much.
If you are a beginner, you can do a high intensity whole body workout 3 times per week and be stronger in each successive session.
If you have been training for about six months, you can make progress weekly with heavy, medium, and light days.
As you get more advanced you can lift heavier and heavier loads, but you will need more recovery because of it.
Read this:
It is reasonable to work out 5 days in a row but not doing the same thing everyday. Strength training shouldn’t be more than 2 days in a row but you could do some other type of training in between. Crossfit does this all the time.
^^^
I’ve seen people make good progress this way, but it’s not something I’m fond of (strictly strength training wise). If you really want to train 5 days/week, then train in a 3-on 1-off 2-on 1-off manner. As stuward says, you can do something else.
Also to add to this, you CAN train the same bodypart more than once a week. Great powerlifters and strongmen, olympic lifters and athletes all do this. That trainer’s advice was crappy. BUT it depends on your level of experience and your conditioning levels. If you’re not conditioned, you couldn’t do it even twice a week, whereas someone really elite could do it 4-6 times a week (oly lifters).
It also depends on the training split you’re using and your volume. One all out thrashing needs a week, with 2 weekly all-out high volume workouts of the same bodypart being an upper threshold (generally, but not always). If you’re training lower volume or total body, or upper/lower, then you can do more per week if conditioning allows.
Most of Waterbury’s programs is working every muscle 3x a week. And it works. 'Nuff said?
[quote]DoubleSidedTape wrote:
If you are a beginner, you can do a high intensity whole body workout 3 times per week and be stronger in each successive session.
If you have been training for about six months, you can make progress weekly with heavy, medium, and light days.
/quote]
I am thinking of training like this. Monday - Maximum effort work outs (at 90% of 1 rep for deadlifts and bench press). Wednesday - peed work (dynamic squats and bench press). Friday - RE work (5 rep max for bench and squats)
Is this okay ?
teotjunk
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
^^^
I’ve seen people make good progress this way, but it’s not something I’m fond of (strictly strength training wise). If you really want to train 5 days/week, then train in a 3-on 1-off 2-on 1-off manner. As stuward says, you can do something else.
Also to add to this, you CAN train the same bodypart more than once a week. Great powerlifters and strongmen, olympic lifters and athletes all do this. That trainer’s advice was crappy. BUT it depends on your level of experience and your conditioning levels. If you’re not conditioned, you couldn’t do it even twice a week, whereas someone really elite could do it 4-6 times a week (oly lifters).
It also depends on the training split you’re using and your volume. One all out thrashing needs a week, with 2 weekly all-out high volume workouts of the same bodypart being an upper threshold (generally, but not always). If you’re training lower volume or total body, or upper/lower, then you can do more per week if conditioning allows. [/quote]
thanks.
[quote]xtreme_plato wrote:
Aragorn wrote:
^^^
I’ve seen people make good progress this way, but it’s not something I’m fond of (strictly strength training wise). If you really want to train 5 days/week, then train in a 3-on 1-off 2-on 1-off manner. As stuward says, you can do something else.
Also to add to this, you CAN train the same bodypart more than once a week. Great powerlifters and strongmen, olympic lifters and athletes all do this. That trainer’s advice was crappy. BUT it depends on your level of experience and your conditioning levels. If you’re not conditioned, you couldn’t do it even twice a week, whereas someone really elite could do it 4-6 times a week (oly lifters).
It also depends on the training split you’re using and your volume. One all out thrashing needs a week, with 2 weekly all-out high volume workouts of the same bodypart being an upper threshold (generally, but not always). If you’re training lower volume or total body, or upper/lower, then you can do more per week if conditioning allows.
thanks.
[/quote]
The most usefull advice on recovery and work load is: dont think of how often you have worked a body part per week - instead count how many sets you have done over the week. As a beginner, you should only be doing 3-6 sets per bodypart a week, and when Aragorn is talking about pros doing two workouts a week, he is talking about them using 8-10 sets per week. If you understand this theory you can understand where the people get different training techniques from, like Splits, and Full-body. Splits will generally have all of the ‘sets per week per bodypart’ done on the one day (which increases intensity and ‘local’ recovery time), Whereas Fullbody will split the ‘sets per week per bodypart’ into 3 days (2 or so sets per day per bodypart). Fullbody thus would increase ‘global’ rest-time, and is less intense on tendons (which are avascular thus need more recovery time).
Each type of training has it’s pros and cons, you just need to figure out what is more convenient or benificial for you.
I started on Fullbody and have moved onto a 4 day split. Just keep open minded and dont let anyone tell you one is better than the other.
So yeah, remember the quote “you grow outside the gym, not inside” and supply yourself with enough recovery ‘growth’ days, and eat lots.
[quote]xtreme_plato wrote:
Also, I hear a lot of trainers saying that you should not train the same muscle twice in a week. Is there a special reason for that? Why is it frowned upon to bench Monday, Wednesday, and Friday?
[/quote]
As I said before, it is not “frowned upon to bench Monday, Wednesday, and Friday”, as long as you are not overloading yourself with too much volume.
E.g.
Rippetoes Program impliments 3 bench days a week, but only does 9 LOW VOLUME sets per week over-all.
PDV includes only one day for bench, but only does 4-8 LOW VOLUME sets per week over-all.
OTV includes 25 sets on only one day for the chest, has high intensity and volume, but is ‘relatively’ MEDIUM-LOW WEIGHT.
GVT includes 10 sets three times a ‘fortnight’, has high volume, medium intensity, and medium-high injury rate. AND its boring.
So, it really all balances out, you just need to know WHY you are doing what you are doing. There is no reason to be a troll when lifting weights.
[quote]teotjunk wrote:
I am thinking of training like this. Monday - Maximum effort work outs (at 90% of 1 rep for deadlifts and bench press). Wednesday - peed work (dynamic squats and bench press). Friday - RE work (5 rep max for bench and squats)
Is this okay ?
teotjunk
[/quote]
If you have at least six months experience, doing full body workouts, try something like this:
If you are just starting out, something like this would be better:
[quote]IronWarrior24 wrote:
Some people can train the same muscle twice in a week. But if you are still sore from your first workout the next time you train that body part I’d have to say you are not one of those people. It is frowned upon to bench that much because it is not doing any good because that is not an adequate amount of rest for the muscles to return to normal working capacity. Please don’t tell me that you are the type of person who actually benches that much.[/quote]
If you are a newb, you can squat, press, and pull heavy three times per week.
48 Hours will be enough rest time for the muscles and the CNS to come in to the weight room stronger than the last time you were there, and lift more weight.
You may still be sore during the second and third workouts, but soreness will largely subside after a few weeks into the program.
I found what works best for me is alternating my splits every 4-6 weeks. Rest (off days & sleep) is extremely important for growth, but I think every person is different when it comes to how much they need.
[quote]DoubleSidedTape wrote:
teotjunk wrote:
I am thinking of training like this. Monday - Maximum effort work outs (at 90% of 1 rep for deadlifts and bench press). Wednesday - peed work (dynamic squats and bench press). Friday - RE work (5 rep max for bench and squats)
Is this okay ?
teotjunk
If you have at least six months experience, doing full body workouts, try something like this:
If you are just starting out, something like this would be better:
[/quote]
I have done the West Side Barbell for about two years. I am trying to reduce my weight workouts to three times per week so I have time for other sports. I am familiar with Mark Rippeote’s Starting Strength
teotjunk
keep a four day split, but make your cycles longer:
Monday: 1
Wed: 2
Fri: 3
Mon:4
Wed: 1
etc.
[quote]DoubleSidedTape wrote:
keep a four day split, but make your cycles longer:
Monday: 1
Wed: 2
Fri: 3
Mon:4
Wed: 1
etc.[/quote]
Is a bodypart spilt necessarily much better than a whole body program ? Bill Starr’s 5x5 and Korte’s 3x3 are whole body programs
teotjunk
I meant to keep using your Westside split as before, but add more recovery by only exercising three times per week.
In my opinion nothing varies from individual to individual more than recovering from training. It has to do with so many factors such as food, rest, hydration, supplementation/drugs, what kind of work you do (sedentary/manual labor), what kind of program you are on, what other kinds of exercise (eg sports/cardio) you do, age, and the big one, genetics. For example, my friend who is Samoan can recover and make gains training the same bodyparts day after day. I certainly could not.
The key is to listen to your body. If you feel beat up, have a day off or go light. I guess this is hard for beginners to gauge, however. There is no answer for this question that will apply to everyone. Use some common sense. If pro bodybuilders on gear only train 4 or 5 times a week, why would an average genetic individual train 5 or 6 times? And don`t train one or two times ala Mike Mentzer. That kind of training is rationalizing laziness.
[quote]DoubleSidedTape wrote:
I meant to keep using your Westside split as before, but add more recovery by only exercising three times per week.[/quote]
I understand what you are saying. What I am saying is that would a West Side Split necessarily work better than a total body program like Korte’s 3x3 ? I am trying to rework the West Side split into a total body program. One day for ME work, one day for DE work and one day for RE work and in all sessions both upper body and lower body is worked. And the number of assistance exercises is cut dramatically. I have a friend who can bench 1.8 times his bodyweight and squat 2.5 times is body weight simply by using a total body program twice per week. And he only does ME work for deadlifts/squats and bench press with no assistance exercises.
teotjunk