I am a wrestler and grappler in greco roman wrestling and brazilian ju jitsu. I have been lifting on a 4 day a week split, upper body tuesday and friday, and lower body on monday and thursday. However, I have begun rock climbing for 3 hours a day on tuesdays. Now, three hours of climbing is a lot of grip and upper back work, and a lot of pulling.
Heres my question; since I am doing so much pulling and upper back work, would it be wise to split my first upper body day into 2 days, pushing (bench press, military press, Extensions) on sunday, then a lower body day on monday, and then tuesdays climbing, and then leave the rest how it is.
Heres what that would leave me doing.
Sunday-Press and extension upper body day.
Monday-Lower body day centered around overhead squat and thick bar deadlift.
Tuesday-Upper body day, climbing.
Wednesday-Off
Thurday-Lower body day centered around parallel squat, front squat, and hamstring work.
Friday-Full upper body day, pressing and pulling.
Saturday-Off.
Any comments and criticism would be much appreciated.
hey bro…you’re doing 3 different sports, strength demanding sports…and lifting! I think you’re heading in the right way if you think about spreading the workouts…but I would suggest to reduce the overall volume via lowering rep ranges.
I always liked low reps high sets…maybe is biasing, but I feel I can get a lot of weight and tonnage going while still leaving some in the tank.
It would be nice if you layout the lifts…thick deadlifts and overhead squat are a very intelligent choice?
One magic combo for grappling, at least in my opinion, is chins/pullup and power cleans. Other lifts like barbell sidebends and side presses tend to be good for shoulder & hip.
Welcome fellow climber From my experience, even with bouldering, my back doesn’t get a workout with rock climbing. Well, once in a while, but only if I’m working on some crazy shit
I would personally recommend not removing your back work from your program, but if you can move it so that it falls the day after climbing (or the day after that), it may be beneficial.
I find much more that my forearms, fingers, and sometimes my biceps get blasted while climbing.
Everything will get trickier when you decide to start climbing 2 or 3 times a week My advice is to do your pulling days the day after your climbing days.
I already concentrate mostly on low reps, and I am very careful to avoid overtraining. It took me a long time to work up to this much volume. Hard to put down an exact routine, because I try to change my lifts every week ala westide’s conjugate periodization method. However, here’s basicly what it is:
Sunday-Press and extension upper body day. Usually start of with bench press, reverse grip bench press, or DB bench press. Then, auxillaries. On this day I usually do side presses, and may finish my abs off with saxon side bends. This is a side bend while holding the weight above your head, very difficult. Try it, I’ve found it to be much more demanding than regular side bends. No pulling, like pull ups or rows.
Monday-Full upper body day, pressing and pulling. Basic upper body day, starting with some form of bench press, then doing some back routine, such as the team gracie back routine or another pull up routine, and then either rows or more pressing, depending on how I am feeling. this is important because if i dont listen to my body, then I will overtrain.
Tuesday-Upper body day, climbing. self explanatory, but it destroys my grip and gets all the pulling in.
Wednesday-Off. Stretching and balance training.
Thurday-Lower body day centered around parallel squat, front squat, and hamstring work. Today is just like any other squat workout, alternating a front squat and a parallel squat. Then, hamstring work. Leg lifts or inverted sit ups. Always done with weight.
Friday-Lower body day centered around overhead squat and thick bar deadlift. I start of with an overhead squat, starting with the bar, and then do reps of 3 till I hit a new max, or fail. Then I go to the thick bar deadlift. I only use 25lb plates on my bar, so that the bar is about 2-3 inches lower to give my back a better workout, since grip is usually the limitting factor in this. Maybe finish with full contact twist, aka landmines.
Saturday-Off.
your choice of moves seems very good to me…very logical and functional to your needs.
something I though for a second about your program…while I don’t know much about the westside template, why do you organize two upper body workout back to back and the same with lower body?
I would think that performance and recovery would be better if you get more balanced stress in short term…in your case, why not try to get a upper body workout sunday, a lower body for monday…tuesday climb…upper body thursday and lower body friday? This way you alternate the upper body and lower body workouts.
Not sure about your case, but generally I perform better if I can get some days between workouts of the same nature. Example…day 1, front squat…day 2, power clean == disaster. Maybe because I’m not very good in GPP.
The team gracie upper back circuit is basicly just a Jiu Jitsu back circuit (pull up, neutral grip, chin up, alternating grip pull up, all in a row, with only 10-30 seconds in between, 3 sets * 6,5,4) but with Isometric holds every other rep and release pull ups every 3rd rep. It trains all aspects of pull up strength. Really tough, especially with the shorter rest periods.
How much do you roll? It seems your doing the kind of load I do and it seems at times I feel overtrained. I roll four times a week and have to take a week or two off from weights every six weeks or so, or I get injured. Like right know I’m having to baby my shoulder from rolling with a big 345 lb monster on thursday and then benching on Friday. Which was a big mistake!
Your routine looks pretty good, if your body is used to that kinda volume.
Personally if I were doing it, I’d go like this:
Sunday - Upper body pressing
Monday - Legs
Tuesday off
Wednesday - Upper body pulling and overhead pressing, then your rock climbing workout.
Thusday - Legs
Friday - Off/recovery
Saturday - Off
I think that would be better than hammering your upperbody 3 times a week.
It would be really hard to climb after the upperbody workout, but you’d get used to it after a couple weeks.
skullcowboy: It is a gem. The toughest thing though, is on the 6th rep, you have to do a release pull up, but instead of just catching yourself and pulling up, you have to do an isometric hold at the bottom, and then come up…
alfaronak: I wrestle 3* a week and grapple once a week. I have to plan my workouts very carefully, or I will overtrain. Also, rather than taking a week off, like I used to, I now just reduce the volume for one week every 3-4 weeks. This allows me to keep the muscles primed, while recovering.
XCelticX: Thanks. I dunno if i could do a full upper body workout and then climb, especially because I have practice on days I climb. That, and if i did that, I would make monday a total upper body day, so that I’m not doing all the upper body pulling on one day.
From my experience, even with bouldering, my back doesn’t get a workout with rock climbing. Well, once in a while, but only if I’m working on some crazy shit 