A workout program I masterminded....

[UA_Iron]

4 Day Split

Monday: Chest/Biceps
Tuesday: Legs
Wednesday: Off day or cardio/abs
Thursday: Shoulders/Triceps
Friday: Off day or cardio
Saturday: Back
Sunday: Off day

I’m giving you the setup for the 5x5 routine for the “core” lifts so you can continue to see strength gains on each muscle using “progressive overload” principles.

FST-7 on some lifts to blast the hell out of them - usually on stubborn ones such as biceps.

Periodization by cycling lifts in and out depending on week.


I’m gonna have 2 workout days. One you do one week, the next you do the following week. We’re going to keep the core lifts with the 5x5 routine the same, but change up the alternate lifts. This will keep things interesting and keep stimulating muscle growth.


Monday workout 1: Chest and Bi's

Barbell Benchpress: Warmup x10, 5x5 starting with roughly 50-60% of your max lift. (You may need a couple sets of warmup as you get to higher weights.) This will seem easy at first, but as you continue to progress and go up in weight it will get a lot tougher. 5 sets of 5 reps with good form. Go up 5lbs each week until you plateau. When you can’t do 5x5 at the weight you’re at then do 5 sets of 3 reps.
Barbell Bench Press

Incline Dumbbell press: 3-4 sets of 10-12. I want you to go up in weight on each set. This shouldn’t be done at the same weight each week, you should be progressing slowly until you get to heavier weights. When you start to plateau stay at your current weight and see if you can pump out more reps.
Dumbbell Incline Bench Press
Incline Dumbbell Curl: 4 sets of 10-12. These are fairly self-explanatory, but at the top of the movement I want you to focus on supinating your arm (twisting out such that your thumb is lower than your pinky). One of the main functions of the bicep is supination, or being able to twist your arm. We take advantage of this by adding weight – it should help the inside peak

Dumbbell Incline Curl

Dumbbell Pullovers: 3 sets of a moderate weight. See if you can go up each week. These are really one of my favorite exercises. This really fills out the pec. You will be feeling this a lot in your lats and very high up in the tricep. Study both the links below.
DB Pullover mount and dismount
Dumbbell Pullover

Dumbbell Concentration Curl: 3 sets of a moderate weight. These again are really helped with the supination technique explained above.
Dumbbell Concentration Curl

Pec-dec Flye or Machine Flye: 7 sets of 12 reps with a relatively easy starting weight. Wait around 30 seconds between sets. This is going to toast your chest workout. The idea here is to feel pumped as hell. This will expand the muscle fascia and help the muscle to grow.
Lever Pec Deck Fly
Lever Seated Fly

Preacher Curl Machine: 7 sets of 12 reps. This again is going to toast your biceps. Start out at a weight that’s maneagable for all 7 sets with 30 seconds rest between.
Lever Preacher Curl (plate loaded)


Monday workout 2: Chest and Bi's

Barbell Benchpress: Warmup x10, 5x5 for the bar or the lowest weight you can start at. (You may need a couple sets of warmup as you get to higher weights.) This will seem easy at first, but as you continue to progress and go up in weight it will get a lot tougher. 5 sets of 5 reps with good form. Go up 5lbs each week until you plateau. When you can’t do 5x5 at the weight you’re at then do 5 sets of 3 reps.
Barbell Bench Press

Chest Dip: 4 sets of 10-12 reps with a moderate weight. Start adding weight to your body if possible
Assisted Chest Dip

Barbell Curls: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. See if you can start increasing weight on this exercise as you progress in the lift. Start out with a weight you can manage for the sets and reps, the next week try and increase it a little bit. You can use either the straight barbell or the ez-bar curl bar (that one is angled) Don’t cheat on this exercise
Barbell Curl

Incline Dumbbell Fly: 3 sets of 10-12 with a moderate weight. Really try and squeeze the pec at the top of the exercise. This will help recruit more muscle fibers and help with development.
Dumbbell Incline Fly

Cable Curl: 3 sets of 10-12 reps of a moderate weight. This is a good one – the cable is nice because it keeps consistent tension throughout the range of motion. Make sure when you do any bicep exercise you really focus on the muscle, you want to build a good mind muscle connection here.
Cable Curl

Dumbbell Curl: 3 sets of 10-12 reps with a moderate weight. Try relaxing the wrist a little bit during this exercise, it will take more emphasis off the wrist and forearm and transfer it into the bicep.
Dumbbell Curl



Tuesday workout 1: Legs

Back Squat: The king of all exercises. Same thing with the benchpress – Warmup x10, 5x5 for the bar or the lowest weight you can start at. (You may need a couple sets of warmup as you get to higher weights.) This will seem easy at first, but as you continue to progress and go up in weight it will get a lot tougher. 5 sets of 5 reps with good form. Go up 5lbs each week until you plateau. When you can’t do 5x5 at the weight you’re at then do 5 sets of 3 reps.

You can do this either with the free weight barbell or in the smith machine, the object here is to keep progressing by adding poundage each week until you plateau.

Barbell Squat
Smith Squat

Straight-legged deadlift: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. This one I definitely want you going up in weight each week if you can handle it. Your hamstrings will get stronger for sure. Begin with a light weight and move up accordingly. This and squats tend to be a more “dangerous” lift as poor form could compromise your back. Form before weight.
Barbell Straight Leg Deadlift

Leg press: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. On workout day 1 we’re going to use a wider stance to emphasize the outer quad sweep. Think “sumo” style stance. Go up in weight each set if you can by adding on 10lbs on each side.
Sled 45° Leg Press

Standing Calf Raise: 4 sets of 20 with this one. If you can go up each set in weight. Calves respond well to more reps.
Lever Standing Calf Raise

Leg Extensions: 3 sets of 12 reps. Really get a pump going with these guys.
Lever Leg Extension

Leg Curls: 3 sets of 12 reps.
Lever Lying Leg Curl (plate loaded)

Seated Calf Raises: 4 sets of 20 reps again. Start with a moderate weight. Try and put weight on the next week etc.
Lever Seated Calf Raise (plate loaded)


Tuesday Workout 2: Legs

Back Squat: The king of all exercises. Same thing with the bench press – warm up x10, 5x5 – starting with roughly 50-60% of your max lift. (You may need a couple sets of warm up as you get to higher weights.) This will seem easy at first, but as you continue to progress and go up in weight it will get a lot tougher. 5 sets of 5 reps with good form. Go up 5lbs each week until you plateau. When you can’t do 5x5 at the weight you’re at then do 5 sets of 3 reps.
You can do this either with the free weight barbell or in the smith machine, the object here is to keep progressing by adding poundage each week until you plateau.
Barbell Squat
Smith Squat

Barbell Good Mornings: 3 sets of 12 reps. This will tighten up your ass and get your hamstrings 
Barbell Good-morning

Leg Press: 3 sets of 12 reps. Go with a closer stance this time. Knees parallel to the rest of your leg – not flared out or angled in. This will focus on the inner quad sweep, the tear-drop that’s on the inside of your quad right above your knee.
Sled 45° Leg Press

Leg press calf raises: In between your sets of leg press use the sled to do calf raises. This is a solid calf exercise. Use the same weight you use for the leg press and see how many you can pump out…should be 30+.
Like this essentially
Lever 45° Calf Press (plate loaded)

Hip Abduction Machine: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. This will help the outside quad sweep.
Lever Seated Hip Abbuction (plate loaded)

Hip Adduction Machine: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. This will help get the outside of your butt and high outer quad attachment area.
http://www.exrx.net/AnimatedEx/HipAdductors/LVSeatedHipAdduction.gif



Wednesday/Friday:

This is where you can start mixing up your cardio. HIIT – high intensity interval training is a super intense quick way to kick your ass and burn off as much fat as humanly possible. Check out this article if you’re interested:
Tabata Training - The fastest way to fitness and fat loss
I wouldn’t follow the weight part of the article so much as the cardio part.
Abs following the brutal leg days I outlined earlier might be tough, but it’s a good day to do it on ultimately.



Thursday 1: Shoulders/Triceps

Close Grip Bench Press: 3 sets of 12 reps with the barbell. This is a variation of the bench press essentially, you’ll be placing your hands substantially closer together – but not too close as this will stress out your wrists too much. Bring the bar down to the top of your abdomen, right at the diaphragm is where it should touch. If you cant do a standard barbell at first then the smith machine will be fine for this exercise.
Barbell Close Grip Bench Press

Dumbbell Shoulder Press: 3 sets of 12 reps. Start out with a moderate weight, see if you can go up in weight over time – the trick here is to progress and keep moving up.
Dumbbell Shoulder Press

Dumbbell Front Raise: 3 sets of 12. Same explanation as above.
Dumbbell Front Raise

Lying Tricep Extension (dumbbells): 3 sets of 10, go a little heavier on this exercise. Triceps respond best to heavier weights lower reps. Make sure you keep the upper part of your arm fairly stationary to really focus on the long head of the tricep.
Dumbbell Lying Triceps Extension
Cable Tricep Kickback: 3-4 sets of 10-12. This is a shaping exercise, it will really help focus on the outer head of the tricep. You’ll feel it hit the tricep very well.
Cable Tricep Kickback Video & Instructions Video & Instructions | Muscle & Strength

One-arm cable Lateral Raise: 3 sets of 12 reps. This is a solid exercise and will really hit that anterior deltoid hard. You will have to start with a very low weight.
Cable One Arm Lateral Raise

Face Pulls, standing: 3 sets of 12 reps. This is a tough one to explain and to master so pay very close attention to the link below. It’s a great exercise and keeps you aligned and your posture better by preventing that hunching forward that your shoulders can do. Use the tricep rope on the cable machines.
Face Pull Exercise For Shoulder Pain : Men's Health


Thursday 2: Shoulders/Triceps

Tricep Dip: 4 sets of 10-12 reps. This is an awesome compound lift that will hit your triceps hard. You can do them on the assist machine if you have one at your gym which hopefully you do.
Assisted Triceps Dip

Arnold Press: 3 sets of 12 reps with the dumbbells. This is a good exercise to hit the front and the middle head of the shoulder.
Dumbbell Arnold Press

Dumbbell Tricep Extension: 3 sets of 12 reps. This will hit the long head of your tricep really well. You can also do this one-arm with a single dumbbell in each hand. With a single dumbbell it’s a better compound lift so it might be better to do that.
Dumbbell Triceps Extension

Dumbbell Lateral Raise: 3 sets of 12 reps.
Dumbbell Lateral Raise

Cable Push down (rope attachment): 3 sets of 12 reps. This will help finish off the triceps well, get the outer part of the tricep well.
Cable Pushdown (with rope attachment)

Rear Lateral Fly: 3 sets of 12 reps.
Lever Seated Rear Lateral Raise

Shoulder Press Machine: 7 sets of 12 reps. This is where we hit the 7 sets of 12 reps with 30 seconds of rest in between sets. We’re working out for the pump here, really finish off the shoulders well.
Lever Shoulder Press



Saturday Workout 1:

Bent Rows: 4 sets of 12 reps. You really want to focus on the muscle groups you will be hitting on this exercise. Back is the toughest muscle group to hit because its hard to know exactly how to recruit the muscles you’re trying to hit. This comes with time.
You don’t have to be as far bent over as is depicted in the link below:
Barbell Bent-over Row

Underhand Lat Pulldown: 3 sets of 12 reps. Like a pull down but your hands are reversed and in closer than standard pull downs. Really focus on hitting the middle back.
Cable Underhand Pulldown

Seated Cable Row: 3-4 sets of 12 reps. This helps get the middle back really well. Again, really try and visualize in your mind which muscles you should be recruiting and then recruit them. Try and keep your hands and biceps as free from the movement as possible.
Cable Straight Back Seated Row

Standing Pullover: 3 sets of 12 reps. Like depicted in the link. You should be standing straighter up than the picture shows though.
Cable Bent-over Pullover

Seated Row Machine: This is just a finishing exercise to really blast the hell out of the back. 3 sets of 12-15 at a lighter weight. Just want to make sure all the muscles are completely fatigued.
Lever Seated Row


Saturday Workout 2:

Assisted Pull Up: 4 sets of 10-12 reps. These are going to be very tough at first. Again try and set it at a weight where you can get all the reps and sets out and gradually start lowering the assistance of the machine. Pull up with your back, not your arms!
Assisted Pull-up

One Arm Dumbbell Rows: 3-4 sets of 10-12 reps. Make sure you really contract the back with this exercise. Really pull through with the elbow and try and use as little arm as you can. Keep the elbow close to the body the entire time.
Dumbbell Bent-over Row

Cable Pull down: 3 sets of 12 reps. Go with a wider grip on this exercise. This second back day is devoted to back “width” while the other one was devoted to “thickness”. Again, pull through with the elbows.
Cable Pulldown

Cable Pull down: Hopefully your gym has a machine like this one. We’ll be pulling from the side – really emphasize the lat on the outside. You don’t have to do them one at a time like
Cable Alternating Pulldown

Hyperextension: Here we’re getting the very lower part of the back. Do 3-4 sets of 10-12. Start adding weight when its getting too easy. The deadlifts you do on leg day will also help these muscle groups out.
Weighted Back Extension (on hyperextension apparatus)

 

[UA_Iron]

This was written for a female obviously. Ultimately it was modeled after my own workouts; a picking and choosing of the best parts of different training methods to achieve growth and continue progress in a game that can leave you feeling rather discouraged when hitting that wall of a plateau.

Bodybuilding as a fluid and evolving sport is only natural. Adaptation is our enemy when we look to get to the top and refine our bodies to the ultimate cyborg looking, female scaring, piece of savage muscle.

Some notes on the above:

One may find they need more calf frequency in any given week and I suggest adding them to the Saturday workout day. One heavy day and one high rep day is a very good way to start; credit to Nelson Montana for this idea. Full extensions, pausing, slow reps and complete range of motion are all not necessarily essential for calf development either; credit to AAP.

Deadlifts: standard deads should be a necessity and core of your workout program if size is your concern. Some people are genetically gifted and don’t have to follow this statement, fuck you 1% of the population. Week 1 can contain deadlifts while week 2 can contain stiff-legged deadlifts – don’t worry, you won’t wither away not hitting either as frequently as you’d like. The taxing on the CNS keeps me to specify one or the other per week. If you choose to 5x5 the deadlifts I suggest doing them every week, dropping the stiff-legged deads.

Back width and back thickness days: Good way to keep it interesting in the back department. There’s so many muscles to stimulate back there it makes it difficult to get in all the lifts you’d want without compromising one. Thanks for the idea, Dorian Yates.
5x5 routines: Good for compound lifts. In fact, one of the best things you could do for compound lifts. We look to progress in the muscle groups, progression gives us motivation. Progressive overloading of a muscle gives us size and strength. At first the 5x5 will seem like cake if you’re doing it right. This is ok, we hit the other lifts harder that day. When it starts getting heavy as hell our alternating lifts take a backseat to the 5x5 – this is natural. This method has been criticized as being “outdated” in terms of routines; we picked the part that was most effective from this routine and applied it accordingly.
DC training: while not specifically mentioned here this is a very valid method of training. Hypertrophy days, strength days and heavy stretching make sense in maximum muscle building. Stretching the fascia by doing weighted stretching is a good complimentary secondary effort in muscle building. While not outlined above, I have informally adopted some of these techniques into each of my days. Heavy stretching and static holds should never be done before your lifting unless you want to tear something. This routine is often criticized as having a high tendency to injure people; I have no comment on this, I cannot say I have been injured.

FST-7 training: Much like the fascia stretching in the DC training by physically stretching, we add a 7x12 set to finish off a muscle group completely. Fascia stretching is achieved through “the pump.” There’s actually some validity to working out for a pump now… it does something, ask Arnold. This works particularly well on muscle groups that are difficult to stretch (ie shoulders, biceps, some back muscles). We apply this accordingly to groups that we see as lagging.

Periodization of lifts: This helps keeps things interesting. I was long in a rut of doing the same thing day in, day out each week, progressing slowly, plateauing quickly and feeling overuse injuries in the wrists and some joints. Stimulation of more fibers should result in changing exercises.

And then things can get even more complicated… Week 2 is when I hit each muscle group twice directly, much in the vein of the DC style training. The alternate week is once per week directly. Things can get abbreviated in the twice per week workouts, yet the increase in frequency means adaptation comes slower.

80% of how you look is based on your diet and activity level. Shitty, I just wrote out a whole workout with different ideas and now you’re gonna tell me that its only 1/5th of the real picture here? Absolutely, get your diet straight fucker. Diet can make you grow it can get you the cuts, and all with minimal tweaks in your workout routine.

 

[the_alcatraz]

Any reason why you chose not to do triceps with chest and biceps with back...while doing traps with shoulders?

Btw, nice thought through post and workout plan

 

[JDid23]

nice post!!

 

[UA_Iron]

Any reason why you chose not to do triceps with chest and biceps with back...while doing traps with shoulders?

Btw, nice thought through post and workout plan

The thought process with that was to hit each muscle group twice a week. Once directly and once indirectly. Biceps are hit on back day, again on chest day directly.

Traps can be done on shoulder day or back day, I will often throw them in with shoulders to get them twice a week like stated above.

I should completely outline my current program - I just had that one written out with links and thought I should share it.

 

[UA_Iron]

FST-7
FST-7 by Hany Rambod

DC Training
DC training has never been well organized, in fact its a little irritating...
DC Newbie Primer (good read)
Another DC Primer
DC Stretching Explained
DC Approved Exercises

Needsize 5x5 routine primer:

I'll do my best to try and remember all the elements that make the program work.

The premise of the routine is progressive overload, meaning that every week you are putting increasing amounts of stress on the muscles, generally through small increases in the amount of weight used. The progressive overload forces the body to grow to adapt to the increasing amounts of stress, even though the body really isnt training to failure.

The routine consists of choosing a heavy compound exercise to use for each bodypart, these can include, squat, deadlifts, bench press, close grip bench, standing barbell curls, military press, etc. On top of the initial 5x5, you also choose 2 other exercises, and aim to do 2 sets on each, of 8-10 reps per set.
Here's a sample routine
Chest
Flat bench 5x5
incline dumbell press 2x8-10
incline flyes 2x8-10

The key for me when using this routine is to start light, at weights that you can easily nail your reps and concentrate on form. For example, say you can bench 225lbs for 8 reps, start with 195lbs on the bar. This should be easy, but if you keep your reps slow and in control, you will still get a good pump and have a good workout. Next week, bump up the weight by a SMALL increment, remember the key is to be able to keep adding weight, it's not a race to get to the massive poundages. If you add too quickly you will plateau in a hurry and the routine wont do jack for you. So you hit 5x5 on 195, next week its 200, the week after 205, etc. When you get to a point where you're starting to have trouble hitting your reps, add something extra to help, if you're natural, thats when I would throw in creatine and whatever else as this will help you keep adding weight. If you dont get all 5x5, then do not add more weight next week, stick with the same and the odds are you'll hit it next time you try.

This routine is very effective as it targets fast twitch muscle fibres(5x5) as well as slower twitch(8-10reps) all in the same workout. Generally when done correctly you can gain lots of size as well as some pretty incredible strength all at the same time. I'm only a bodybuilder and dont give a rat's ass about strength, but have hit lifts (ie, deadlift 550lbs for 5 reps) that would allow me to compete as a powerlifter.