How many days should i work out in a week ?

[symphoney]

Hi guys,
am new to this forum. I have been goin to the gym for a couple of years now. my upper body has found a bit of shape. but i have these flabs on the sides.
I have been goin to the gym 6 days a week. is this alright ? and on sunday, i swim for an hour. all this seems to have no effect.
what is the schedule i shud folow.
this is how i used to workout :
monday - chest
tuesday - shoulders
wed - back, lats, legs
thu - biceps, abs
fri- triceps, legs
sat - chest
sun - swimming

i go along with a friend and we workout from 6:45 to 8:30.

help me with my schedule guys !!!

[mustang GT]

symphoney, do you workout everyday for an hour and 45 minutes, even on monday and tuesday when you work one muscle those days? You should try and cut your workouts a little shorter...as long as you work your muscles hard with heavy weight. Everybody has a different split, but here's my 3 day split...
monday - chest, triceps, shoulders
tuesday - biceps, forearms, lats/back
wednesday - abs, legs

Each of the days that I lift are between 60 and 75 minutes. And the rest of the days I would rest during a bulking phase when I'm trying to gain more muscle. If I was on a diet phase, I would work those same muscle those days, but I would add cardio thurs, fri, and sun. So the way I have my split, I work each muscle only once a week, and that's all you really need, as long as you have your workouts with high intensity and heavy weight.

[Jalopy]

tips to lose bodyfat and gain muscle (from a limited experience, so take with grain of salt):

do not work out for more than an hour and a half, preferrably an hour at most

do not weight lift for more than 5 days a week

give yourself a complete off day once a week, no intense cardio or lifting

the best cardio is light jogging in the morning, for 20-30 min, not to exceed 40 min, no more than 4x a week

make a good split where you don't work out more than 3 days in a row. here is mine:
mon chest/back
tue tris/bis
wed off
thurs shoulders/abs
fri legs
sat off
sun off

the key is to not overtrain. once i stopped i actually started getting seriously stronger.

and the biggest killer: loss of patience. never give up. change is measured over months and maybe even years.

good luck and enjoy

[symphoney]

thank u guys,
is it advisable to go in for the foll schedule -

mon - chest
tue - off
wed - legs, back, trap, lats
thu-off
fri- biceps
sat - shoulders, triceps
sun- swimming for 1 hr.

i was thinkin of joggiing 20 mins durin the off days , coz i heard that u r not supposed to do any cardio when u r excersing for ur legs. i read somewhere that a cardio session and a session for legs should be spaced at atleast 4 days. is it true ?

[angel22]

Welcome Symphoney. Your schedule looks great to me. You wok out a lot!!

[triton69]

Symphoney,

I started working out about 10 months ago, and in that time I have lost over 110 pounds, and have gained what I feel to be considerable muscle. My routine was 3 days on, 1 day off, and then start all over again. I was working out on day 1 with the muscles that push (chest, triceps, shoulders), day 2 - muscles that pull (back, arms), day 3 legs.

Through advice from this board I have altered my routine to 1 day on, 1 day off...in the same order as I have in the past. This is giving my muscles more time to recuperate with the additonal rest time. The only input I could offer (only from my own experience and thoughts) is to keep the muscles in groups that work together (i.e. push pull). My thought process is that you use more than just on set of muscles for an exercise, and doing say your back 1 day, and your arms the next...well you use your arms for your back work outs, your triceps for your chest, etc..

They may not get the rest that you may think that they are needing. I am but a rookie in this, so take my offering based on just that.

[Cooper]

Originally posted by symphoney


mon - chest
tue - off
wed - legs, back, trap, lats
thu-off
fri- biceps
sat - shoulders, triceps
sun- swimming for 1 hr.

legs and back seem a little much to me especially when you've got Biceps on their own on friday.

I would do legs one day and back / biceps another day.
also I would move shoulders / tris to earlier in the week coz if ya do them on saturday you've only got one days rest before chest which involves these muscles again.

[mustang GT]

Originally posted by triton69
Symphoney,

I started working out about 10 months ago, and in that time I have lost over 110 pounds, and have gained what I feel to be considerable muscle. My routine was 3 days on, 1 day off, and then start all over again. I was working out on day 1 with the muscles that push (chest, triceps, shoulders), day 2 - muscles that pull (back, arms), day 3 legs.

Through advice from this board I have altered my routine to 1 day on, 1 day off...in the same order as I have in the past. This is giving my muscles more time to recuperate with the additonal rest time. The only input I could offer (only from my own experience and thoughts) is to keep the muscles in groups that work together (i.e. push pull). My thought process is that you use more than just on set of muscles for an exercise, and doing say your back 1 day, and your arms the next...well you use your arms for your back work outs, your triceps for your chest, etc..

They may not get the rest that you may think that they are needing. I am but a rookie in this, so take my offering based on just that.

I agree with triton69, keep the muscles in groups that work together. Look at my split that I posted before, I have the muscles that I work out that all work together on the same day, which is best in my opinion. Put push and pull on different days.

[morocco]

Well, bad news here, it seems like youīre wasting a precious Sunday every week. Doing cardio once a week even for 3 hours will not do any gains for you, thatīs any kind of cardio, too. Itīd definately be better if you did 20-40 mins 3 times a week, every other day. Itīd be easier and it will give you excellent results, swimming is great!

About the weights, try at least to have rest 2 days (not in a row) and youīll be fine!

[symphoney]

guys,
thanks for your suggestions.
Mustang, ur schedule seems to make a lotta sense. But a few doubts...

mon - chest/triceps/shoulders
wed - biceps/triceps/lats/back
fri - abs, legs

1) morocco, Do i need to indulge in any cardio at all ? if so, how do i make sure that they give enuff rest after my workout for legs ?

2) how do u guys fit chest/tricpes/shoulders into an hour ? i normally take 1 hour for chest alone. what are the exercises that i shud do for each of these ?

3) and if i workout for legs on friday, can i still swim for an hour on sunday ?

4) can i jog (20-30 mins) on tuesday and thursday (two times a week) without disturbing the above schedule ?

[mustang GT]

symphoney, I think that is a great idea to make the lifting days mon, wed, and fri, so you should definetly go with that. The reason I do mon, tues, and wednesday, is cause the other days I'm probably busy and wouldn't be good days to lift weights. Everybody has a different timetable. It's not too hard to fit chest/triceps/shoulders in one hour. If you can't fit chest/tricpes/shoulders in an hour, it's o.k to fit it in 90 minutes, but don't really go over that. When you go through long workouts, the body produces more cortisol, which will get in the way of building muscle and you won't get good results. Quite a while ago, I use to work chest/triceps/shoulders in 2 - 2 1/2 hours. Wow, that was way too long, and then IronMan gave me some very helpful info and told me to shorten my workouts to between 60 - 90 minutes, so I made the adjustment, and for a while now I've only spent 75 minutes on chest/triceps/shoulders. As long as you lift heavy and keep the lifting with high intensity, you will get a really good workout in. I usually get in 3 different exercises for each muscle, with about 2-3 minutes rest in between exercises. As for the exercises to do for each muscle, it's sometimes good to switch the same muscle exercises a little each week to add some variety. I'm gonna post a site that has a bunch of great exercises for each muscle, and you can try these exercises out and see what works best for you. Also, if you work out legs on friday, you can still swim on sunday. As for jogging tuesday and thursday, I don't see any reason that it would disturb the above schedule. It looks like you have a great schedule to try out, good luck with it, and look forward to seeing great results. Here's the site with the exercises for each muscle...

http://www.betterbodz.com/exercise_main.html

[morocco]

Yes!! You should do aerobic exercise (cardio). In the long run, it is cardio that gives you good health and a better life quality.

Swimming after working legs wonīt do you any harm, in fact, itīll help them heal faster, just try not to push them a lot. Maybe jogging woulnīt be recommended, since it puts a lot of stress in sore or "post worked out" legs.

Hope that helps!

[symphoney]

hi ,
hey guys. do u warm-up at all before ur work-outs ? i was told to do some exercises for the neck(without weights ) as a part of the warm-ups DAILY. is it ok to do this ?
and can i have water during the workouts ? and wil drinking exces of water (14 glasses a day) do any harm ?

and how do u rate the "Health" magazine ? is it any good ?


how abt cool down exercises ?

[angel22]

I don't know much about worm ups, but Drinking during the workout is good thing. to do.

I like shape magazine better than health.

[triton69]

[

mon - chest/triceps/shoulders
wed - biceps/triceps/lats/back
fri - abs, legs


2) how do u guys fit chest/tricpes/shoulders into an hour ? i normally take 1 hour for chest alone. what are the exercises that i shud do for each of these ?


I work out in the following way, and it all fits in real nicely within 1 hour.

Push Group

Chest - Bench press, dumbell flys, inclined press..3 sets each

Triceps - Tricep dips, cable pulldowns, skull crushers..3 sets each

Shoulders - (all dumbell) seated press, side lifts, front lifts, shrugs..3 sets each


Pull Group

Back - cable pull downs, t-bar rows, bent over dumbell rows...3 sets each

Arms - barbell curls, dumbell curls, preacher bench...3 sets each


I do legs and forearms on day #3, squats, leg press, hamstring curls, toe raises. I can knock all of these routines off with 1.5-2 minutes rest between sets with no problem.