Hi all.
The last time I posted here was around October, 2005.
I probably argued for the umpteenth time that Heavy Duty is the (only) way to go, and in the process, putting down anyone, who dared suggest that going all-ou on every single workout might NOT be a good thing.
Heck, HD had given me the best growth spurt I'd ever had.
Which had happened YEARS AGO, but still, it had been the only traininig method to produce some serious results for me, so it had to be the holy grail, right?
Wrong.
Finally, even I had to admit that HD only works for a short amount of time before it burns you out.
The CNS drain with HD is just humongous,
for a mere mortal like me.
So, my sincere apologies for being an HD jedi, and I hope not too many followed my training "advices".
To finally realize and admit to HD's disadvantages, I had burnt myself out with HD for about, oh, say a thousand times.
Well, at least my ability to take punches has grown immensely, from banging my head against the wall so much for so long...
Anyway, I tried HST, wasn't quite my thing but I learned valuable lessons from it.
Then I tried other types of full body workouts, and after experimenting and generally p***ing about, and studying my training logs to see what had worked for me (until the burn-out caused by HD)
I noticed that the best gains seemed to come with a 3-way split, and also that 12 (working) sets for a workout seemed to be a limit which I should not cross too much.
Add to the fact that even after I learned to avoid failure sets, I still seemed to stagnate after about 3 weeks on any given rep scheme, I was finally able to come up with something that so far seems to be working, and has some sensibility behind it.
These days, I workout 4 times a week (2 on, 1 off, 2 on, 2 off), and my workouts look like this:
Legs: squats, leg presses, leg curls, and a calf raise for a total of 12 sets.
Upper body pull + abs: 2 variations of pulldowns, cable rows, shrugs, bb biceps curls for a total of 13 sets. For abs: two sets of pelvic tilts and 2 sets of crunches. That amounts to 17 sets, but crunches aren't that draining after a back/biceps workout, so I can handle it
Upper body push: incline bench, db bench, db side
lateral raises, and triceps pushdown for a total of 12 sets.
My rep scheme is 12-8-4, and then back to 12.
I cycle the intensity, HST style though I fluctuarte the weight somewhat less than is done with HST.
I start each rep cadence with a weight that is light enough so that after a couple of weight increases I get to my previous best weight for x reps, and then try to surpass it.
After which I move to the next rep cadence.
The exercise selection was based on
a) what I know my body can handle (e.g. chest and shoulder presses together are too much for my front delts)
b) knowing what exercises work for me (e.g. bench hurts my shoulders, incline and db bench don't)
c) the limitations of the gym that's in the office basement
So now my training philosophy is as follows:
- Try to work your body more than once a week (even 1 and one third is cool and suits me better than one workout per muscle group per week)
- Fluctuate your
workout intensity to avoid CNS drain.
- Use different rep schemes (after fidning out what works for you, 15 reps was waa-hay too much for me, and while 4 reps is doable, 3 reps is not lifting anymore for me , it's just trying to avoid getting crushed by the weight
Now if only I could get my diet in order...
:
Linear Mode
