T Nation

How Is My Routine

Beginners
#1

I have been training seriously for six months now and a couple of months ago I switched my routine from full body 3 times a week to a split that looks like this:

Monday - Back

T-bar Rows
Rack Pulls
Lat pulldown
Seated Rows

Tuesday - Chest

Flat Bench Press
Incline Bench Press
Decline Bench Press
Standing Fly

Wednesday - Legs

Front Squats
Lunges
Leg Press
Good Mornings
calf Press
Seated Calf Press

Thursday - Biceps / Triceps

Curls
Hammer Curls
Cable Curls
Preacher Curls

lying Triceps Extensions
One arm triceps extensions
Pushdown
One arm triceps pushdown

Friday - Shoulders

Lateral Raises
Bent Over Lateral Raises
Cuban Press
Face Pulls
Shrugs
Farmer Walks

Set 1 x 10
1 x 8
1 x 6
1 x 4
Increasing the weight on each set.

What do you guys think? I go easy on my shoulders and biceps because I get a sharp pain in my left shoulder when doing lateral raises and a similar pain in my forearm when doing preacher curls. Any idea what this might be?

My goals are to get strong and as big as Stan Mcquay.

#2

Are you still making progress?

I would try to switch up your routine more often than it sounds like you are, every 4-6 weeks maybe. Where are the deadlifts? I started doing them about 8 months ago and my back started to grow like crazy.

If you feel like you have a solid base I would check out OVT for your next program, pretty intense but I’ve had success with it.

#3

Do what you want, but a split is the last thing you need right now, being a beginner. If you insist on the split, I’d move rack pulls to the front on back day, and you don’t really need to do both the seated row and and the T-bar row on the same day. If you do the rack pulls with any intensity, you’ll probably be pretty wiped after them, so no need putting in a bunch of unnecessary stuff. When I deadlift, a lot of the time it’s the only thing I do that day.

Chest day seems like overkill to me. I’d pick one variation and hammer it for 2-4 weeks, then go on to another and repeat, and toss in any direct biceps work you want on that day, and direct triceps work on back day, and get rid of arm day. Arms don’t need their own day. More like five minutes at the end of another workout.

For legs there is way too much quad work relative to posterior chain work, unless you’re doing pretty long lunges. Personally, I don’t see the need to do four exercises for legs. I’d just pick one quad exercise and one posterior chain exercise and rotate every 2-4 weeks like with bench presses.

Same story for shoulder day. Shoulders get so much work they don’t need their own day. Sure, do your posterior delt stuff, Cuban presses, etc. but it will probably be easier to toss them in on another day, and free up that day for something else. If you eliminated arm and shoulder day, you’d have two extra days to train, and you’d basically have a 3-day chest, back, and legs split, which to me makes much more sense, especially for a beginner.

#4

[quote]subflood wrote:
I have been training seriously for six months now and a couple of months ago I switched my routine from full body 3 times a week to a split that looks like this:

Monday - Back

T-bar Rows
Rack Pulls
Lat pulldown
Seated Rows

Tuesday - Chest

Flat Bench Press
Incline Bench Press
Decline Bench Press
Standing Fly

Wednesday - Legs

Front Squats
Lunges
Leg Press
Good Mornings
calf Press
Seated Calf Press

Thursday - Biceps / Triceps

Curls
Hammer Curls
Cable Curls
Preacher Curls

lying Triceps Extensions
One arm triceps extensions
Pushdown
One arm triceps pushdown

Friday - Shoulders

Lateral Raises
Bent Over Lateral Raises
Cuban Press
Face Pulls
Shrugs
Farmer Walks

Set 1 x 10
1 x 8
1 x 6
1 x 4
Increasing the weight on each set.

What do you guys think? I go easy on my shoulders and biceps because I get a sharp pain in my left shoulder when doing lateral raises and a similar pain in my forearm when doing preacher curls. Any idea what this might be?

My goals are to get strong and as big as Stan Mcquay.
[/quote]

I will like a little more detail as far conditioning, typical rep scheme etc. Regardless I’m throwing in a couple of suggestions in the time being.

Back
For back I would throw in at least two pull ups/chin ups exercises and take away one of the rowing movements.

Shoulders
you mentioned your shoulder hurts when you laterals. Have you tried L’s?
I think if would be better replacing your pressing movement for shoulders with standing military press for 8 to 12 weeks then go to seated dumbell presses.

Biceps
As far as the pain you get doing preacher curls. How fast do you let the bar go after you’re done? Instead of cable curls why don’t you try straight bar curls?

Triceps…I would remove the one arm tricep pushdown and put close grip bench . Perhaps dips as well.

I tend to center my routine around big compound movements. I get the best and fastest results with this. Generally my rep typically hovers around 5 reps doing about 5 or 6 sets. I say do your routine for 8 maybe 12 weeks then design your next routine around big compound movements.

#5

Oh yeah… you do realize all of your hard work means nothing if your nutrition is lacking.

#6

[quote]Mad Titan wrote:

I will like a little more detail as far conditioning, typical rep scheme etc. Regardless I’m throwing in a couple of suggestions in the time being.

Back
For back I would throw in at least two pull ups/chin ups exercises and take away one of the rowing movements.

Shoulders
you mentioned your shoulder hurts when you laterals. Have you tried L’s?
I think if would be better replacing your pressing movement for shoulders with standing military press for 8 to 12 weeks then go to seated dumbell presses.

Biceps
As far as the pain you get doing preacher curls. How fast do you let the bar go after you’re done? Instead of cable curls why don’t you try straight bar curls?

Triceps…I would remove the one arm tricep pushdown and put close grip bench . Perhaps dips as well.

I tend to center my routine around big compound movements. I get the best and fastest results with this. Generally my rep typically hovers around 5 reps doing about 5 or 6 sets. I say do your routine for 8 maybe 12 weeks then design your next routine around big compound movements.
[/quote]

For most exercises I do 4 sets starting with a weight I can do 10 times. With each set I increase the weight and decrease the reps by 2. It looks like this:

1st set 10 reps
2nd set 8 reps increase weight
3rd set 6 reps increase weight
4th set 4 reps increase weight

As far as shoulders go what are L’s? The reason I’m not doing the military press for my shoulders is because they are usually sore from chest day.

When doing preacher curls I think I let the bar go down at a regular controlled speed. If I can remember the pain hurts the most when I stop squeezing the bicep that is, usually at the top and bottom.

#7

[quote]Mad Titan wrote:

Oh yeah… you do realize all of your hard work means nothing if your nutrition is lacking.[/quote]

sure do. Learned that from all the big guys around here like you and ProfessorX.