Poliquins Splits

Out of these type poliquin splits has anyone had any success with them, and which would be a better split/organiztion of the body parts?

He recommends

Chest/back
legs/shoulders
off
arms
off
repeat

or

chest/bis
legs/shoulders
off
back/tris
off
repeat

or

Also, is the first off day necessary (once every five days), or would doing something like this work

chest/back or chest/bis
legs/shoulders
arms or back/tris
rest
repeat

[quote]boatnerj wrote:
Out of these type poliquin splits has anyone had any success with them, and which would be a better split/organiztion of the body parts?

He recommends

Chest/back
legs/shoulders
off
arms
off
repeat

or

chest/bis
legs/shoulders
off
back/tris
off
repeat

or

Also, is the first off day necessary (once every five days), or would doing something like this work

chest/back or chest/bis
legs/shoulders
arms or back/tris
rest
repeat
[/quote]

The organization of muscle groups has more to do with what you are trying to accomplish and what your individual strengths and weaknesses are. There are going to be advantages and disadvantages to about any combination you could think of. You just need to figure out which one will best meet your needs.

I was a coach at the Poliquin Center in Chicago for a while and I can tell you first hand that we use those as well as other splits. The “magic” so to speak is in the individual assesments. When we begin working with anyone the first thing we do is a full structural assesment (upper body and lower body) When we know what the athlete needs to work on we design a program accordingly. Most of the time athletes start on a GBC whole body type of split with an emphasis on common weaknesses such as Rotator Cuff, VMO, hamstrings to name a few, it is not uncommon for even top level athletes to abstain from pressing movements (bench, incline etc.) for the first phase of their program.

I also trained at Westside Barbell where a completely different approach was taken and I have trained with Dennis James and Mike Francois who both use still another approach. The best split is the one that is best for you and effective training will be in a constant state of evolution.

My suggestion to you would be to first determine your goals:

1.) Are you training for size, strength, speed, endurance etc.

2.) What movements are you using? (Unilateral, Compound, Machines)

3.) What is the state of your nutrition (e.g. on a carb rotation diet you may want to pair up your weakest muscle groups with higher carb days)

In terms of days of rest this will be highly individual too. I do think that (and from my experience training people I can attest) most people will need 2 days per 7 of rest although this most often has to do with nervous system versus muscle recovery. Personally, I do best limiting my days to 4 per week (although I may go 2x daily on my training days).

Hope this helps and good luck with your goals!

Just the tread I was looking for!

I recently completed the Super Accumulation program and gained muscle, whilst losing fat during BOTH weeks.

I did come straight from doing a GBC type program, 4/a week and moving to the SAP was a crazy shock to the system which lead to these results.

Seen as I have NEVER tried directly overtraining, I did find that my workout capacity is alot higher than I thought…because my weights did not tank as heavily as expected during the program in fact I got stronger during the first week, but this may be due to not training with these exercises and rep range prior(change is always great).

My current goal is fat loss and using the GBC was not achieving as high results as expcted, but I am thinking that this may be due to me been more fast twitch predominant. Moving to more a muscle gain routine lead to MORE fat loss for me. I have read in one of Poliquin’s Questions of Strength articles that higher reps may only work for some for fat loss and lower for others(sprinters), yes even for fat loss. So my new goal is fat/loss AND mucsle gain.

So, from my recent experience, I am going to give this a try:

Day 1: Chest/Back/Rotators
Day 2: Quads/Hams/Calves
Day 3: Delts/Arms
Day 4: Off
Day 5: Repeat

First phase will be Accumulation(higher volume)+ a deload at week 3, then after 6 weeks will switch to Intensification + HIIT.

I figured that I should be able to handle more frenquency than I thought initially.
After the first couple weeks, I will know for sure whether my above predictions on what I respond to, is correct or just due to the change in program.

GJ

[quote]laroyal wrote:
I was a coach at the Poliquin Center in Chicago for a while and I can tell you first hand that we use those as well as other splits.

I also trained at Westside Barbell where a completely different approach was taken and I have trained with Dennis James and Mike Francois who both use still another approach. [/quote]

Was?!? What happened, buddy? I thought everything was going great. Sorry to hear about it.

Just training for size and strength. More so for the “look” associated with bodybuilding, the x-frame, etc. Tryin to just gain lean muscle slowly but surely. Get in about a little over 1.5 grams of protein per pound, alil over 2 carbs per pound, and 50-60 grams fat. DOn’t really rotate carbs or anything like that but my food choices are pretty solid. Mainly looking to bring up my side delts, upper lats, lower chest, and arms…lol

Mainly concerned with the arms so Im guessing that the split with an arms day would be better

One of my goals is to at least have a good inch per 10 pounds of weight on me, some of my friends have those proportions and their arms look great on their bodies even if they arent “huge”

You keep saying athletes so would this split not be bodybuilder friendly (which I guess lies more in line with what I desire)

At the PPC we really didn’t work with bodybuilders, not that these methods couldn’t work for bodybuilders but it simply was not the clientele.

I would suggest hitting arms about once every 5 days and reducing the volume of other groups to something that will maintain. I would probably do something like:

Day 1: Arms/ Shoulders
Day 2: Legs
Day 3: Off
Day 4: Torso
Day 5: Off
Day 6: Repeat

Hope this helps.

Hmm, I see. Would you recommend a different split for someone with my goals or is this one fine? And how does the nutrition sound?

Hmm, I see. Would you recommend a different split for someone with my goals or is this one fine? And how does the nutrition sound?

[quote]laroyal wrote:
At the PPC we really didn’t work with bodybuilders, not that these methods couldn’t work for bodybuilders but it simply was not the clientele.

I would suggest hitting arms about once every 5 days and reducing the volume of other groups to something that will maintain. I would probably do something like:

Day 1: Arms/ Shoulders
Day 2: Legs
Day 3: Off
Day 4: Torso
Day 5: Off
Day 6: Repeat

Hope this helps.

[/quote]

Hey Laroyal,

What was the reason for reducing volume for other body parts to maintanence, whilst training arms once every 5 days, just like the rest? I was under the impression that this split was one of Poliquins personal fav’s for hypertrophy, and hence reg volume per muscle.

I have set my similar split up, with 10 sets per muscle(bi’s and tri’s) spread over 2-3 exercises.

Thanks,

GJ

Hey Laroyal,
Sorry for the mini-hijack. I dropped you a message a few days ago and today and both are not showing up as having sent. Do you know of anything screwy with your messages?

End Hijack

[quote]laroyal wrote:
At the PPC we really didn’t work with bodybuilders, not that these methods couldn’t work for bodybuilders but it simply was not the clientele.

I would suggest hitting arms about once every 5 days and reducing the volume of other groups to something that will maintain. I would probably do something like:

Day 1: Arms/ Shoulders
Day 2: Legs
Day 3: Off
Day 4: Torso
Day 5: Off
Day 6: Repeat

Hope this helps.

[/quote]

[quote]BattlewithIron wrote:
Hey Laroyal,
Sorry for the mini-hijack. I dropped you a message a few days ago and today and both are not showing up as having sent. Do you know of anything screwy with your messages?

End Hijack

laroyal wrote:
At the PPC we really didn’t work with bodybuilders, not that these methods couldn’t work for bodybuilders but it simply was not the clientele.

I would suggest hitting arms about once every 5 days and reducing the volume of other groups to something that will maintain. I would probably do something like:

Day 1: Arms/ Shoulders
Day 2: Legs
Day 3: Off
Day 4: Torso
Day 5: Off
Day 6: Repeat

Hope this helps.

[/quote]

Not sure if there is a problem with my PM? I will have to check my box, I go a little behind.