Rate My Routine Please

Bigger Stronger Leaner
1

Been doing pretty much a PHAT upper/lower split 4 days a week. Here are the exercises/sets/etc.

Tues (leg hypertrophy)

squats 4 x 10-12
RDL 4 x 10-12
leg press 2 x 12-15
leg curl 2 x 12-15
leg extension 2 x 12-15
seated calf raise 3 x 15-20

Thurs (upper hypertrophy)

Incline DB press 4 x 10-12
DB row 4 x 10-12
DB shoulder press 3 x 8-10
BB curls 3 x 6-8
Dips 3 x failure (usually 6 to 8 reps)

Sat (lower power)

Squat (warm up, set new 3RM, then take off 10lb and do 3 x 4-5)
RDL 3 x 6
leg extension 3 x 12-15
seated calf 3 x 15-20

Sun (upper power)

Bench (work up to 3 or 5RM, 3 more sets of 4-6 as heavy as possible)
Bent row 4 x 6-8 palms facing
DB shoulder press 3 x 5-6
DB curls 2 x 10-12
DB tricep extension 2 x 10-12

Eating a steady 3900 calories per day. I am enjoying the routine, although not so much leg hypertrophy day as i dont enjoy the lighter weight higher rep squats, but love leg press. Love the strength sets for squats and same for bench, and seeing my lifts increase steadily. Bench is 155 x 5, squat 230 x 3, row 155 x 8. I feel that i am too weak to do an all out hypertrophy routine, and need to chase those strength gains. I figure its impossible to have a decent upper body unless you can bench 220+ I am really struggling to make my upper body and especially arms grow. Im just under 6’2, 192lb but look about 170 as i store all my fat on my ass, which also makes it difficult to judge BF. Is this routine a good choice for where i am at now?

2

No pulling?

3

You better change that first 2 in 220 to a 4 lol
But in all seriousness, are you keeping a log?

4

Lol 220 would be huge for me as i started off struggling to bench the bar! Yeah i always add weight from the previous workouts, squat is up 45lb, bench about 15lb. I’ve only recently started squatting again as i had problems with my hip flexors which have resolved, so i expect to keep adding on weight for a while, have been adding 10lb each workout to 3RM. Andrew im guessing you mean no pulling as in deadlifts? Not at the moment. My best deadlift is 310, i might swap them in for squats for a while once my squat gets to like 260. Am i going about things the right way by trying to force my strength up on one day and doing higher volume on the other?

5

[quote]stinger70 wrote:
Lol 220 would be huge for me as i started off struggling to bench the bar! Yeah i always add weight from the previous workouts, squat is up 45lb, bench about 15lb. I’ve only recently started squatting again as i had problems with my hip flexors which have resolved, so i expect to keep adding on weight for a while, have been adding 10lb each workout to 3RM. Andrew im guessing you mean no pulling as in deadlifts? Not at the moment. My best deadlift is 310, i might swap them in for squats for a while once my squat gets to like 260. Am i going about things the right way by trying to force my strength up on one day and doing higher volume on the other?[/quote]
I just recently went through a little stage of rebelism and made my own workout…and it sucked, I legitimately lost strength. Everyone always says this on here but get on a proven program. Alot of guy say SS/texas method/madcow/531 but I’ve only done one of those so I’m not in a position to give advice.

6

You are wasting your time… you can’t even bench 220 pounds nor deadlift 3 plates.

Get on a full body 3x a week program, then make a switch to a PROVEN PROGRAM

A list of PROVEN PROGRAMS …

#1) Sheiko
#2) 5/3/1 or 3/5/1
#3) Periodization Protocol [ ED COAN TRAINING ]
#4) Madcows 5x5

7

I can deadlift 3 plates. Like i said my bench started at 45lb for a genuine max effort, so 220 is not gonna be easy. Could you explain why im wasting my time doing an upper lower split, i thought that was a proven routine. I will look at the routines you mentioned though.

8

[quote]stinger70 wrote:
Been doing pretty much a PHAT upper/lower split 4 days a week. Here are the exercises/sets/etc.

Tues (leg hypertrophy)

squats 4 x 10-12
RDL 4 x 10-12
leg press 2 x 12-15
leg curl 2 x 12-15
leg extension 2 x 12-15
seated calf raise 3 x 15-20

Thurs (upper hypertrophy)

Incline DB press 4 x 10-12
DB row 4 x 10-12
DB shoulder press 3 x 8-10
BB curls 3 x 6-8
Dips 3 x failure (usually 6 to 8 reps)

Sat (lower power)

Squat (warm up, set new 3RM, then take off 10lb and do 3 x 4-5)
RDL 3 x 6
leg extension 3 x 12-15
seated calf 3 x 15-20

Sun (upper power)

Bench (work up to 3 or 5RM, 3 more sets of 4-6 as heavy as possible)
Bent row 4 x 6-8 palms facing
DB shoulder press 3 x 5-6
DB curls 2 x 10-12
DB tricep extension 2 x 10-12

Eating a steady 3900 calories per day. I am enjoying the routine, although not so much leg hypertrophy day as i dont enjoy the lighter weight higher rep squats, but love leg press. Love the strength sets for squats and same for bench, and seeing my lifts increase steadily. Bench is 155 x 5, squat 230 x 3, row 155 x 8. I feel that i am too weak to do an all out hypertrophy routine, and need to chase those strength gains. I figure its impossible to have a decent upper body unless you can bench 220+ I am really struggling to make my upper body and especially arms grow. Im just under 6’2, 192lb but look about 170 as i store all my fat on my ass, which also makes it difficult to judge BF. Is this routine a good choice for where i am at now?
[/quote]

Doesn’t look too bad. You said you’ve been gaining strength, so it’s working. I would add more rowing movements however. You’ve only got 1 on each of your upper days, compared to 2 pushing movements each day.

Can you do chins? A very easy way to add in rowing volume is to just do a set of chins between every pushing set. Say you could do 10 chins, do a set of 5 between every pushing set, including warmups. Do this for your bench, DB press, and DB shoulder press work.

9

Check out ws4sb, very similar to what you posted but a bit better laid out

10

[quote]RampantBadger wrote:
Check out ws4sb, very similar to what you posted but a bit better laid out[/quote]

Agreed. This would be similiar but better.