Which Training Split Do You Prefer: PPL or Arnold Split?

Bigger Stronger Leaner
1

Hi,

Which do you prefer Push/Pull/Leg (PPL) or Arnold split
(PPL)
Example:
Monday - Push
Tuesday - Pull
Wednesday - Legs
or maybe you want another order
Example:
Monday - Pull
Tuesday - Push
Wednesday - Legs
But you get the point.

Arnold split
Monday - Chest/Back
Tuesday - Shoulders/Arms
Wednesday - Legs

Which do you prefer and why?
I see one problem with Push/Pull/Legs and it’s that my shoulders gets to fatigued on Push day.

2

I think you’ll get a better response if you post this in the beginner section. This is an extremely remedial, boring question, and nobody who’s been lifting for awhile will have much of a desire to engage you on this topic.

3 Likes
3

Either. Both. Neither. It depends on a lot of things.

The split you use is influenced by your actual goal, your needs/weaknesses/priorities, your actual practical schedule, etc.

Push-pull-legs is pretty versatile. Paul Carter had an article all about it that laid out how it can be used to train each bodypart once a week (3 total workouts per week) or hit everything three times a week (6 workouts per week). That versatility is pretty useful for programming.

The Arnold split you wrote, from the Encyclopedia, is designed to be run 6 days a week hitting each bodypart twice. Again, Paul Carter wrote about how to plan an “Arnold split” with a back/chest day, leg day, back/shoulders day, and arm day each once a week.

Then program it smarter. Of course the shoulders are getting hit during pressing (and some rowing) movements, but getting “too fatigued” means you’re hitting them directly with too much volume and/or too much intensity.

In a push workout where you’ve presumably already done one or two types of chest pressing (benching and dips, for example) you might only hit shoulders with laterals and no shoulder pressing.

2 Likes