First time Posting-- Question

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imported_ddbtoth

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First time poster--long time lurker, I've completed my first cycle and just started my second, after a 9 day SD. MY first cycle I had twelve exercises:

Weighted Chin ups
Bench Press
SLDL
Weighted Dips
Squats
Calf-Raises
Military Press
BB Curls
Tricept Extensions
Weighted crunches
Shrugs
BB Rows.
I did ok till I got to the 5's--and then beyond, was taking hour and half, had a hard time getting in the iso's (curls and tri-extensions, shrugs), so I dropped them. This cycle I'm mostlydoing the same:
Weighted Chin ups
Bench Press
SLDL
Weighted Dips
Squats
Calf-Raises
Military Press
Weighted crunches
BB Rows.
Relying on the Dips and Chinups to hit the bi's and tri's. OK, the question (finally) --should I save the iso's till the 5's this time to really hammer them, or do you see a hole in the routine that I have totally missed? Don't like dropping some exercises but I think I've got all covered. By the way I work out in my home gym (safety cage, dip station, etc). Any help or encouragement would be appreciated. Thanks for the help! David
 
Wow, I am making a post tomorrow about my 2nd cycle, and I have the same exact question. I will most likely repeat it since my exercises are different, but it's something I have been thinking about - not adding isolations like barbell curls and skullcrushers tillt he 5's. However IMO I think shrugs should be in there.
 
Welcome ddbtoth

You know it is a strange thing to be able to answer something I was just thinking of yesterday
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I have just started the 5's and this is the area where I add isolations and variations, however I have found use those only for the arms/shoulders and not too much variation either.

I did the mistake of fiddling with the chest exercises and included a set of peck-decks along with the bench only to start feeling a plain injury to my right shoulder
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The best is to fiddle as little as possible throughout and maybe include some stretch point exercises or even loaded stretches but man...exercise caution!
 
Hey :)

Ok, let me try to break it down.

First, due to the number of exercises you have, when you get to the heavier phases, it would be hard to keep the workout short perhaps because of resting time. There is no problem with this as long as you are already working out as fast as you can (no time-wasting, I mean).

Second, the main reason that some people recommend doing biceps and triceps on heavier phases (and definitely not on the 15's) is that these exercises usually have very few increments available to them, especially compared to your heavier lifts. By starting them out early, like in the 15's, we make these smaller muscle groups more prone to RBE. This is noted in the Pimp My HST pdf. Also, arm size really grows chiefly because of the heavy compound movements like bench and chins. The best you can do for the bi and tri isolations would be to use exercises that significantly increase the stretch, like incline db curls and skullcrushers. And since arm size grows because of the heavy movements, we place the bi and tri movements on the heavy phases because that's when the heavy compounds start to max out, and the only way we can add to arm growth then would be to increase the stretch, so we add in the bi and tri exercises to increase the stretch in those muscles.

As for dropping the isolations, that can work. It really is up to you if you drop them or not.

If you only wish to drop them because you don't want to take so long duing the heavy phases, I'd say don't. That might not be the best reason to drop them. But if you wish to drop them in order to concentrate more on your heavier lifts, then that would be a better reason, IMO.

If you are worried about the long workouts, well there really is no need to worry about them as long as you have decent pre and post workout nutrition. Just finish your wokout with no distractions, and that's fine. It just takes more time the more exercises you have.

Regards and good luck :)
-JV
 
I had the same time problem during my first cycle. During the 15's and 10's everything was ok (1 hour max), but the last workouts of the 5's took too long (1 hour and a half) due to more work sets, more warm up sets and some metabolic work. It was exhausting, so I decided to use a 2-way split and go to 6x a week in order to be able to train each muscle group three times.

For my current cycle, I plan to do something similar, but adopt a split somewhat earlier. Standard 3x a week routine for the 15's and 10's, then 2-way split and 6x a week for the 5's and negatives. This should make enough room for more work sets and metabolic work sets, without taking too long (about 1 hour).
 
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