Question about HST variations

dax07

dax07

Member
I was wondering about changing up the days/frequency of the training. As of right now I do an upper body / lower body split hitting each one 3x per week always allowing 36-48 hours of rest in between muscle groups. So that clocks me at 6 sessions per week, sometimes upwards of 10 sessions because I may train early in the morning and hit the same muscle group once again later on in the day only when I am feeling well rested of course.
The reason I train with more sessions is because the meal before and the meal after the workout are the most effective meals of the day. Pre meal prepares the body to handle the stimulus and gives it what it needs right when it needs it the most (intra workout) and the post meal is to sustain the anabolic state for as long as possible and to create a large insulin spike directly after training. The way I see it, the more sessions I have per week 6-10, as opposed to the standard 3, could be superior because you are creating more effective meals.
Does anyone have any knowledge on this? Does anyone think that it would be advantageous to continue my training this way or to switch to the standard 3 sessions per week? And lastly, if I switch to the standard 3x per week, is it possible to do the full body workout 2x (am/pm) in one day?

Any insight would be appreciated, thanks in advance.
 
If you have the time, shorter, more frequent workouts is the way to go from a muscle loading and fatigue standpoint. I do not know about the meal part being more effective though.

I do 12 workouts per week for muscle work:

M, W, F
AM: Chest, Shoulders
PM: Triceps, Hamstrings and calfs

T, TH, S
AM: Back, Biceps
PM: Quads

I average 20 minutes per workout or 40 minutes per day. Each body part hit thrice per week. OF course, being retired and having a nice home gym makes this more feasible then for the average working Joe.

6 to 7 weeks of workouts and then a 9 day SD. Usually the 7th week is a struggle and I lose strict form so 6 weeks is more typical. I wish I could have done this program when younger but work (with a lot of international travel), family, nights out, etc. got in the way too much and zapped my energy.

Good luck! :cool:
 
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actually the meal after the workout doesn't matter a whole hell of a lot as long as you took in adequate pre workout meal or shake seeing as how that will still be digesting in your stomach after the workout. Your body is not going to somehow magically totally empty your entire stomach and digest everything that you consumed prior to that work out before the workout is over, so whatever you eat after the workout is only adding to your meals from the entire day prior to the workout. Even breakfast is still digesting. Much more important than the post workout meal is the food you take in during the 24 hour period after the workout, since that is what builds the muscle. it does not matter if you have the perfect pre workout and post workout meal for shake, if you do not take an adequate calories and protein over the 24 hours after the workout then you will not grow at all.

I hope you can read through any spelling or grammar errors seeing as how I am using speech to text because I am on my phone, typing on a phone is exceedingly difficult with my big fingers. I will give you a more detailed response later today when I get home with regards to hst variations.
 
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10-12x per week (6 days, twice per day) is perfectly fine. In fact, it's rather awesome.

Some caveats from my own experiences:

-Keep total weekly volume about the same. You can't merely double it and expect no burnout. 1 set per part per workout, is 2 sets per part per day is 12 total per week. The same as 4x per part, three times a week - PLENTY :). 2 sets per part, 6 times a week is how to do it if 10-12x doesn't always appeal. Simple rule is 1 set if you're hitting it twice in that day, 2 sets if hitting it once.

-Glucosamine and fish/krill oil. Your connective tissue and joints will thank you.

-High rep stuff; don't do it, your volume will be plenty and keeping glycogen levels up will be difficult enough as it is.

-Remember to eat even more for the extra work expenditure.

-Keep it simple, excessive isolations will break a 6-day routine.


Example:

AM:
Dips
Squats/Leg Press
Rows
Military
Shrugs

PM:
Incline
Chins
Leg Curl
Bi's
Tri's


1 set for everything, 6x a week.


Booyah.
 
Thank you everyone for clearing this up for me. I am an exercise physiology major and normally if I had a question I would ask a professor, but most of them just blindly follow the American College of Sports Medicine recommendations and none seem to know anything about HST. So I will continue with my current program and making sure I get in extra calories to cover the energy used to fuel my second workout and to control the volume as to not overtrain.
 
Old and Grey said:
If you have the time, shorter, more frequent workouts is the way to go from a muscle loading and fatigue standpoint. I do not know about the meal part being more effective though.

I do 12 workouts per week for muscle work:

M, W, F
AM: Chest, Shoulders
PM: Triceps, Hamstrings and calfs

T, TH, S
AM: Back, Biceps
PM: Quads

I average 20 minutes per workout or 40 minutes per day. Each body part hit thrice per week. OF course, being retired and having a nice home gym makes this more feasible then for the average working Joe.

6 to 7 weeks of workouts and then a 9 day SD. Usually the 7th week is a struggle and I lose strict form so 6 weeks is more typical. I wish I could have done this program when younger but work (with a lot of international travel), family, nights out, etc. got in the way too much and zapped my energy.

Good luck! :cool:
Click to expand...

Hi, O and G,
This is very interesting to me. How long have you been training w/ this high frequency? What effects have you noticed on body comp? I assume you are only doing a small # of working sets per muscle group to maintain this frequency?

S
 
smf,

I trained this way for over one year. Now I have increased it to 4 AM/PM sessions per week. So my frequency has gone from 3X to 4x per week but my total workouts has actually decreased from 12 to 8 because I am now working out 4 day per week instead of 6 days per week. I have never noticed any difference in my body comp unless I change my diet.

My total volume per week runs about 50 sets currently so I average about 6 sets twice per day 4 days per week or so using this program. The previous program I was on that you inquired about averaged about 4-5 sets per session or 50 to 60 sets per week. I do not repeat the same exercise in any training session as the efficacy of successive sets is, according to several studies, cut by 50% or so with each extra set. So by the time you do the 3rd set of say bench presses, you are only getting about 25% of the benefit of the first set. (There are probably an equal number of so-called peer-reviewed studies to refute this so take this with a grain of salt.) So I will use a different exercise for a second set, etc. You still don't get the full wham of the very first set for that body part but I think it helps recruit different fibers so you don't lose as much benefit as doing the same set. Just my opinion and experience. I cannot point to a specific research paper to back this up. If it feels good to my body, I do it. Also, any second or even 3rd exercise I may do per body part is done at high rep volume even if I am working 6's. For example, for chest right now, I do one set of bench press with heavy weight for 6 reps followed immediately by a set of 15 plus reps of slow and low dips and at least 15 reps of slow and very low push ups on a raised surface such as bars or even a pile of books. I have found this to be very effective for growth but not so much for strength.

As an aside, body weight exercises are, I think, highly under rated. Some of the best upper bodies around are found in long term prisons with no gyms. The guys do multiple sets of chins, push ups and sit ups throughout every day with better results than 99% of the people get at expensive gyms and they have lousy high carb diets to boot. Their key appears to be frequency since they cannot easily add load. Because they cannot add load, they can tolerate the high volume and frequency. I am trying for this cycle to prioritize under developed lats so I put a good multi-position chin bar over my home office. I do a set each time I go through that door. So I am doing about 5-6 sets per day at least 5 days per week using just body weight and 3 different types of hand positions. I do no lat work during my regular workout. The results after only 3 weeks have been amazing, at least to me. Something to think about.

As for work sets vs warm up sets, I do not need to warm up as I am very active on the horse farm and using very strict form, slow eccentric movements and never go all the way to my true rep max. So my total volume is all work sets. It makes my workouts short and effective. This I would not recommend for a guy who goes from the office desk straight to the gym.

Happy training.

O&G
 
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Thanks for the reply, O & G. Very informative. That's great (and a bit eye opening) about your results w/ the nearly daily multiple sets of chinning. That seems like more support that if Dax07 has the time, he may want to stick w/ his 6 sessions per week rather than cutting it down.

I just finished up my coaching season which takes a lot of time in addition to my regular job. I was often lucky to get in one w/o per week for the last several months. But I now will have quite a bit more time, and I've been thinking about really ratcheting up the frequency. After hearing from you, I plan to give it a shot and let the chips fall where they may. And really, I enjoy the feeling of just having completed a hard workout and feeling that I've worked my muscles well.

Not to hijack this thread, but one more quick question: What split/frequency per muscle group are you employing?

Thanks,
S
 
Current split routine:
M, T, F, S (or any 4 days that fit into my schedule):

AM:
Chest
Incline BP
Dip*
Push up*
Shoulders
Lateral Raise
Shrug
Rotator cuff exercise using bands*

PM:
Legs
Squats
Leg press*
Leg extension*
Triceps
Close grip BP
Biceps
DB Seated Curls
Abs
Seated crunch machine*

Other:
Lat prioritization experiment:
Basically body weight every day throughout the day for a total of anywhere from 5 -8 sets starting at 5 reps and adding a rep each week:

Pull ups, Chin Ups and neutral grip Pull ups (I really like the neutral grip pull ups)


* Denotes a high rep exercise
 
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Interesting concept , I wonder if it would be applicable to fat loss with a cardio blast at the end of the morning session (I'm primarily thinking there would be no need to cut calories further!). From what I've read here I can see huge advantages to the am -pm split. Outside of the sessions being brief there has to be better nutrient partitioning by eating post workout twice a day and also possibly taking greater advantage of the protein synthesis window by reducing a 48 hour timeframe.

I'm thinking of a legs-shoulders -abs and chest-back -arms split.
Coming to the end of the 5's next week , I'm certainly open to feedback on this am pm possibility from those more experienced in the setup.
 
I am now into a 12 day SD after completing the first cycle previously describe. I really liked it and will be doing it again. Without cutting calories I dropped about 4 pounds, mostly in my stomach area...water retention? I ate my high protein meals immediately after each workout session.

I had to stick to neutral grip chins as I ran into shoulder/bicep problems with the high lat volume. I cut it down to to 5 sets, 5 days per week and ended at at 11 reps as the lower rep chins did not do much for me. I never came close to failure. I will probably start chins at 11 reps as they were pretty easy and I may have to invest in a weighted vest in the future. I don't like weights hanging off a belt and clanging next to my nutz! My lats seem to be substantially larger and I will repeat the same prioritization next cycle. I do them throughout the day so get no noticeable neural fatigue. The next cycle will be a short cycle of 5 weeks to fit into my vacation schedule. Then a week off and then a 4 week cycle because of another vacation.

I am also adding 3 days of using a Physio Step machine on off days at high resistance for 30 minutes. I am trying to build up my muscle endurance. I am not sure how this will work out with lifting and I may have to cut lifting back to 3 days and have one full day of rest each week. I probably will have to up calories a small amount per day as well. Since the Physio Step works all your major joints, I probably can skip the 15's. I'll see how it feels.

However, the real key to me is doing short intense workouts so I don't zap all my energy in one session. If you can fit a split into your schedule, I highly recommend it to assist in recovery. I stole the idea from Boris Klien!
 
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Almost complete on this current cycle , pics attached showing the pretty much same bodyweight of 160 lbs yet differing composition 5 weeks apart (or it could be the myopia of middle age;)). HST doesn't need anyone to sell it .......it sells itself as far as I'm concerned.

Late May Late June
ul2.jpg frul.jpg
 
Have decided to move to an upper lower split for the next cycle with a ten to 15 minute cardio blast at the and of each workout. Will move straight into the tens for two weeks and then fives for four weeks. The twice a day scenario can be looked at again for the final cycle.

A
Squats /Leg Press
Sissy Squats or Split Squat - as a 15 rep finisher
SLDL /GHR
Calf Raises
Shoulder Work

B
Incline Bench
Elevated Pushups as a High rep finisher
Lat Pulls / Chins
Seated Rows/Rackpulls
Decline French Press
CGBP -high reps as a finisher
Arm Curls
Abs
 
I like it a lot. It is very similar to the type of workout that seems to work best for me (albeit with some change in certain exercises). I will be very interested in finding how it works for you.
 
Tough as old boots getting through this split on the two days so far , have dropped calories this week and certainly feeling it with fatigue. Nothing wrong with it as a split I think, but probably too much with little recovery when on a caloric deficit.
Going to reset the compass to a 3 day split again...makes logical sense to try and maintain lbm and allow some more recovery. A simpler layout covering the basics with enough to maintain lbm is definitely worth going with I feel. Cardio will be a one hour fast walk every evening. May well look at zig zagging to take in 1800 on training days and 1600 on rest days.

Front Smith Squat or Split Squat/Sissy Squat
SLDL or GHR
Shoulder Rehab
Incl Bench
Lat Pulls or Rows
Decline French Press
Arm Curls
Decline Weighted Crunches
 
Where do you draw AM/PM the split line, between shoulder and incline?

How many days per week?

How many sets?

How long does each session take?

What is the purpose of 1 hour of walking? Cardio/Weight loss/endurance?

Why only 1800 calories? are you trying to lose weight?
 
Old and Grey said:
Where do you draw AM/PM the split line, between shoulder and incline? The intended split was an upper lower one O & G , the am / pm one got put on hold.

How many days per week? It was an every day split O n G upper one day lower the next

How many sets? 3 x 5 per each exercise

How long does each session take? 35 minutes

What is the purpose of 1 hour of walking? Cardio/Weight loss/endurance? weight loss

Why only 1800 calories? are you trying to lose weight? - prepping for a contest 13 weeks away
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The system is creaking atm after nigh on 8 months of constant dieting and training , recovery is on the floor as a result I would warrant. So it really has to be a sensible and simple approach for the next few months.
 
Nagels said:
The system is creaking atm after nigh on 8 months of constant dieting and training , recovery is on the floor as a result I would warrant. So it really has to be a sensible and simple approach for the next few months.
Click to expand...


Well, don't kill yourself, eh?:rolleyes:
 
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