Starting HST Today

C

chefboy

New Member
Hello to everyone. I am 46 male with 1 year of weight training under my belt and am starting my first run at HST today. This program makes the most sense to me after doing an investigation on weight training for the last year. My history was the newbie full body routine of 3x10s for 3 months and then a 2 day split routine 3 times a week with a mostly push pull strategy. My strength went up in the beginning quite well but I  have stalled recently and now I understand why.
This routine looks so good for a man of my age who doesnt want to kill himself each workout but still wants the strength and muscle gains which my body will allow.
More weight on the bar ending with a good heavy x5 workout perhaps followed by negatives or more heavy x5s and then the SD followed by more weight on the bar. As a chef this sounds like a recipe for success.
Here is my first workout.
Squat
SL. Deadlift
Bench Press
Bent Rows
Military Press
Shrugs
Pull Ups/Downs
These exercises I will preform 2x15,2x10,and 3x5 during there 2 week blocks.
I will also preform 1 set each of these exercises following the same rep scheme as above.
Push Ups (BW, 15 reps)
Bicep Curls
Lying Tricep Extension
Side Bends
I will finish with ;
Sit Ups 2 x 20
Good Mornings(low weight) 2 x 20
I will post my thoughts and results during the next 8 weeks. Thanks to all for such a great and imformative site and feel free to advise.
Doug............
 
For your first cycle you should keep things simple, then as you progress you can add stuff later. The pushups and arm work and stuff might be good once you get into the 5s, for metabolic workout.

Also I wouldn't do good mornings and SLDLs cause they basically both the same exercise, for the hamstrings.

Some people might advice you not to do 2x15 because that's pretty high volume (30 reps), but I did that and didn't see any problems from it, and I'm still growing in the 3x5.

Other than that looks good!
 
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(chefboy @ Oct. 02 2006,11:36)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">This program makes the most sense to me after doing an investigation on weight training for the last year.</div>
I agree, Doug. I didn't research for a year, but HST makes alot of sense. I am new to HST myself, getting my RMs this week, so I can't critique your program.

Look forward to reading about your progress.
 
Peak Power beat me to it. Having done 2 full cycles (and about to start my next one) I can tell you from experience that when you get up in the weight on the 15s, they can be the most grueling of all the rep ranges.

It may work out good for you and if it does that's great but 15s liked to killed me with 1 set I could imagine doing 2 sets!
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I agree with Peak for your first cycle keep it simple and you can't go wrong!
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Welcome chefboy! Assuming you are working out M/W/F, I would do normal deadlifts on Wednesdays throughout your cycle. I think it is a good idea to get used to doing them as they are a fantastic mass building compound. You will be able to shift the most weight with these babies. They are very demanding so you should only do them on Wednesdays and alternate them with your squats and SLDLs on Mon &amp; Fri. Drop the SLDLs on Mon &amp; Fri during 5s if your lowerback finds it all too much.
 
Thanks so much for the feedback. I just finished my first workout and it was much more demanding than I anticipated. Workout time was 55 mins with 5 min warm up. I am going to follow your advice and drop the arm work , good mornings and push ups. I will also incorperate the deadlift as a wednesday lift and watch out for back strain during the 5s with the SLDL.
This HST is such a different mentality compared to most of the information which is available and I feel compelled to change my thinking on this matter as well in the respect that more exercises and harder work will make the outcome better.
Thanks,Doug.....
 
Doug

Your workout looks fine, the first part that is, as Peak says drop the itty bitty stuff for now
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Stick to compounds and oh...by the way...see if you can do chin ups instead of pulldowns at least from the 5's on, if you can add additional load and try them that way (close overhand grip) that will work out your arms as well.

Why do we prefer compounds?

Well...kinda kill two...sometimes three or more birds with one stone!
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That is besides the loading compared to isolations, so more load = better hypertrophy.

Make sense?
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Yes this makes sense Fausto. I am doing workout #2 later today and Ive dropped the itty bitty stuff and am rotating in deads on Wed instead of squats.
I love the part in the faq which talks about not focusing so much on set and rep numbers but on how you feel and progressive loading of weight on the bar.
Im sure after a couple of runs I will have a much better understanding on exercise selection as well as the volume which my body responds to best.
Thanks to all,Doug
 
Hello everyone.I am on week 2 today and I have made some changes to my first run due to my in depth reading on this forum(and I think understanding the principles) as well as your suggestions either in this post or from what I have gleaned in previouse posts which most of you have contributed to.
I did my first workout on Mon, second modified on Wed,
and then on Thurs night I did the beggining of an am
pm split which I have been doing through this morning.
This routine has been stolen from all of you so please pass on any suggestions .
AM
Good Mornings
Dips
Bent Row
Shrugs
Tricep Kickbacks
Side Bends
PM
Sit Ups
Incline Bench
Pull Ups
Military Press
Curls
Squats
I am doing 1 set only and am on the 15s for another week and then its on to the 11s and sixs or perhaps the 12s, 8s and then 5s. Just being a little sarcastic as I now see that the principles are very simple and adding weight to the bar will indeed cause the reps to decrease
so the progression is inevitable. As far as frequency goes well I am a chef now but back in the early 80s I was a roughneck in the oil fields and we did heavy work frequently which caused me to eat a lot more and man did I grow like a weed not to mention strength gains.
I have often wondered about the mentality behind the frequency in body building and I am going to do 5 or 6 days a week with the am pm split. So far I feel much better working out like this than I have with other routines. Also I might only go to the 7 or 8 rep range instead of the 5s as I am a new lifter with 1 year under my belt and the 5s can get kind of heavy and I do not want an injury.
My thoughts on this split so far are I feel much fuller in my muscles and my appetite has drastically increased.
Thoughts appreciated, Doug........
 
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