Bout To Start Hst Again. Keep It At 3 Workouts Per Week?

R

robthebeast

New Member
Does anyone deviate from the 3x per week full body original HST setup? Curious if anyone stretches it to a 4 day or 5 day. Not 4 or 5 full body workouts but just spreading volume around more. Been doing an Upper/Lower and im burnt out on it.

Another question is i want to incorporate flat bench, incline bench, oh press, and dips into my program. Would that be overkill to perform those 4 together in each session
 
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I deviate all the time, currently doing each muscle group 5 times a fortnight over 10-12 days, workout 1 is bench, front squats, calf raise and close grip bench and workout 2 is Pendlay Row, shrugs, RDL, upright row, BB face pulls and curls. Current protocol is myo reps starting with the activation set plus 1 myo rep set increasing each workout by 1 myo rep set with the final workout of the fortnight doing myo rep sets to match number done in the activation set.

In terms of your proposal I would say it is overkill and a recipe for over reaching quite quickly especially for the anterior delts, well it would be for me on push exercises.
 
Good question and a good answer depends on your condition now. However, in general three times per week seems ideal all around. You can spread that three times over three days or even up to six, just keep your total weekly sets the same. I currently do every over day. My total body workout consists of 18 sets or 3 sets per body part. I do the same exercise for the 3 sets but do a different exercise for each body part with each separate workout. I also incorporate very short rest periods and myo reps so it is a fast but incredibly intense workout. I would not recommend that for you at this point.

Mick answered your second question nicely. I would just even more strongly suggest that you balance push/pull over the week to avoid hunching or shortening you pec muscles and lengthening your posterior delts. You want to keep a good posture and not look like an ape.

Post your entire progrm and we wil give you our thoughts on it. We do not always agree 100% but the advice is not far off. If we get too fouled up Bryan will step in and correct us with a technical explanation that is over most of our heads but he always gives a nice summary paragraph at the end for us idiots. ;)

BTW, take Mick seriously as he is well known DEVIATE. :D
 
Some great answers already, but yeah you definitely can spread around the volume through the week. I prefer sticking to the 3 days, as I can use other days for other exercise, and flexibility/mobility work. But it's gotta be what suits you. I'd say that as long as you've got a good frequency and progression it'd be fine. And just watch out for fatigue and keep recovery in check, even if you lower volume and spread it to 6 days, if those 6 days are still quite intense it could still overdo your CNS. But many have done it just fine without issues, just a courtesy heads up :).

And yeah those 4 exercise seem to be a bit overkill.. I'd only have one of the bench exercises (either flat or incline, no need for both), OH press and dips should be fine, but see how you go. I've always wondered about this combo too to be honest!

Nowadays I usually try to specialise 2 or 3 muscle groups whilst keeping the rest at semi-maintenance. Helps to avoid the overkill, but either way, depends on your current conditioning/goal.
 
All good points above,

A couple of splits that have worked well for me in the past are
  • 4 Day upper/lower split
Mon -Upper
Tue - Lower
Thur - Upper
Fri - Lower
  • 6 Day Push/Pull/Legs split
Mon -Push
Tue - Pull
Wed - Legs
Thur - Push
Fri -Pull
Sat -Legs
Sun - Off

Since switching to powerlifting/strength specific training I now do pretty much full body 4-5 days a week.
 
Mojo77 said:
@mickc1965 , @old&grey

So you guys have ditched your daily full body routines?

Why is that?
Click to expand...

I prefer to keep workouts short (under 30 minutes) and train 6 or 7 days per week, so had to drop full body routines. However current set up is working both upper and lower on the same day but in a push / pull fashion
 
No, I usually just split push/pull between AM and PM to keep the workouts short like Mick. That way I can give it my complete effort without fatigue becoming a factor. If I did not have the luxury of a home gym and were a few years younger, I would do the full body all at one workout. I have done it over 6 days also but really like the full day off now by working out every other day. Old farts need more recovery. :rolleyes:
 
I can personally do a full body workout in 30 minutes using 5 exercises. I do 1 squat, 1 hinge, 1 pull, 1 push and 1 carry. I perform them myo-reps style which means I do 1 activation set of 10 reps, next I do something like 4-4-4-4 doing 26 total reps.
If I'm really time pressed I could even do a full body workout under 15 minutes! I'd choose the clean and press which is basically a squat, hinge, push and pull exercise all in one together with a carry.

I feel when you're busy with life and families a full body workout just offers you the best possible integration with life itself. When you're doing a split and you can't train from time to time your program just gets fucked up so I no longer do these.

I think I have found pretty much an optimum with the above. I train as often as I can, when time allows and I'm not to tired and I don't worry about program consistency. I do between 3 and 5 sessions a week this way
 
Mojo77 said:
I can personally do a full body workout in 30 minutes using 5 exercises. I do 1 squat, 1 hinge, 1 pull, 1 push and 1 carry. I perform them myo-reps style which means I do 1 activation set of 10 reps, next I do something like 4-4-4-4 doing 26 total reps.
If I'm really time pressed I could even do a full body workout under 15 minutes! I'd choose the clean and press which is basically a squat, hinge, push and pull exercise all in one together with a carry.

I feel when you're busy with life and families a full body workout just offers you the best possible integration with life itself. When you're doing a split and you can't train from time to time your program just gets fucked up so I no longer do these.

I think I have found pretty much an optimum with the above. I train as often as I can, when time allows and I'm not to tired and I don't worry about program consistency. I do between 3 and 5 sessions a week this way
Click to expand...

I train at home so fitting in a session is not an issue for me
 
Home gym owner too. Still when raising small children, chances are high you won’t have time or will be too tired to get in a session. Finding the optimum is really hard.
 
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