new training routine

[colossus]

Kerry

In previous posts you've mentioned that doing a weeks worth of training on a specific area of the body can be a good thing because those muscles are getting 7 days worth of nutrition, and are not being 'robbed' by other parts of the body right?

As of last week I changed my gym routine but have not yet fully implememented it (so not too late to change things). Based on what you said I was thinking of doing an upper body work out one week, and then legs the week after (over Mon, Wed, Fri) consisting of compound excercises only (as you advised in my last post). What do you think about this?

Thanks

Sam

[colossus]

kk - You have misunderstood my previous posts or I have not explained myself properly, either way I will start again.

What I was trying to say was some bodybuilders have got over developed body parts which means other body parts on that same bodybuilder are under developed. When you train you put a positive stress on that muscle, telling it it is not big enough, the first thing it has to do is repair and recuperate (this takes a lot of nutrition). It then and only if you have got adequate nutrition compensates by making itself bigger or stronger.

A good example would be, and I have advised a couple of bodybuilders with this problem, if say you have got genetically great legs then because it is a genetically good body part, that bodybuilder enjoys training it and he presses lots of weight and it does his ego the world of good. The problem is as it is a big body part and as he's trained it very hard it takes a lot of nutrients to repair the micro tears and the missing muscle nucleii, then it needs more nutrition to make it bigger and stronger. This can take 3,4 or 5 days nutrition leaving only 2 or 3 days of nutrition for the upper body, then he wonders why his upper body is not growing. if he stops training legs and as they are very advanced, he will not lose much muscle, his upper body gets 7 days nutrition enabling it to repair and grow far better. You will get the best results on this if you stop training that over developed body part for a minimum of 2-3 months, NOT for a week as you have suggested in your email.

Training the upper body for 1 week and then the lower body the next week is no different than training the entire body on a sensible split routine.

[colossus]

Yeah sorry mate I think I got the wrong end of the stick, thanks for explaining it, that makes sense.

Ok then so if it's gonna make no difference then scrap that... so what about doin alternate days (again Mon, Wed, Fri) of upper body and lower body work outs? When I was doing the upper body work outs last week it felt really satisfying to concentrate all my effort in to just 2 excercises per muscle- short and intense- rather than spreading your effort thinly over 3 or 4 excercises.

Many thanks again

Sam

[colossus]

kk - Yeah, you can alternate upstairs and downstairs. Ii suggest if you are training 3 days a week you do the following

week 1

monday - legs

wednesday - upper body

friday - legs

week 2

monday - upper body

wednesday - legs

friday - upper body

This way you are training your entire body equally.

Carry on just training 2 exercises per body part this way even though your upper body is a lot bigger workout it will still only be no more than 10 exercises and only 8 if you do 1 exercise for biceps and triceps which I suggest.

[colossus]

Thanks Kerry this is what I had in mind also- just wanted your approval.

Sam

[colossus]

kk - Let me know how you go on.