Nm0ney34
You really think its a coincidence splits didnt become popular until steroids started to enter the scene?
From my understanding - splits have always been popular. When I see someone that is big using a split I don't assume he's on steroids. Likewise, do you think it's a coincidence that these powerlifter guys that made the squatting, deadlifts routines didn't start deadlifting 900 pounds until steroids? Bodybuilders aren't the only ones that uses them.. powerlifters use steroids too.
Muscle magazines, pro body builders have certainly put a Splits are the way to lift mentality into the general public.
Because they
are a good way to train.. I've seen tons of magazines condoning full body routines, but likewise - I've never listened to what I've read in magazines.. it's usually a scam to sale a product.
Now, I most certainly am not saying your not going to see results. As smoundzou said, with a great diet, or even reasonable diet above caloric maintenance and your stressing your body enough, you will see progress...
Yes - because 80% of your hypertrophy gains, IMPO, is from the nutrition.
But as for time spent in the gym and over all fundamentals and movement, full body just achieves that more then the splits. Especially for beginners and intermediates.
I have to disagree.. beginners? Maybe - but once again, it's goal oriented. My chest days I do a flat bench, incline press and weighted dips or decline presses (these two alternate weekly).. on my last full body routine my day 1 was - squat, bench, row, chins.. 4 exercises only the full body and 3 on the split. I also feel I increase my recovery by using splits, simply because I get used to training each day.. and every other day for that matter, a muscle group is trained.
Besides yourself advocating splits with nearly all compound movements, I have really yet to see anyone, magazine publish or talk about a split that was not isolation dominate. Let alone the frequency issue.
I feel it's goal oriented - as we've heard smoundzou say, increasing the weight isn't the only way to overload a muscle. You can increase the exercises (adding isolation) or you can increase the reps, sets, tempo, etc.. anything to make progress. I do feel personally that the compounds
are the mass builders and rarely will I isolate anything other than my arms; however, I do feel that compound splits are superior to those wishing to take a hypertrophy - physique development approach.
You know as well as I do when people talk about splits, its almost always... chest, back, arms, shoulders, legs...etc. Laced with isolations, little compound movements, usually the only ones are bench press and rows.
Yes - this is true. But if you look at my posts under the critique my training or training and exercises section.. you'll see that I always point out that those isolation movements are unnecessary. You'll find me thousands of times say "every body part does not need isolated, only the body parts that
need isolated should be isolated" - which is very little body parts.
and if you want to talk about goals, I really dont see any advantage at all to doing splits.
Thousands of advantages - I'll elaborate, splits allow you to hit the muscle harder and ensure that each muscle group gets an equal amount of intention. With a full body program, your bench press wares you out, then when you go to the OH Press, it gets cheated a little and each movement after that gets cheated a little more.. when you do a flat bench, incline bench, decline bench - it's still the chest being worked so you can't say the chest is being cheated as it was already worked hard.
For the record, im not saying splits are bad. In fact if I had to do a split I would go with upper/lower or twice a week to keep some frequnecy. I just dont see any advantage of that though over hitting the whole body 3 times a week.
The body will always be hit 2-3 times per week.. split or no split.
I did splits for awhile after high school on and off for a few years barring injurys, I saw results. But nothing like what I have seen with full body programs.
We've concluded that full body allows people to progress better in terms of adding weight, especially a beginner - we've also concluded that not everyones goal is to make linear progression in weight.
This has been a great thread but lacks, IMO, routine structure - it's basically just been "chevy vs ford".. without going into detail on which in particular you're referring to and
who you are referring it to.
The frequency comments are geared towards making progress on your lifts, increasing weight. Bodybuilders typically don't have to be that strong to get big, there are some huge guys with what most would consider "decent" strength.. 405 lb deadlifts, 355 lb squats, 315 lb bench presses and got huge off that alone.. in bodybuilding, strength isn't a big extreme. If your goal is to get "big", then strength goes so far.. then you start training specifically for hypertrophy, which is what bodybuilders do.
But, to be clear with everyone - my intentions are not splits > full body; nor full body > splits; it's simply full body = splits.. my main intention has been that both methods have pros and cons and are a good way to train, likewise you'll more than likely reap benefits of both if you practice both. So someone that does nothing but full body won't do as much as someone that does full body and splits.
I'll elaborate on how they both have their place and it is reflective of the structure of the routine itself, more than which structure is designed.
Here's an example of a phenomenal full body program, good frequency, volume, balanced exercises... and last but not least, movement variation.
Day 1- 3 x 10
Front Squat
Flat Barbell Press
OH Press
BB Row
Pullup
Day 3- 3 x 8- 5-10 lbs more than Monday
Deadlift
Incline Barbell Press
Push Press Press
Compound Row
Pullup
Day 5- 3 x 5- 5-10 lbs more than Wednesday
Squat
Weighted Dips
OH Press
Cable Row
Pullup
Excellent program ^. Below, is a good split..
Day 1
Flat Bench
Incline Bench
Dips
Day 2
Squat
Power clean
Lunges
Day 3
OH Press
Lateral Raise
Posterior Deltoid raise
Day 4
Deadlift
BB Row
Pullup
Day 5
DB Curl
Skull Crushers
Tricep Extensions
Here is an example of a full body routine with zero frequency.
Day 1
Squat
Bench
Row
Day 3
Deadlift
Press
Pullup
Day 5
Chins
Dips
Grip
Here is an example of a split with too many movement variations.
Day 1
Bench
Incline Bench
Decline Bench
Pec Dec
Flat Fly
Incline Fly
Decline Fly
Machine Bench
Machine Fly
Day 2
Deadlift
Stiff-leg deadlift
BB Row
DB Row
Cable Row
Compound Row
Pullup
Reverse grip wide pullup
Latpulldown
Day 3
OH Press
DB OH Press
Push Press
Wood Chops
Side Lateral Raise
Machine Lateral Raise
Posterior delt raise
Cable posterior delt raise
Day 4
Squat
Machine Squat
Leg Press
Leg Extension
Leg Curls
Hack Squat
Front Squat
Day 5
BB Curl
DB Curl
Preacher Curl
Concentration Curl
Sit Ups
Planks
Leg Raises
Bicycles
CGBP
Skull Crushers
Tricep Extensions
Tricep Kickbacks
Shoulders and chest balance each other, making the frequency of the muscle groups stimulated not much different than the full body routine, the full body works the shoulders three times in one week... the split works the anterior deltoids twice and the posterior deltoids twice; therefore, the frequency isn't much different.
A beginner could make linear progress on the full body. An intermediate/advanced lifter that either doesn't care about strength progression and/or is strong enough so that his bones, joints and muscles need more rest than the beginner... the split would be acceptable for him.
My moral has been that both have their place and it can be categorized as an goal oriented program. The requirements of full body and the biggest benefit it provides is making constant progress on the compounds, three times per week being better than once; however, if you would reverse the principles to someone that couldn't increase the poundage's on the movements itself, then the conclusion would be - the shoulders are worked again on chest day.. the back is worked again on leg day and vice versa. No, the seven days rest isn't essential to the requirements of training again, but the movements cannot be increased in a linear fashion without the use of anabolics therefore making performing those movements three times per week unnecessary. Working those muscle groups, on the other hand, could be argued as necessary and can be done through other movements that require them to be an antagonist, stabilizer, synergists, whichever muscle group and movement we are putting on the spot.
<message edited by MVP on Friday, May 29, 2009 5:02 PM>