I want to hear thoughts on a rather uncomplicated routine I could stick by. My idea is a full body split since I prefer to go 3 times per week. I want to primarily focus on hypertrophy, definition and lose some stubborn mid section fat. For context, I'm a 31 y/o guy, 184 cm (6"), hovering around 80 kg (176 lbs), approx. 15-20% BF, have been learning to lift for two months with adjusted nutrition and focus on my protein intake.
@malkah18 I've never been a full body guy but you seem to have a pretty good mix of exercises in my opinion. The only thing I wanted to suggest is to play around with your reps and sets. 3 x 12 is a good general number but you may find more success with dropping a few reps on the high load, compound exercises and increasing the reps on the small ROM isolation exercises. Ex: drop down to 8 on the deadlifts and do 15-20 on calf raises.
@malkah18 It's a fine set of exercises arranged in a way which makes sense.
Only thing I would question is the sets and reps and progression. Why have you chosen 3x12 for nearly everything? Do you have weights in mind for each movement? Will 12 reps be enough or too much for you? What is your plan if it's either too easy or too hard?
@dawn16 I should've added this - I go by 3 sets to keep it simple for myself, but regarding reps I always aim for 8-12 range until failure after the warm up set. For many of my listed exercises I already started overloading progressively by increasing weight if I see it's too easy.
Do you reckon some movements would benefit from more/less sets/rep range?
@malkah18 I have a few general rules for putting a workout plan together:
Big muscle groups before little
Compounds before isolations
Have a push for every pull to avoid imbalances.
Looking at your routine, you follow most of them, but I have a few comments/questions:
Maybe consider just having an A day and a B day, so week 1 would be ABA and week 2 would be BAB. Your Day 3 workout seems to be whatever you could cobble together
muscle groups like calves and side delts are small and recover almost immediately - you could do those every day if you wanted
Starting a workout with calf raises is almost a comical waste of time and energy, and 3x12 will barely tax them. They're a muscle group that responds well to really high repetitions seeing as you walk using them every day
there's really no need to do hamstring curls on the same day you're doing RDLs in a dull body routine, both exercises hit the hammies hard
If you're worried about total time in the gym, drop the cardio and just do it on your off days. That's 15 minutes to get more sets in.
If you actually care about getting strong too, you'll probably see significantly more success swapping those 3x12s on some of your compounds for 3-4x8s.
What's your goal for lower body? Size? Athletic performance? Juicy booty? Because I can't see one based on your exercise selection.
Do you have any specific muscle groups that you feel need more work than others?
Here's a sample template that I think would be more effective movement-wise:
Lower body compound - alternate squat/leg press and RDLs on A/B days
Upper body compound push - Alternate Bench Press and OHP on A/B days
Upper body compound pull - Alternate pullups/lat pulldowns and rows on A/B days
optional superset of secondary upper body compounds. Press examples - Incline DB press, Dips. Pull examples - chinups, hammer strength lat machine, chest-supported rows, face pulls
3-4 upper body isolations - do curls, triceps, and dealers choice of lateral raises, flyes, face pulls, and shrugs. If you're pressed for time, consider supersetting.
Calf raises
Ab work
3-4x8-12 is a fine rep range to work in for hypertrophy, but consider maybe dropping your sets on your main powerlifting movements into the 3x5 range with some pyramid up, pyramid down sets if you care about getting some strength-specific work on top of volume. Depending on what you want with your lower body, you also have the option to add a secondary lower body compound like hip thrusts on your squat day, or hack squats/front squats on your RDL day
By push and pull, I assume you mean alternating on same workout, rather than separate push/pull A/B days, right?
Re: compounds, I will definitely reduce most of them to 8s.
For lower, I just aim at general size maintenance and proportion. I cycle a lot, and I don't want to skip legs completely, but I want to more focus on the upper body.
Given your A/B suggestion, do you think these would work well for ABA and BAB?
@malkah18 Looks pretty good overall, though I question flyes as a main chest movement - to me it's much more of an accessory than anything else. You do you, but I'd personally choose something you can go heavy on like incline DB press or dips, and you're not doing vertical pressing. B day is begging for overhead press IMO.
And yes, alternating within the same workout. That way your pushing muscles get an extended break while your pulling ones are working, and vice versa.
