Lower/Upper/Lower for 3 days in a row, and then rest 1, and Upper again, and rest 2. Is it okay?

[sammierose18]

Is this okay to workout upper lower 3 days in a row? It won't affect recovery or anytbing? I usually see upper/Lower for two days in a row and then rest for one, then upper/lower again for two more days.
My schedule would be Lower Upper Lower (Tue-Thur), Off Fri, Upper (Saturday), Off Sunday and Monday

 

[shel75]

@sammierose18 Sometimes you just have to go with what your schedule will allow and make the best of it. There’s nothing so bad with this that you can’t do it, and you can always make adjustments based on how well you’re recovering. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.

 

[sammierose18]

@shel75 thanks man, wise words. better to not overthink it and just be consistent and change things based on how I feel

 

[ray0174]

@sammierose18 Two leg days, with one day separating them,at high intensity might be tough to recover from. You can definitely try it out and see how you feel.

As someone else mentioned, maybe do upper/lower/upper - that might be more manageable from a recovery standpoint.

Alternatively, you’re kinda running a 3 day split. Why not just do a PPL or a 3 day full body split?

 

[sammierose18]

@ray0174 Actually, I was running 3 full body for the past month! It's just I started going with my complete noob buddy who only did weightlifting class in highschool. ( 4 years ago) So for a few months I'm going to be running this upper lower because time wise, we noticed if we go together it just takes too long to do full body. (For reference it takes me 2 hours to do my full body solo, but with him it took 2:45), we tried an upper Lower and we finished in an hour and a half, so it was just better time wise and it's a good way for me to show him how to do the workouts for now until he gets in his own rhythm and learns things to where I don't exactly need to help him with stuff like stretches or how to do an exercise. I haven't considered PPL, only because I'm currently using Jeff Nippards Fundamentals Program (flame me if u want) for us to build some starting strength and size gains. Atleast just for the 8 weeks the program is long for. The program has 3 day full body (which I was running), 4 day Upper/Lower (what we are doing now), and a 5 day body part split.

I just think a 3 day split would take too long with my partner currently.

I will be switching to my own program possibly after I do these 8 weeks maybe I'll run it again after and do another 8 weeks, but at some point I wanna switch over and focus on some Olympic weightlifting movements like snatch and cleans and so on, and he's not one to do those.

 

[paupooncer]

@sammierose18 No you will die

 

[mike230]

@sammierose18 If you really want to do upper lower, you'd be better off with Lower, Rest, Upper, Rest, Lower, Upper, Rest.

You want to do leg-oriented things before upper because back effects leg exercises more than recovering from leg effects back.

You also may want to make the first Lower a quad-priority day (heavy exercises are quads, light on hams,) then the second one posterior chain focused (heavy pn glutes/hams, light on quads.)

Theb your first upper would be heavy on pull muscles (back, biceps) and light on push (chest, triceps), then vice-versa on the second push day.

Depending on your training age, you'd benefit from putting extra arm and shoulder exercises on the first Lower day. Don't make it a strict dogma. The reason for this is because 1) arms (and side delts) aren't very systematically fatiguing like legs are and 2) it allows you to load them heavier and train them with more intensity than if you'd do them on the upper day.

Something like this:

Lower 1:

Lateral Raises (3x10-20

Barbell Bicep Curls (3x5-10)

Skull Crushers (2x5-10)

Squats (4x5-10)

Leg Curls or Light Good Mornings (2x10-15)

Rest

Upper 1:

Pull-ups (3x5-10)

Row of some kind (2x5-10)

Dumbbell Incline Press (2x10-20)

Chest Fly (2x10-20)

Dumbell Curls (3x10-20)

Overhead Tricep Extension (3x10-20)

Dumbbell Upright Rows (3x10-20)

Rest

Lower 2:

Cable Cross Body Lat Raises (3x10-20)

Deadlift (2x5-10)

RDL (2x5-10)

Hack Squats (2x10-20)

Leg Press (2x10-20)

Upper 2:

Barbell Bench Press (2x5-10)

Incline Barbell Bench Press (2x5-10)

Some kind of row (2x10-20)

Lat Pulldown (3x10-20)

Tricep Pushdown (2x10-20)

Incline Curls (3x10-20)

Facepulls (3x10-20)

With upper lower, you have to sacrifice something to not go into junk volume. In this case, rear delts get worked once directly (as rows work then enough to grow slowly,) front delts get all their growth from chest exercises, no forearms or calves and arms take a back seat if you don't add them to one of the lowers. Which, that's fine for a beginner.

The other issue is that you have to increase the set count slowly over the meso or you'll burn yourself out like icarus.

Just doing a whole-body split in the style of PPL would help, as long as you can keep the drive to go in 6 days a week.

 

[tirzah2]

@sammierose18 I wouldn't reccomend training the Upper Lower split without a rest day after 2 consecutive training days. Upper Lower Rest Repeat. People say muscles recover within 48 hours but that doesn't mean ligaments and tendons do as well. And if your truly going to failure and training with quality you need 72 hrs at least between training the same muscle group in my opinion. Rest is underrated.

 

[rubenfree]

@tirzah2 True sometimes I do ULRRULRR

 

[tirzah2]

@rubenfree What do your Upper days currently look like?

 

[rubenfree]

@tirzah2

1. Barbell bench press 5x5
2. Barbell incline bench press 5x5
3. Overhead press 5x5
4. Meadows Rows 4x10
5. Dips 5x5
6. Pull ups 5x5
7. Cable crossover 3x15
8. Overhead tricep extension 3x15
9. Preacher Curls 3x15
10. Incline Hammer curls 3x15
11. Cable lateral raise 3x15
12. Reverse cable fly 3x15

I also just switched to the U rest L rest repeat, I feel like it’s better for the amount of volume I do

 

[dayisdone]

@sammierose18 I’d personally swap the ordering so that your upper days are closer together and a lower day being on its.

Reason being that lower typically includes a greater systemic fatigue so having them further apart would be better for recovery and also potentially for gains.

Another reason is that I think it’s easier to find upper body exercises that overlap less and that it’ll be easier to have those closer together.

But otherwise if this is the only way you can arrange your days it’ll be fine as long as (just like every other split) you are recovering and making progress.

Have you ever considered PPL + Full body? Might work well for your situation.

 

[oldmarine]

@sammierose18 Rest days are the best days

 

[remas]

@sammierose18 Whatever you schedule, try to give same muscles 2 days of rest in between.

 

[kukla]

@sammierose18 Sure why not, assuming you cant do 2 on 1 off, 2 on 2 off.

 

[jesussavedme10]

@sammierose18 I've started doing Upper Monday, Lower Tuesday, Upper Wednesday, Lower Thursday and Upper Friday. But I'm a beginner, always on a caloric deficit so far, so don't take me as an example. But I never understand when people talk about recovery. I never feel sore (unless I start doing a muscle that I hadn't done in a long time) or feel that I have to recover from anything.

 

[ray0174]

@jesussavedme10 It doesn’t sound like you’re training hard enough or you’re likely not progressing optimally. Most folks, if they’re training hard (and not on juice) need time to recover. But if you’re doing 30 minute sessions 5 days a week, yeah, you can recover before the next session.

 

[jesussavedme10]

@ray0174 I've been told this before but, what can I say, I mostly go to failure every time. It's true I now do fewer sets (just two sets per exercise), but it was the same thing when I used to do more. No soreness or anything. However, since I workout at home (different dumbbells and a bench) I take a long time before sets and I don't mind if the workouts last for hours because I work on the computer during rests. I know it sounds crazy but it works for me. Feeling really well rested between sets is the best for me.

 

[primary0]

@sammierose18 rn, I‘m training upper on friday, lower on saturday, shoulder/bicep/tricep on sunday and full body on tuesday or wednesday. Will see if that‘s a good idea in the long run

 

[zaphod1983]

@sammierose18 Any split can work just as fine as any other
If you like it go for it
You want yourself to love your split so you are excited everyday for the next training session