PPLers: Which day is the most difficult for you?

7

786man

New member
I am currently on a PPL program that I came up with on my own by reading stuff from here and there. My Leg days are the most difficult/fatigue-inducing, and Pull days come at a quite close second. Push days feel like a breeze compared to the previous two. I was wondering, how do you rank your days in terms of difficultness/fatigue?

Below is my training program in case you were wondering:

Pull​

  • Barbell Bent-over Rows x 4 (9-12 reps, 50kg)
  • Single-arm DB Rows x 3 (9-14 reps per arm, 24kg)
  • Pull-ups x 4 (8 reps, bodyweight)
  • Reverse Flys x 3 (12-20 reps, 4kg)
  • Deadlifts x 4 (6-10 reps, 65kg)
  • Barbell Shrugs x 3 (9-12 reps, 57.5kg)
  • Barbell Bicep Curls x 4 (9-12 reps, 30kg)
  • Hammer Curls x 3 (9-14 reps per arm, 12kg)

Push​

  • Push-ups x 3 (20-24 reps, bodyweight + 7.5kg)
  • Flat Bench Press x 4 (9-12 reps, 50kg)
  • Incline Bench DB Flys x 3 (12-20 reps, 8kg)
  • Seated Barbell Overhead Press x 4 (9-12 reps, 27.5kg)
  • DB Lateral Raises x 3 (12-20 reps, 8kg)
  • Skullcrushers x 4 (9-12 reps, 22.5kg)
  • Tricep Kickbacks x 3 (12-20 reps, 4kg)

Legs​

  • Back Squats x 5 (9-12 reps, 42.5/45/47.5/50/52.5kg)
  • Superset x 5:
    • Standing Barbell Calf Raises (reps 13-16, 60kg)
    • Back Squats (reps 5-8, 60 kg)
  • Romanian Deadlifts x 5 (9-12 reps, 57.5kg)
  • Barbell Hip Thrusts x 5 (9-12 reps, 35kg)
  • Planks x 3 (1 minute, boyweight)
 
@oregongirl1 I currently have a home gym situation going on so I'm restricted to free weights only. The RDLs on Leg day are for my hams. The RDLs themselves are not so fatiguing, it's the Squats that are killing me. Deadlifts on Pull day are quite fatiguing, yes, but they are two days per week.
 
@786man You can just drop deads from pull day entirely. What’s your purpose in doing them? Some people consider them a back exercise, but they really only train the back isometrically. The legs are the prime mover.

Unless you’re using a very well designed PL program with good exercise selection and volume and intensity moderation, training legs/some variant of deadlift 4x a week is not wise.
 
@dawn16 You may be right in dropping them entirely. Other than that I enjoy them, I feel like they contribute to training my lower back/spinal erectors. Although I believe that this training routine is currently manageable, if I am to lower the volume eventually as the weights go up, dropping Deadlifts on Pull days would be the logical choice.
 
@786man RDL also trains lower back and erectors. If you won’t want to drop them entirely, then you can do do a deadlift/posterior chain focused/priority leg day, and a knee bend focused/priority leg day. Do deads as your primary movement on one, and squats as your primary on another.
 
@dawn16 It's an excellent idea, I've been doing this for the past year with a home gym setup and have seen some crazy lower body gains. Imo doing only squats on one day and only deadlift on the other works great, you just need to work through various rep ranges, and go to, or close to failure on your heavy sets. Oh and throw calve raises in the mix aswell.
 
@786man Back Squats 120-150 sec rest:

50kg 1x12
80kg 1x10
110kg 1x6
130kg 1x4
150kg 2x5 1x4

Dropset no rest to failure:
130kg x9
110kg x14
80kg x22

Standing barbell calve raises 60sec rest
50kg 4x15
 
@786man Same structure for deadlift day, just different weight. The moment I reach 3 sets of 5 reps on my heavy sets, I add 10kg to everything. Also, track your progress to make sure you're improving.
 
@786man Of course the squats are killing you, it looks like you're doing 10 working sets. If you really think that's necessary, I recommend 1) changing the second set of 5 to front squats and 2) move one of your posterior exercises in between them. Your overall load will increase if your movements are staggered quads/glute+hamstring rather than all quad exercises followed by all posterior exercises.

And move your heavy/low rep squats and deadlifts to your first exercise.
 
@peterjakeyboy
Of course the squats are killing you, it looks like you're doing 10 working sets. If you really think that's necessary,
Click to expand...

It's not that I think it's necessary, but rather the fact that I couldn't progress on my squats, so I figured I wasn't doing enough quad work. To be honest though, squats were killing me before adding the extra 5 sets as well, hahaha.
 
@786man The solution might very well be the opposite of that. PPL 6 on 1 off can be very taxing and you may be over training. Check out this page to get an idea of how many sets per week per muscle group you should be doing. For instance it says 20+ sets (like your squats) is the Max Recoverable Volume, a volume you should like once a month then drop to a lower volume and work your way back up while your body adapts and recovers.

Also you could try 3 on 1 off and see if you get the results you want.

Leg day in particular is very taxing cardiovascularly as well. I saw definite improvements in longer sets and workouts when I started doing cardio a few times a week; not crazy 20-30 minutes at 70-80%maxHR a few times a week.

It's up to you if you want to make changes, but I improved significantly when I stopped overtraining.
 
@peterjakeyboy Believe me, if I can throw away those extra 5 sets of squats and still make gains on my quads, I'd do it in a second as it's the exercise I hate the most. But I noticed that I couldn't progress on my squats, while at the same time all other lifts were getting better, so I added some more squats. I think that most leg routines that I've seen incorporate both squats and leg extensions for quads. Since I can't do leg extensions without a machine, I added a bunch of heavier squats on the lower rep range in order to get stronger at them. I might have to remove them again, and just up the reps on my first squats...
 
@786man Leg day, a base level always causes more systemic fatigue. So that a love hate tough day. Push and pull often feel like "bro day" in comparison.
 
@bettering Anyone who doesn’t say leg day is lying. You may enjoy training legs more, sure, but you’re mailing it in if you think training legs is easier.

On a side note, what I love about PPL is I get two fun pump workouts before the more challenging one. I really only don’t look forward to a workout every 3-4 days.
 
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