Exercise routine advice & critique

Butty

Hi All

Looking for some advice on my exercise routine. My goals are to tone / bulk up and lose some body fat. Not looking to become really big but would like to add some bulk will reducing body fat.

I exercise about 3-4 times per week with the following routine (weights & cardio – takes approx 1 hour 15 mins incl brief warmup):

Weights routine
Benchpress - 4 sets / 8-12 reps
Squats - 4 sets / 8-12 reps
Deadlifts - 4 sets / 8-12 reps or bent over rows - 4 sets / 8-12 reps (do these on alternate days)
Pull-ups & dips - supersets - 3 sets / 8-12 reps of each
Military / shoulder press & bicep curls - supersets - 4 sets / 8-12 reps of each
Calf raises & Leg curls - supersets - 4 sets / 8-12 reps of each

Cardio:
20 mins HIIT on either treadmill or bike incorporating 3 minute steady build up; 10 HIIT reps of intense / rest for 45 seconds each followed by 2 min warm down.

Just looking for peoples opinions and advice on this routine given my goals. Too much or too little? Exercises that I should drop out or add in? etc etc

Obviously I know that diet is a massive part of any exercise program but I am getting some expert advice on this separately.


Appreciate all help!!

cardio,shoot me

to be honest i think your overworking.

springs

Butty wrote: »

Weights routine
Benchpress - 4 sets / 8-12 reps
Squats - 4 sets / 8-12 reps
Deadlifts - 4 sets / 8-12 reps or bent over rows - 4 sets / 8-12 reps (do these on alternate days)
Pull-ups & dips - supersets - 3 sets / 8-12 reps of each
Military / shoulder press & bicep curls - supersets - 4 sets / 8-12 reps of each
Calf raises & Leg curls - supersets - 4 sets / 8-12 reps of each

Cardio:
20 mins HIIT on either treadmill or bike incorporating 3 minute steady build up; 10 HIIT reps of intense!!

Wow Butty! Well first let me tell you that I don't think anyone here will argue with excercises you have selected. Great selection. There are no better. Plus HIIT is great for toning up too. But all on the same day? 4 times a week? No sir!

Butty

Cheers for the responses guys. Yeah had been wondering if that was the case. 3 days a week is probably more the norm but presumably I'm still overworking at that by doing all of this in one session.

Would people recommend that I split my routine? Perhaps 2 compound exercises (e.g. bench & squat) along with a subset of the ones above and some cardio on day 1. Then different weights routine and cardio on day and alternate each day?

Or perhaps doing the same weights routine along with cardio each day but with less exercises in the weights part of my program?

Or alternating days between weights and Cardio.

Also, are there any weight exercises that people recommend doing on all training days?


I think my main problem is finding the balance between packing the right routines into each session while being careful not to try and do too much.

Any advice greatly appreciated.

cardio,shoot me

well the fact that your routine is so similar to it id reccomend doing starting strength

Butty

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

well the fact that your routine is so similar to it id reccomend doing starting strength

Yeah the starting strength routines look good and much briefer and focused that my current one. There's no cardio work involved in it though which is good for fat loss - would you recommend adding the HIIT work to the starting strength routine or doing it on alternate days??

cardio,shoot me

well im no expert and i dont exactly do cardio :P but i lost fat while doing starting strength. But if you wanted to there is plenty of time throughout the week to add cardio

floggg

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

well im no expert and i dont exactly do cardio :P but i lost fat while doing starting strength.

Did you lose much? Were you trying to or was it just a pleasant surprise? What was the diet like?

Brian?

Butty wrote: »

Yeah the starting strength routines look good and much briefer and focused that my current one. There's no cardio work involved in it though which is good for fat loss - would you recommend adding the HIIT work to the starting strength routine or doing it on alternate days??

Personally, I'd do the cardio on the opposite days. I'm not sure you'd have enough left in the tank to do HIIT properly after a heavy weights session, in fact if you can do HIIT on a treadmill after squatting and deadlifting you're probably not lifting heavy enough.

Other than that I'd rotate squat and deadlift every 2nd workout and probably drop the reps on both to 5x5.

If you're stuck for time and are mainly worried about fat loss you could try this.

Squat or deadlift 5x5

Bench, no rest, row(whatever type you decide), no rest, lunges. Rest 90secs and repeat x3. I usually do 8 reps on all.

In the same pattern, military press, lat pulldown or pullup, stiff leg deadlift x3.

and to finish (this ones just for vanity) bicep curl, skullcrushers, calf raise x3

cardio,shoot me

flogg, i lost about 7 kilos of fat, got stronger and i wasnt trying to :P, i was actually eating quite alot, i find SS very demanding

floggg

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

flogg, i lost about 7 kilos of fat, got stronger and i wasnt trying to :P, i was actually eating quite alot, i find SS very demanding

Cool. Are you one of these annoying high metabolism type people that loses weight easily or a regular joe (i'm assuming regular joe if you had fat to lose!)?

Still got some to lose myself, but got so sick of trying to cut out cals i said feck it, lets do SS and try and put on some weight. still hoping to lose the belly though, although not too optimistic, but want to break even at least if you get me!

cardio,shoot me

haha no no, i put on fat extremely easy! I could easily gain 10 kilos over a month without much hassle at all. That being said i had alot of fat to lose when i started SS

floggg

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

haha no no, i put on fat extremely easy! I could easily gain 10 kilos over a month without much hassle at all. That being said i had alot of fat to lose when i started SS

Good to hear (for me, not you)! Well done though.

kevpants

Please bear in mind Cardio,ShootMe is 15. The fact that he's growing and all kinds of other stuff * could contribute to his weight loss/gain.

I wouldn't consider Starting Strength a weight loss program.




* He may be burning up to 2000 calories a day furiously pulling the chimp off himself

DM-BM

kevpants wrote: »

Please bear in mind Cardio,ShootMe is 15. The fact that he's growing and all kinds of other stuff * could contribute to his weight loss/gain.

I wouldn't consider Starting Strength a weight loss program.




* He may be burning up to 2000 calories a day furiously pulling the chimp off himself

+1 on that.

Although, it does depend how much fat some one has to lose and how inactive they were before starting it. Its not a weight loss program, quite the opposite in fact, but if you are fat enough starting you can lose some, but its never going to get you lean.

celestial

kevpants wrote: »

Please bear in mind Cardio,ShootMe is 15. The fact that he's growing and all kinds of other stuff * could contribute to his weight loss/gain.

I wouldn't consider Starting Strength a weight loss program.




* He may be burning up to 2000 calories a day furiously pulling the chimp off himself

Exactly - you often see people say 'I did X exercise programme/diet and lost all this fat' and then others want to try the same approach - forgetting that whether the approach will work depends on a lot of different factors - their starting point, how fat they were to begin with, age/gender, diet etc....

Cake Man

Lads,
Just wondering myself, what stretches shoud ya do before goin into the gym? I notice whenever I'm on the threadmill, I get a slight uncomfortableness (not really a pain) at the right of my lower back, any ideas?
Also, I usually go to the gym in the evening so would it be better to have dinner before or after the gym?? I notice if I have it before I tend to get heartburn but if I had it after I prob wouldn't have a lot of energy?

Any help would be great, thanks.

cardio,shoot me

hmm, kevpants i forgot about that, and i resent that last statement if i interpreted it correctly :P. And as of yesterday im 16 so ha

itsallaboutheL

cardio,shoot me wrote: »

hmm, kevpants i forgot about that, and i resent that last statement if i interpreted it correctly :P. And as of yesterday im 16 so ha

so now you're **** burning even more!!:p

cardio,shoot me

man u must be able to "burn" alot with all those curls