Program Advice

HankScorpio1985

Hey all,

Just getting back into the gym after working on mobility and playing sports for the last few months and I am looking for some advice on the following program. I'm looking for an overall body workout in a 3 day split concentrating on the main compound lifts. Trying to keep it under an hour with 10/15mins for a warm up. I was just wondering if I've included everything and if everything is in a decent order. Main goal is strength followed by size.

Day 1
Squat (4x5)
BB row (3x8)
DB bench (3x12)
Single leg work supplementary (4x12) (e.g. Bulgarian split squats, SLDL)
Core and conditioning

Day 2
Trapbar DL (4x5)
Pull ups (3x8)
Hip thrusts (3x12)
Shoulders and Lat supplementary (4x12) (Lat raises, shrugs etc)
Core and conditioning

Day 3
Bench (4x5)
Front squats (3x8)
RDL (3x12)
Bis & tris supplementary (4x12)
Core and conditioning

The core and conditioning will vary depending on what's available in the gym and how I'm feeling. Also I will try to do a 4th day of pistol squats, pull ups and dips on the gymnastic rings in the gym and press ups.

How does that look? Any info/criticism gladly taken on board.

Cheers,

h

dor843088

Its a breath of fresh air to open a thread with such a title and actually see something decent. Its a bit "fluffy " . For instance why not just deadlift instead of RDL and trap bar and hip thrusts ? Why not just squat instead of squats and front squats and Bulgarian squats ? Reduce your exercise selection and concentrate on progression in the basics will serve you better .

HankScorpio1985

dor843088 wrote: »

Its a breath of fresh air to open a thread with such a title and actually see something decent. Its a bit "fluffy " . For instance why not just deadlift instead of RDL and trap bar and hip thrusts ? Why not just squat instead of squats and front squats and Bulgarian squats ? Reduce your exercise selection and concentrate on progression in the basics will serve you better .

Fluffy? Not really what I was going for.
Trapbar deadlift is my main heavy deadlift. I am going for trapbar instead of barbell to look after my back and make sure the glutes are working. Same with having the hip thrusts and the front squats. They are more supplementary as an accessory to the main compound lift. The main compound lift at the start (squat, tb deadlift and bench) will take up a lot of the session, with a lot of warm up sets, and where I will be progressing each week hopefully.

Cheers,

h

HankScorpio1985

Actually looking back on it it would probably serve me better to swap the RDLs and DB bench.

Alf Veedersane

HankScorpio1985 wrote: »

Actually looking back on it it would probably serve me better to swap the RDLs and DB bench.

I'd move the RDLs to Day 2 instead of Day 1 for two reasons.

One, it just reduces the load on leg work on one of the days and two, your hamstrings won't be worked as hard with the trap bar deadlift (in comparison to conventional, I mean) so there's room to bring them in there.

dor843088

HankScorpio1985 wrote: »

Fluffy? Not really what I was going for.
Trapbar deadlift is my main heavy deadlift. I am going for trapbar instead of barbell to look after my back and make sure the glutes are working. Same with having the hip thrusts and the front squats. They are more supplementary as an accessory to the main compound lift. The main compound lift at the start (squat, tb deadlift and bench) will take up a lot of the session, with a lot of warm up sets, and where I will be progressing each week hopefully.

Cheers,

Making the advice I just gave you even more relevant. Not to worry.

JamesRussel

If strength is your main goal then youve no business doing so many different exercises. Specificity is king, that generally means doing a lift 2-3 times a week, not once and then a few variations aswell. Thats why most powerlifting programs have you squatting and benching up to 4 times a week.

4x5 once a week on a "main" lift isnt enough volume either. Even looking at the most basic of strength routines (starting strength), you're doing 9 working sets of squats a week at 85%+

Its definitely better than most routines people write for themselves, but if i were you, i'd strongly consider increasing frequency on the lifts you want to prioritise.

Blacktie.

JamesRussel wrote: »

If strength is your main goal then youve no business doing so many different exercises. Specificity is king, that generally means doing a lift 2-3 times a week, not once and then a few variations aswell. Thats why most powerlifting programs have you squatting and benching up to 4 times a week.

4x5 once a week on a "main" lift isnt enough volume either. Even looking at the most basic of strength routines (starting strength), you're doing 9 working sets of squats a week at 85%+

Its definitely better than most routines people write for themselves, but if i were you, i'd strongly consider increasing frequency on the lifts you want to prioritise.

Starting strength is not a good example of a strength program once your past the novice phase and which programs have you both squatting and benching 4 times a week unless you're running two programs in tandem?

Program looks decent enough I reckon. I would sub in regular deadlifts and change the 12 rep scheme to something a bit lower but you know your body better than I do so maybe you're working on supplementary work on your weaknesses

deadlybuzzman

Would you not just do a tried and tested programme like madcow which in fairness has a little bit of similarity to yours only the reps are much lower and it's much more focused on the main lifts.
Also, are they straight sets or ramped sets and what's the weekly progression plan?

JamesRussel

Blacktie. wrote: »

Starting strength is not a good example of a strength program once your past the novice phase and which programs have you both squatting and benching 4 times a week unless you're running two programs in tandem?

I was only using starting strength to point out even a low volume program has more weekly volume on a particular lift that OPs routine, regardless of level.

I should have worded the second part better, i was thinking of smolov jr specifically,, which some people do squat and bench together.

Mellor

JamesRussel wrote: »

I should have worded the second part better, i was thinking of smolov jr specifically,, which some people do squat and bench together.

That would be two programs in tandem.
And regardless, that's one example. Most PL programs don't have you squatting & benching 4 times a week as you said.