Critique my push/pull routine

[El Freako]

I'm planning on hitting a push/pull routine once I feel I'm done with my current split and I wanted some informed criticism of my first draft. It will be a 4 day split performed Mon, Tue, Wed.

Push 1
Bench Press
Front Squat
Incline Smith
DB Shoulder Press
BTN Press
Skull Crushers

Pull 1
Deadlift
WG Lat Pulldown
T-bar Row
CG Upright Row
1-Arm Cable Rear-Delt Fly
DB Preacher Curl

Push 2
Squats
DB Incline Press
Rack Press
Military Press
Lateral Raises
Weighted Dips

Pull 2
Dorian Row
SLDL
Weighted Chins
Rear-Delt Row
Rear-Delt Fly
Ezybar Curl

I'll explain a few things...
1. I'm only doing leg exercise per day, I don't need bigger legs because then I'll need to buy bigger jeans and I can't be fucked with that. I'm more concerned with my squat and deadlift 1rm.

2. 2 shoulder exercises per session, I'm aiming for cannonball delts. My rear-delts in particular need a bit of work.

3. I've yet to decide on rep and set ranges. I'll probably go 1-5 for all my core power movements (squat, deads, bench, military press) and do 6-10 or 8-12 for the rest.

Week 1 (Mon, Tue, Wed): push 1, pull 1, push 2
Week 2 (Mon, Tue, Wed): pull 2, push 1, pull 1
Week 3 (Mon, Tue, Wed): push 2, pull 2, push 1
Week 4 (Mon, Tue, Wed): pull 1, push 2, pull 2
etc...

Thanks in advance for replies...

 

[El Freako]

Anyone?

:crymeariver:

 

[Rocky]

Personally I think you are doing too much given the rest periods (i.e no rest days for 3 sessions straight) and you are doing shoulders in everyworkout - specific exercises on top of the work they will get from chest movements. The delts are only a small group of muscles and I think you'll kill them with all that. You're effectivelty training delts 3 days in a row with direct exercises.

I know that may seem like the pull days are lacking in exercises but you don't need to do tons. Of course I don't know what your set numbers are going to be for each exercises, but regardless you still need to rest your delts at least 1 day between sessions given the exercises you are planning on doing.

If you want to balance the number of exercises per session, and you're not worried about overloading your legs with regards to number of exercises then move the front and regular squats to your pull days - I know that sort of alters the push/pull aspect but this way you are doing a similar number of exercises per session (providing you knock off the delt lifts from the pull day) plus given the similar muscles that deads and squats use they are (despite being pull and push lifts respectively) quite suited to being in the same session and allowing you to rest the muscles between sessions.

Having seen your log I know you have some good strength and could probably manage the routine you have pointed out but feel you would limit your potential progress by doing that one.

Just my thoughts.

The 1st push session you don't need to do BTN presses aswell as DB presses, not least because of the incline chest work you've done, if you do anything, do rear lateral raises - I know you have them elsewhere in your routine, but you don't need them there.
Get rid of all shoulder work in your pull days

 

[El Freako]

Once again Rock I'm retarded. I'm actually going to be resting every Tuesday and Thursday (bar cardio and abs) so I'm only working out every second day.

I really should review everything I write a bit more.

On the topic of the BTN presses, I've just started doing them and I'm enjoying them so much that I'm really hesitant to give them up. But I also love doing DB presses because of the poundage I can throw about. I'm so torn!!!

 

[El Freako]

Reposting this with some corrections, I'm not doing 3 consecutive days, that would be stupid. I'm training every second day.

I'm planning on hitting a push/pull routine once I feel I'm done with my current split and I wanted some informed criticism of my first draft. It will be a 4 day split performed Mon, Wed, Fri.

Push 1
Bench Press
Front Squat
Incline Smith
DB Shoulder Press
BTN Press
Skull Crushers

Pull 1
Deadlift
WG Lat Pulldown
T-bar Row
CG Upright Row
1-Arm Cable Rear-Delt Fly
DB Preacher Curl

Push 2
Squats
DB Incline Press
Rack Press
Military Press
Lateral Raises
Weighted Dips

Pull 2
Dorian Row
SLDL
Weighted Chins
Rear-Delt Row
Rear-Delt Fly
Ezybar Curl

I'll explain a few things...
1. I'm only doing leg exercise per day, I don't need bigger legs because then I'll need to buy bigger jeans and I can't be fucked with that. I'm more concerned with my squat and deadlift 1rm.

2. 2 shoulder exercises per session, I'm aiming for cannonball delts. My rear-delts in particular need a bit of work.

3. I've yet to decide on rep and set ranges. I'll probably go 1-5 for all my core power movements (squat, deads, bench, military press) and do 6-10 or 8-12 for the rest.

Week 1 (Mon, Wed, Fri): push 1, pull 1, push 2
Week 2 (Mon, Wed, Fri): pull 2, push 1, pull 1
Week 3 (Mon, Wed, Fri): push 2, pull 2, push 1
Week 4 (Mon, Wed, Fri): pull 1, push 2, pull 2
etc...

Thanks in advance for replies...

 

[Rocky]

Well it is a better split period with the rest intervals now and this way doing the squats and deads on different days won't be so much a problem but I still personally feel that for the size of the muscle complex that doing effectively 8 specific exercises for delts (not including the secondary work they will get from the chest moves) compared to 4 for chest and 2 for legs is still far too much emphasis on the shoulders.

Other than that it looks alright. What about calves?

 

[philosopher]

Imo you should do more lowerbody work. Your doing 1 LB exercise against 5 UB exercises. dont be a beachboy and train those legs.

 

[El Freako]

Other than that it looks alright. What about calves?

Calves will probably be done every training session, sometimes abs too time permitting. I'll consider your advice about my shoulder volume but will probably try out the 2 exercises to start off with.

Philo: As I said, I already have legs as big as I really want to get them. I'll keep on training them heavy with deads and squats but I've had big legs before and I had to spend shitloads on new jeans, not to mention the chafe was killer! My leg days used to be 3hr epics.

eg.
squats x 5
deads x 5
leg press x 5
curls and ext x 3
sometimes even finishing with hack squats x 3
...then i'd hit calves

 

[El Freako]

Damn, even one of my threads got attacked by the chinese gold miners.

 

[tim290280]

I can't really comment until you put in loadings, relative volume, intensity cycles over the weeks, etc.

A routine shouldn't just be your body parts trained or the exercises you will use. If you max out bench with forced reps etc, but do the same on paper with your back yet never do the forced reps etc then you can't expect any one else to understand your routine.

 

[El Freako]

I've never really actually got that technical with my programs. My choice of rep range is mostly instinctive, but as illustrated in my log I start heavy with low reps. As far as loading is concerned I try to progressively load week to week, adding 2.5-5kg each time and going as heavy as I can. I've still got a few more weeks before I start this program since I'm going to do a smolov jr routine first so I might look into the more technical side first.

Revised program:
Push 1
Bench Press
Front Squat
Incline DB Press
BTN Smith Press
Skull Crushers

Pull 1
Deadlift
WG Lat Pulldown
T-bar Row
Upright Row
DB Preacher Curl

Push 2
Squats
Hammer Chest Press
Military Press
Lateral Raises
Weighted Dips

Pull 2
Dorian Row
SLDL
Weighted Chins
Rear-Delt Fly
Ezybar Curl