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For my first cycle I really want to add as much muscle on to my chest as I can. It's always been a lagging body part, so I want to hopefully use this cycle as a way to correct my proportions. Is it okay if I hit my chest twice or even three times a week? Or should I keep at it once a week and just hit it really hard.
What's your stats?
Hmmm... yes stats please
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As far as lifting off or on cycle goes, you should lift so that your large muscle groups like back and legs have at least 3 days up to 5 days to recover between workouts, mid sized muscles need 2 to 4 days depending on intensity (mid sized meaning chest, shoulders, triceps etc) and small groups (abs, forarms, calves) only need 1 to three days to recover usually. So you'll train your calves and abs almost twice as often as legs or chest. Thats called variable training. You train depending on the intensity with which you trained the muscle group last time and how many days it has been. Poke your muscle, if it isnt sore then its time to train it again. I dont dig it when people say "only train this or that once a week". If you are cycling you should be experienced enough to forgo the newbie training techniques like Legs monday, back and triceps Wed, and Chest, shoulders and biceps on Fridays. Those are for beginners. Know your body and be able to adapt your workouts to what your body is telling you it is ready for. If you don't understand this concept then you probably arent ready in your understanding of training to cycle.
I can tell you for a fact that trying to train your chest more to improve its size will fail. I've done it and it did not work. You need to train with max intensity once a week, and alternate an A week with flat sets and a B week with a heavy pyramid. Flat bench, incline, decline, flys, and pullovers.
Most often what causes stubborn body parts to lag is overtraining not insufficient training.
I respectfully disagree with training any body part once a week unless you are a beginner.Quote:
Originally Posted by TKO Performance
I agree about overtraining tho.
When I needed to bring up my upper chest a bit I would train it first whenever I worked my chest (so that I got the most energy into training it without being worn out) and once in a while I would train upper chest with shoulders just for a little extra.
You hear professionals talk about training the body part that was lagging more often too. I'm sure I've seen a film of Ronnie talking about training something 3 times a week rather than two when he needed to bring it up.
Anyway...
How frequently you train a bodypart depends on intensity. You cannot expect a muscle to recover from mind blowing intensity (drop sets, rest-pause, forced reps) as fast as it would recover from sets that aren't done anywhere near failure.
And more doesn't always mean better.
And it all depends on the person. People's recovery times differ from person to person, depending on age, genetics, diet, general health factors. People who give out absolutes in terms of how someone should (or shouldn't) train, doesn't know what they're talking about.
Joe Blow might be able to train chest 3x a week because he recovers very quickly. You might require 8 days to recover before you train chest again! You must find what works FOR YOU, not what works for someone else. Ronnie Coleman does what he does because it works for him. He doesn't do what he does because it works for you.
Part of training is training yourself to recover. That's why top level BBs can train a body part 2 times a week. I've rarely heard of even a top level BB training a body part more than that. There are exceptions like calves and abs, which recover faster due to the type of muscle fibers they are made of, but typical muscle recovery for a major muscle group is going to be 72 hours minimum, and 96 hours later there is typically still some repair ongoing. If you train hard while repair is ongoing you are sabatoging yourself. I guarantee you will not gain anything like that, and will reach a point where you stagnate and may even backslide.
Plenty of experienced guys only train a body part once a week. The guys who taught me that system were both top level amatures, one was Mr. East Coast in the 185 lb. division. It is a very intense workout each day, which is the way I like to train anyway.
I may experiment with a 4 day split routine again in the future, but until I'm back up to full strength and pushing my limits again I will continue my 3 day routine. I had no problem continuing to see great gains with that system as long as my diet was right. I feel that for most guys, even those who think they are experienced, this routine will work very well. Most beginners and even some more experienced guys fall into the more is better philosophy and end up hurting their progress in the long run by overtraining.
I've actually dedicated one day a week now to training one muscle or muscle group a 2nd time but i don't train the same one twice every week. For example week 1 chest gets hit twice. week 2 back gets hit twice and so on. If you time it just right you can get 72 hours rest for that muscle group that your hitting twice. I've had results with it. It comes down to knowing your own body after enough years of training you should be able to recognize when you're overtraining and when you haven't recovered fully. I've had some workouts that have taken so much out of me that i've taken an extra day off that week just to recover. Maybe try doing 5x5's for your chest and see how that works. Or try varying your rest intervals. Just some food for thought