In need of routine advice

[smoogs]

Hello folks. Nice forum you have here.

I need to change my exercise routine. I've been doing the Book of Muscle routines for close to a year, and I am beginning to tire of it. Anyhow, I figured I would piece together a routine of my own using the HST principles. Only problem is, I am not much of an expert.

This is a full body routine I'll do 3 times a week. Do these exercises cover the muscle groups properly? Are there any muscle groups I am neglecting here? Or possibly am I overworking a certain muscle?


Squats x2 (sets)
Leg curls x2
Incline Bench x2
Chins x2
Shrugs x2
Lateral raise x2
Shoulder press x2
Kneeling dumbell bent over row x2
EZ barl curl x2
Tricep pushdown x2
Single leg standing calf raises x2
Weight crunches x1
Side raises x1
Toes to sky x1

The one thing I am wondering is, do I need to add some type of lower back exercise to the mix? Any responses are greatly appreciated, thanks!

[matador1]

I would add some deadlifts in there for lower back. Also, shoulder presses and laterals are working the same muscle (delts)but you might want to do away with the side laterals and add some bent over laterals for the rear delts.

[OtherOldguy]

Add some bent-over rows, they'll work your rear delts, your bi's, traps, rhomboids. Why aren't you doing reg. bench?? They work your tri's front delts as well. I'd drop the EZ bar curls, if you add the rows and with the chins, your bi's will get plenty of work. Lose the leg curls for more squats or lunges. And Deads, as mentioned above for your lower back. Oh And by the way, welcome to the board!! [img]smile.gif[/img]

[TA Baracus]

Why not just do the following exercises?

Bench press
Bent over row
Squat
Deadlift
Pull-up or lat pulldown
Dips
Then any ab work you want to do

That will work pretty much every muscle you need. Maybe throw in some calf raises and curls, but they aren't needed.

[Morris]

That workout that travis posted is dynamite. I am following a HST cycle that is almost identical. Watch out for doing two sets on those excercises if you actually spent time finding out what your maxes are...you will not want to do two sets of 15 on any of those excercises because they are all compound and will kick your butt. In mine I threw in Chin-ups right after squats and that is a killer.

Once you get down into the 5's I would suggest doing two sets. In the 10's I would wait and see if you feel like you have enough to complete another set on each excercise. On another forum Brain Haycock (HST Man) told me in then 10's he would even do half sets after the first full one just because another set was too much. Good luck.

[TA Baracus]

If anyone does the routine I mentioned, it is probably best to make them into supersets with non-competing exercises (i.e. squat and pullup).

I am not too familar with the setup of HST, but if it uses compound lifts it might work.

[OtherOldguy]

Good one, Travis. I do a similar one only split upper and lower body. I superset Bench w/ rows, shoulder press w/ Pull-ups. But they are all done 5x5. I stick to pull-ups, personally. I think they work more muscles than the lat-pulls and work them harder. They are a Beyotch at first, but after you feel the pain every where! Use lat-pulls for warm-ups for pulls.

[TA Baracus]

Yeah, the one above is more for working out two or three days a week. It can easily be modified into a four day split (two upper body, two lower body) or two push, two pull days.

Overall pullups are more effective than pulldowns because you are pulling your own weight, balancing yourself and using many different muscles. I always have a tending to use my arms more during pullups than my lats....i just have to go slow and concentrate on pulling my lats together.

[DKing]

Rather than repeat the same exercise three times a week, I like to change exercises and loads throughout the week with a full body routine. Easiest way to think about it is like this. Take the four main groups: Chest, Back, Hammies, Quads. Then take a large compound for each: Bench, Row, Deadlift, Squat. Then think of a unilateral exercise for each: DB Bench, DB Row, Leg Curl, Bulgarian split squat. Then lastly, take another compound but usually less stressful exercise for each: Dips, Pullups, Romanian Deadlifts, Leg Press. Alternate between high reps low sets, medium reps medium sets, low reps high sets and bam! program is ready. Plus you have a ton of exercises while keeping the theme and you can just change loading parameters of the same if you want. Plus you can choose to have high rep days, low reps days, etc or you can mix it up per exercise.

Danny

[TA Baracus]

That is a great idea Danny, I've never though of doing that. I will need to be implementing that in my routine!