How I Structure Workouts

The topic today is how to properly structure your workouts. To get the most work done while minimizing your rest periods, pair antagonistic body parts (ie. biceps and triceps, quads and hamstrings, chest and back). Pairing exercises like this will allow you to do more total work in your session, and it will increase muscle activation by inhibiting the antagonist.

Depending on your goal, you may use anywhere from 2-10 different exercises, with 6 being average for my clients. Using 6 exercises means ,on average, 3 different groups (labelled A, B, and C). In order to keep track of the exercise order, I use the following system (which was taught to me by Charles Poliquin):

A1 Chest
A2 Back
B1 Chest
B2 Back
C1 Chest
C2 Back

Exercise A1 is done first, then you would proceed to exercise A2 after resting the prescribed time. Once done the set of A2 you would rest again before returning to A1 and repeating the cycle until all of your sets of group A are done. Then you would do the same with groups B and C.

Having a set plan in place will make your workouts more efficient, and therefore you'll get a better result.

Question: When should I change my program?

Answer: I like hearing questions like this because it implies that the person already knows that they should not stay on the same program forever. That being said, when I ask them how long they've been on their current program, they will typically respond with anything from 3 months to 2 years (doesn't that get boring?). After hearing their response the next question is, "Why haven't you changed it yet?" Often times they will tell me that the program isn't easy yet, or that they don't know what to change to. Before diving further into those, I'd like to bring up the Kaizen Principle.

Kaizen is Japanese for improvement or change for the better. When applied to your workouts, it means always doing a little more (whether that be 2% more weight or 1 more rep). If it was possible to do 2% more weight, or 1 more rep on the same program forever, it would only take 2-3 years to become a world record holder in weightlifting. Your body will adapt to the stress you put on it. Therefore, if you continually stress it with the same weight, it has no reason to get stronger. Now, obviously you can't progress at the same rate forever. So when does it slow down or plateau? Typically, six workouts is all it takes. My clients will never do the same workout more than six times. It may take them anywhere from two to six weeks for them to do these, depending on how many different workouts they have . Once you've completed all six of the workouts, it's time to move on to a different program. What should you go to next? Well, that's a whole lot more complicated and will need its own post. In the meantime, do your six workouts, apply the Kaizen Principle each time, and enjoy the rewards.