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Aug 28 2014 09:02pm
Post up, what have you had the best results with/felt were the most enjoyable and/or beneficial pure hypertrophy routines
Do y'all follow a specific template or make it up as you go along?
Strong lack of ACTUAL H&F related topics in here other than the articles topic that has like 3-4 people that actually pay attention to it.
Hell even post up your favorite strength programs if you want

This post was edited by Mesonychid on Aug 28 2014 09:05pm
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Aug 28 2014 09:56pm
After trying several different things, it does seem hitting everything twice is superior. That also makes sense from a mechanistic perspective, as hitting 30 sets over the course of 2 days, as opposed to 1, enhances the propensity toward a myogenic gene expression modality and leaves protein synthesis elevated longer. The only caveat here is that it's likely dependent on training history.. ie, a complete beginner could easily get away with more and so on.

Ergo, a push/pull/legs/push/pull/legs/off/repeat is my ideal split now. It's not that I'm opposed to something different, it's just hard to come up with a different split that allows hitting each body part twice a week without severe overlap and still enables high volume, which is unequivocally optimal for hypertrophy.

To break it down some, high volume is concomitantly the most and least important aspects, paradoxically. You must lift with a certain % of your max (intensity) to fully stimulate and activate all motor units/muscle fibers adequately. The recent study from Brad corroborated that. Furthermore, for the reasons I briefly outlined, hitting everything twice is undoubtedly optimal, and at this moment, there's no reason to think otherwise. Thus, increasing volume is the only real component you can play around with and increase (similar to CHOs in your diet, for instance.. protein/fats should be RELATIVELY stable based on a necessity).

From Brad's book (he's basically the most prominent figure in the field of exploring hypertrophy.. I hate referencing him so much, but he's done by far more than anyone else) and from strictly mechanistic insight again, keeping a relatively controlled/slow negative is ideal for hyp as well (ie 2-3 secs.. I usually stick with 2 secs as a good standard). A forceful concentric portion is fine/ideal as well, just ensure you actually squeeze the weight somewhat (don't go overboard, that's also a mistake). Mind-muscle connection is actually quite integral to true progression, as to ensure optimal contraction.. we are going for hypertrophy after all and don't want to just "move" the weight with literally no care/bearing for our actual muscular activation. Rest periods, anywhere from 45 secs-2 mins is probably ideal. The studies on this subject are more scarce, however, it's definitive that lower rest times will stimulate greater metabolic stress which likely translates to augmented hyp. Optimal rep range is around 10-15 for fast twitch predominant fibers and 15-20 for slow twitch predominant fibers.

Purpose of the higher time-under-tension (based on 2 sec negatives and high rep sets) and low rest times is to augment metabolic stress, resulting in maximal muscular micro-tears necessitating celeritous repair. Reaching lactic acid threshold (plus other metabolites) as well will cause an increase in extracellular (surrounding the muscle) acidity (lower pH) causing further fiber degredation, membrane rupturing, and general membrane perturbations (apart from the intrinsic aspects such as cross-bridge cycling, mechanotransduction, etc) to fully maximize ALL possible anabolic pathways ie; mTOR-p70s6k pathways, MAPK pathways and Ca2+ - calcineurin pathways. Not only that, this type of training orienting itself in general will cause further hypertrophy of different non-contractile proteins (ie; desmin, dystrophin, alpha-actinin, nebulin, titin, et cetera) and cytoskeletal rearrangement (ie sarcoplasmic gain), as well as increased cell swelling/water & glycogen retention. With that said, higher volume routines also stimulate greater bouts of protein synthesis (though I'm not one to typically look at the fallacy of ONLY measuring acute protein synthesis rates, it certainly plays a role).

Furthermore, following w/ the previous section: there's good evidence to suggest that higher volume ALSO stimulates greater satellite cell proliferation (and ofc MyoD upregulation, coinciding w/ the proliferation). Most types of training will equate to robust satellite cell differentiation and induction, though higher volume, typical hyp training even equates to greater myonuclei donation (via greater myogenin increases) than do other types of training. The difference in proliferation is more profound but both are noteworthy. Much of that can likely be attributed to the muscular shearing and such causing a more robust immune cascade following training.

So yeah, my favorite hyp workout is outlined above.. and the reasons are also given why it probably elicits the greatest hyp adaptation as well.

With that said, my favorite form of progression is increasing sets every so often.. it's seemed to work the best for me. Volume = weight x reps x sets. Your reps will generally remain stable (10-15) whilst your weight slowly creeps up. Esp as you continue progressive overload and progression and get into some decent weight, a hyp workout is going to provide quite slow weight progression. For that reason I like to slowly add sets, say, bi-weekly over the course of a long period of time. This gives me another form of progressive overload irrespective of any governed by the canonical weight stack increases.

I try to aim for roughly 30 sets per large body part per week (around 16-20, direct for bis and tris, separately). One thing I would do also to acclimate to the higher volume is the employ the progression I outlined.. ie start the bulk modest (say, 24 sets/week for that bp), then slowly creep up the sets over a few months until you're at 30+. When you begin feeling run down via the overreaching that's probably occuring, deload and get back at it.
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Aug 28 2014 10:04pm
Shane, only for what you write would I read such a massive wall of text lmao
But yeah, when I did push/pull/legs I had great results. I'm probably gonna hop back on it starting October.
Except I did push/pull/legs/rest/push/pull/legs/repeat

This post was edited by Mesonychid on Aug 28 2014 10:05pm
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Aug 28 2014 10:10pm
Quote (Mesonychid @ Aug 29 2014 12:04am)
Shane, only for what you write would I read such a massive wall of text lmao
But yeah, when I did push/pull/legs I had great results. I'm probably gonna hop back on it starting October.
Except I did push/pull/legs/rest/push/pull/legs/repeat


I can feel that, especially in regards to people's schedule.

Very often I only hit legs on either the saturday or the wednesday and not both actually haha. Wednesday is because it's one of my very few free days that I get out of class by 10am w/ nothing else scheduled (seems to be like that EVERY semester strangely lol), so I like using it to be productive. And saturdays are usually a day I like to do some experiments in the lab to gather data (my gym closes at 5pm on saturday :angry: )

as for actually hitting everything 6x/week.. I think the risk of overtraining is overstated, even in this paradigm. I'm not saying you suggested that was the reason, I just know I've often seen it cited.

This post was edited by Balla on Aug 28 2014 10:13pm
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Aug 28 2014 10:28pm
Quote (Balla @ Aug 28 2014 08:10pm)
I can feel that, especially in regards to people's schedule.

Very often I only hit legs on either the saturday or the wednesday and not both actually haha. Wednesday is because it's one of my very few free days that I get out of class by 10am w/ nothing else scheduled (seems to be like that EVERY semester strangely lol), so I like using it to be productive. And saturdays are usually a day I like to do some experiments in the lab to gather data (my gym closes at 5pm on saturday  :angry:  )

as for actually hitting everything 6x/week.. I think the risk of overtraining is overstated, even in this paradigm. I'm not saying you suggested that was the reason, I just know I've often seen it cited.


I feel ya, I have Mondays and Fridays off this quarter (minus research/work time), but my other days are so packed it's insane.
But yeah, upping the frequency is definitely a huge plus in any hypertrophy routine if you're eating properly
I really liked GVT and FST when I did them though, just because I love high volume workouts lol

This post was edited by Mesonychid on Aug 28 2014 10:29pm
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Aug 28 2014 10:40pm
so balla you saying u do 15 sets of push one day, then 15 sets of pull, then 15 push, then 15 pull?

so 30 sets of push and 30 of pull, but split into two days?

so id assume something like 3-4 sets of 4 different exercises? so like 2 different exercises for back and 2 bicep one day, and then 2 chest and 2 tri the other day? each exercise around 3-4 sets?
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Aug 28 2014 11:29pm
Quote (Balla @ Aug 29 2014 01:10pm)
I can feel that



Quote (Mesonychid @ Aug 29 2014 01:28pm)
I feel ya,


U guys right?

This post was edited by HotHamAndCarl on Aug 28 2014 11:29pm
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Aug 29 2014 06:20am
Quote (Mesonychid @ Aug 29 2014 12:28am)
I feel ya, I have Mondays and Fridays off this quarter (minus research/work time), but my other days are so packed it's insane.
But yeah, upping the frequency is definitely a huge plus in any hypertrophy routine if you're eating properly
I really liked GVT and FST when I did them though, just because I love high volume workouts lol


Gvt is great actually. Burns gvt that is, worked amazingly for hyp. I'm curious now though.. Maybe I'll try to set up burns style GVT employing the 2x/week split sometime soon.

Quote (HotHamAndCarl @ Aug 29 2014 01:29am)
U guys right?


Lol
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Aug 29 2014 06:50am
Quote (Balla @ Aug 29 2014 04:20am)
Gvt is great actually. Burns gvt that is, worked amazingly for hyp. I'm curious now though.. Maybe I'll try to set up burns style GVT employing the 2x/week split sometime soon.



Lol


Gvt with increased frequency seems like it can be pretty taxing on the cns if you don't get enough food in you lol
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Aug 29 2014 07:23am
An effective ppl can reach 200 weekly sets. Not suited for everyone out there
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