Do you work the same body part more than once per week?

[Astro_Gym]

I'm 43 years old, with a solid and consistent, 3 years of training under my belt. My workout partner insists we're "too old" to recover to work the same body part, twice per week or more. While my muscle gains have been pretty good over the past 3 years, I feel I'm ready to switch things up a little bit.

According to Arnold, in his BB's Encyclopedia, some body parts recover faster from heavy training that others, e.g. biceps, calves, abs, thereby, you can get away with training them more often. That advice, on the surface, seems rather dated, but I'm still unconvinced either way. In addition, since I'm training natural -- fish oils/multi/protein shakes -- I have no special help to aid in a faster recovery.

My normal week is as follows: Back, Biceps on Monday; Chest, Triceps on Wednesday; Legs, Shoulders, Traps on Friday. I do mix these up every 4-6 weeks, but often remain on a 3 day per week plan. Also, I am amendable to 4 days per week, if I were to train a few body parts twice per week.

I do see the younger guys doing the same parts, 2-3 times per week, but I know I cannot recover as quickly as these guys who are mostly 20 years younger or less, than I.

Any thoughts, suggestions, or success/gain stories for guys over 35, or 40, that are totally natural, and have seen gains and benefits to working the same part 2 or more times per week?

Thanks in advance.

PS I would like to focus a bit more on specialization, i.e. getting a few lagging body parts more equal to others, so as to achieve better symmetry. I'm thinking, those are the parts I'd wanna train twice per week. In my case, abs, forearms and shoulder sculpting<?>, are at the top of my list.

[IronCharles]

Do you work the same body part more than once per week?

Yes.



Pull

Push

Legs

Rest

(repeat)

[Turboboy]

I only work a bodypart about once every 7-10 days. I've done it that way for 16 years. I never get burned out and I never come into a workout feeling sore or overtrained.

[x-trainer ben]

I'm 43 years old, with a solid and consistent, 3 years of training under my belt. My workout partner insists we're "too old" to recover to work the same body part, twice per week or more. While my muscle gains have been pretty good over the past 3 years, I feel I'm ready to switch things up a little bit.

According to Arnold, in his BB's Encyclopedia, some body parts recover faster from heavy training that others, e.g. biceps, calves, abs, thereby, you can get away with training them more often. That advice, on the surface, seems rather dated, but I'm still unconvinced either way. In addition, since I'm training natural -- fish oils/multi/protein shakes -- I have no special help to aid in a faster recovery.

My normal week is as follows: Back, Biceps on Monday; Chest, Triceps on Wednesday; Legs, Shoulders, Traps on Friday. I do mix these up every 4-6 weeks, but often remain on a 3 day per week plan. Also, I am amendable to 4 days per week, if I were to train a few body parts twice per week.

I do see the younger guys doing the same parts, 2-3 times per week, but I know I cannot recover as quickly as these guys who are mostly 20 years younger or less, than I.

Any thoughts, suggestions, or success/gain stories for guys over 35, or 40, that are totally natural, and have seen gains and benefits to working the same part 2 or more times per week?

Thanks in advance.

PS I would like to focus a bit more on specialization, i.e. getting a few lagging body parts more equal to others, so as to achieve better symmetry. I'm thinking, those are the parts I'd wanna train twice per week. In my case, abs, forearms and shoulder sculpting<?>, are at the top of my list.

Yes, 1 light day and 1 heavy day. It is not so much that you can not recover but you want to avoid injuries. One week i tried an ex bodybuilder suggestion of doing a body part 5 days in a row and letting it recover for 2 weeks. Every 1 has a diff method so try out all kinds of things and stick with what works for your dna`.

[-=FLEX=-]

I'm just getting back into it, but I've always trained legs twice a week, and my plan is to do so on my new program.

I have occasionally trained other body parts twice in a week, but not a full workout.

I went through a phase where I thought my back and chest needed a boost, so when I did my back workout, I'd do ONE chest exercise at the end, and when I did my chest workout I did ONE back exercise at the end.

It worked out well. I noticed some good gains.

-=FLEX=-

[MantisShrimp]

5 years ago when I was 32 I could work everything twice a week hard on a 4 day upper/lower split, without even having particularly good nutrition or sleep. My sleep has gotten worse, my RMR has gotten lower, and I can still train every body part twice a week if I do a more westside style dynamic/maximal effort break down (essentially a speed day and a heavy day) but even then I periodize across the month, and it is mega rough.

Last month I experimented with a 9 day program that interspersed cardio and rest days more throughout the microcycle and I found that to be too easy, so I have reverted to the 7 day dynamic/maximal [periodized high, medium, very high, and low volumes per week across the one month mesocycle, per Eric Cressey's Maximum Strength program, not sure where he got it] and with proper nutrition and sleep, this SHOULD work for me.

In other words, older guys can pull this off, but their diet and sleep have to be good (can't be getting drunk once a week like a 20 something), or they have to be gifted with good hormones....that's the way I see it.

Keep in mind I am hypogonadal with about 210lbs of lean mass so my recovery is terrible. If you are smaller and/or you have better hormones genetically, you will probably be able to pull this off more easily.

[mitch9518]

I'm 43 years old, with a solid and consistent, 3 years of training under my belt. My workout partner insists we're "too old" to recover to work the same body part, twice per week or more. While my muscle gains have been pretty good over the past 3 years, I feel I'm ready to switch things up a little bit.

According to Arnold, in his BB's Encyclopedia, some body parts recover faster from heavy training that others, e.g. biceps, calves, abs, thereby, you can get away with training them more often. That advice, on the surface, seems rather dated, but I'm still unconvinced either way. In addition, since I'm training natural -- fish oils/multi/protein shakes -- I have no special help to aid in a faster recovery.

My normal week is as follows: Back, Biceps on Monday; Chest, Triceps on Wednesday; Legs, Shoulders, Traps on Friday. I do mix these up every 4-6 weeks, but often remain on a 3 day per week plan. Also, I am amendable to 4 days per week, if I were to train a few body parts twice per week.

I do see the younger guys doing the same parts, 2-3 times per week, but I know I cannot recover as quickly as these guys who are mostly 20 years younger or less, than I.

Any thoughts, suggestions, or success/gain stories for guys over 35, or 40, that are totally natural, and have seen gains and benefits to working the same part 2 or more times per week?

Thanks in advance.

PS I would like to focus a bit more on specialization, i.e. getting a few lagging body parts more equal to others, so as to achieve better symmetry. I'm thinking, those are the parts I'd wanna train twice per week. In my case, abs, forearms and shoulder sculpting<?>, are at the top of my list.

I was curious about the same thing. I got some great responses from my post. Do a search for: "50 plus guys, a question" I got some great answers. there.

[Korr]

Most of the so called muscle time recovery that body builders follow is pure nonsense. It's all a matter of what your body can adjust to. If you train yourself to once a week, twice a week, three times a week (ie 5x5), or whatever, then your body would get used to it.

To put it in perspective, Olympic weight lifters train two times a day 6 days a week and once on Sundays.

[Dain_Bramage]

Yes.



Pull

Push

Legs

Rest

(repeat)

Do you go heavy each time or go heavy light?

[HeismanWatch]

No!

[HeismanWatch]

Most of the so called muscle time recovery that body builders follow is pure nonsense. It's all a matter of what your body can adjust to. If you train yourself to once a week, twice a week, three times a week (ie 5x5), or whatever, then your body would get used to it.

To put it in perspective, Olympic weight lifters train two times a day 6 days a week and once on Sundays.

Oly lifters and Body builders are two different animals, completely different!

[BrotherWolf]

I'm 43 years old, with a solid and consistent, 3 years of training under my belt. My workout partner insists we're "too old" to recover to work the same body part, twice per week or more.

I squat and press 3x a week I recover just fine, most of the times ..

[Korr]

Oly lifters and Body builders are two different animals, completely different!

You're right. Oly lifters squat 7 days a week. The average body builder only squats 1 time a week.

[BrotherWolf]

You're right. Oly lifters squat 7 days a week. The average body builder only squats 1 time a week.

true but unfair comparison , bbers train with hypertrophy as a goal and rest and recovery is important for that..
oly lifters programming is much more complicated and need not worry about hypertrophy,
their training is in part to perfect technique and part strenght... and they do run into overtraining problems from time to time.

There is also the chemical aid factor, remember the whole mighty Bulgarian team that was disqualified in Sydney ??

[timberwolf]

Most of the so called muscle time recovery that body builders follow is pure nonsense. It's all a matter of what your body can adjust to. If you train yourself to once a week, twice a week, three times a week (ie 5x5), or whatever, then your body would get used to it.

To put it in perspective, Olympic weight lifters train two times a day 6 days a week and once on Sundays.

Agreed. I'm a believer in higher frequency and so usually hit each bodypart twice per week. It used to be one heavy and one volume though I mix it up now.

[IronCharles]

Do you go heavy each time or go heavy light?

I follow the "muscular confusion" and "instinctive training" principles. When I step into the gym, I know only what bodyparts I will be training that day. Everything else falls into place as the workout progresses.

If I'm feeling particularly strong that day, I take advantage and go heavier, add reps, decrease rest periods.... any number of schemes. If all the bench press stations are taken, I have no problem doing some dumbbell presses. Some days I'll do 5 or 6 different chest exercises. Occasionally I'll do 10 sets of only Smith machine bench presses for chest. Drop sets, pyramids, 21's, forced reps, negatives, partials..... everything is an option.

There are a lot of folks who do the same thing every time, rigidly structured programs, documenting everything, etc. I am not one of them. My way may not work for everybody, but it's given me the best results, and is the most fun way to work out..... for me.

[Reality_Check]

I only work a bodypart about once every 7-10 days. I've done it that way for 16 years. I never get burned out and I never come into a workout feeling sore or overtrained.

x 2 (except replace 16 with 22)

[mikieson]

Yes...I do a full body workout 3x a week. Same exercises, same sets, pretty much same reps. And I do treadmill 3-4x a week as well.

[jocularric]

Currently I do a full body workout three times a week. Different exercises, different weights, and different total number of reps.

Day 1 Strength - Heavy - 4 to 6 reps per set
Day 2 Rest
Day 3 Hypertrophy - Medium - 10 to 12 reps per set
Day 4 Rest
Day 5 Endurance - Light - 20 to 22 reps per set
Day 6 Rest
Day 7 Rest

[yakabebe]

Most of the so called muscle time recovery that body builders follow is pure nonsense. It's all a matter of what your body can adjust to. If you train yourself to once a week, twice a week, three times a week (ie 5x5), or whatever, then your body would get used to it.

To put it in perspective, Olympic weight lifters train two times a day 6 days a week and once on Sundays.

If by that you mean you can train a body part 3x a week....following the maxim that one grows when at rest....I'd rekon that if you hammered a body part 3 x a week...I cant see you developing the hypertrophy that is the objective of a body builder.

[_XYDREX_]

If by that you mean you can train a body part 3x a week....following the maxim that one grows when at rest....I'd rekon that if you hammered a body part 3 x a week...I cant see you developing the hypertrophy that is the objective of a body builder.

Yes if you hammered it 3x.p.w you wouldnt recover & grow. But together with increasing frequency of training is obviously you must reduce how much/hard you hit it when you do. You cant take the same workload & intensity that you would use for once a week & do it twice or three times. You obviously have to spread it out a bit. Its the stimulate vs annihilate debate, it was Lee Haney's favorite motto to say stimulate dont annihilate .

Mainly in the 90s it became popular to do a bigger workload once a week. Some people may think whats the point if you dont trash the bodypart, but you'd be surprised how many people actually do respond better to a lesser workload more often. Apparently its been measured that protein synthesis takes between 48-72 hrs. So after 72 hours no more hypertrophy happens even though it may take longer to recover fully (such as remove soreness for example, or mend the connective tissues which can take longer than muscles) it seems there wont be any extra benefit with extra days of rest (sort of like a window of opportunity). On its own I wouldnt just believe some research, but the fact that many people do respond better in real life to several times a week leads me to think that there is something to this.

[gbg]

Currently doing Smolov which is squats Mon,Wed,Fri and Satuday.

[timberwolf]

Here's a good read... again one perspective.

http://www.higher-faster-sports.com/strengthvssize.html

However, the problem with training on a training split dedicated towards moving the heaviest weights possible is that the amount of workout volume and recovery between workouts that is optimal to demonstrate maximum strength tends to be not enough volume and too much rest for what is optimal for maximum hypertrophy. Strength is largely about the ability of the nervous system to fire and coordinate your muscles. Whenever you induce muscular trauma, you also induce neural fatigue. Strength is best demonstrated with a fully fresh nervous system and muscles. This is why powerlifters tend to train with lower workout volumes than bodybuilders and also why they will often reduce the volume of training in the month prior to a meet and then take a full week off just before a meet.

So if one really wants to be strong they should train with fairly low volume and recover well. The problem with waiting for full strength to return between workouts before hitting the muscle again is that your muscles only grow for a few days after a workout before they start to shrink back to normal. So, you might do that gut busting squat workout today and find that you have to rest a week before you can improve upon that workout. By the time you hit the workout again you might be a bit stronger but the same size as you were the last time. This is why may people who used old low volume/ low frequency hardgainer routines found that they got stronger but gains in muscle size came quite slow.

What I personally recommend is some version of a heavy/light split. You hit a muscle group at least twice during the week. One workout is designed to stimulate strength gains with balls to the wall all out training where the focus is on setting strength PRs. Then a few days later you hit the muscle again but with a lighter workout designed to stimulate some hypertrophy without draining all your strength. Then you wait a few more days and hit the heavy workout once again for more strength PRs. The lighter workout can come about either through hitting the muscle indirectly (such as a military press for shoulders on the heavy day and incline press indirectly a few days later) or by hitting it directly but with less intensity than used in the "heavy" workout. (Such as flat bench DB press for chest on the heavy day and a flye variation on the light day). The end result is you optimize recovery for heavy intense workouts so you can make progressively dramatic increases in strength and you also use enough frequency and volume per body-part to optimize growth.

[Astro_Gym]

Thanks for all the informative and thoughtful replies. I think I'll do a week of deloading, and begin a 5 day per week workout schedule thereafter. I'm thinking Back on Mon/Thurs, Chest on Tues/Friday, Legs once per week on Wednesday... or on Saturday.

I'm going to try it for 4-6 weeks, then try doing legs twice per week, and upper body parts, once per. I definitely need to mix it up and this seems like a great way to start.

[liegelord]

it depends on factors such as training volume and intensity, nutrition and sleep.

I train full body 6x a week and getting stronger on a cut, muscle growth would be there if not for the caloric deficit.

The muscles can be trained everyday as long as the nervous system is not overloaded and your volume is not too high, just as long as too much fatigue is not generated you'll be fine, but you need to know your body and when enough is enough.

When training full body 5-6x a week, the exercises should be varied somewhat. Training 6x a week I've deadlifted 455x11, olympic squatted 395 3x5, cleaned 285, dips with bw+135 and pull-ups with bw + 100.

Proper training, nutrition and sleep.

[Northeasterner]

Yes, I do.

One of the guys who answered you mentioned 5x5. It's a strength-training system.

I'm using it right now and one week has me do:

- bench press twice
- squats three times
- barbell rows twice

I also deadlift once a week with this program which means my back is getting worked 3 times. This system also has me do pull-ups or chin-ups once a week. So my back is getting a lot of work.

Note also that as these are major, compound exercises, and that the arms will also get worked a lot. By bench pressing twice, I am working triceps twice.

[yakabebe]

it depends on factors such as training volume and intensity, nutrition and sleep.

I train full body 6x a week and getting stronger on a cut, muscle growth would be there if not for the caloric deficit.

The muscles can be trained everyday as long as the nervous system is not overloaded and your volume is not too high, just as long as too much fatigue is not generated you'll be fine, but you need to know your body and when enough is enough.

When training full body 5-6x a week, the exercises should be varied somewhat. Training 6x a week I've deadlifted 455x11, olympic squatted 395 3x5, cleaned 285, dips with bw+135 and pull-ups with bw + 100.

Proper training, nutrition and sleep.

Impressive stats - you are one strong mofo as they say.

Still rekon though that with such a regime whilst your strength is going to go off the charts - the hypertrophy that a competitive BB seeks simply would eventuate.

Not with my body anyway........

[beachguy498]

Yes...I do a full body workout 3x a week. Same exercises, same sets, pretty much same reps. And I do treadmill 3-4x a week as well.

I do pretty much the same thing but have lately switched the sets from pyramids to either a 4x6 or 5x5. The 4x6 and 5x5 are great plateau breakers for me.

BG

[Marius_Ursus]

Have you ever seen a question asked so many times in the forum that the answer pops into your head, but you can't remember if it was in the same thread or a couple of years ago that you answered with that exact phrase?

I work every bodypart every time I workout.

[mikieson]

I do pretty much the same thing but have lately switched the sets from pyramids to either a 4x6 or 5x5. The 4x6 and 5x5 are great plateau breakers for me.

BG

Good deal man..as long as we keep going we all win!!..