TOO much time in the GYM

[LanTHEman]

Hey Guys, Whats Up? I have been lifting for years, but seriously for about 16 months now. I have been doing this routine for the last six months. I am a little worried about overtraining. Also my strength gains have not been great, but I have gained alot of size.

I do 3 sets for all lifts increasing in weight and lowering reps (12-8-6) if i can do more than 6 on the final set i will go to failure. I average 4-6 lifts per muscle group.

Day 1 Chest,Back

Chest
Flat bench
Incline Bench
Decline dumbell presses
incline dumbell flys
decline dumbbell flys
cable crossovers and or Pec deck machine


Back
wide grip pull downs
bent over barbell rows
seated row
stiff legged dumbell deadlift


Day 2 Bi,Tri

Biceps
standing heavy ez-bar curls
standing heavy dumbell curls
seated hammer preacher dumbell curls
standing hammer curls
reverse cable curls
concentration curls

Triceps
overhead one arm dumbell extensions
skull crushers
cable push downs
cable rope pushdowns
reverse grip cable push downs
behind the head cable tricep extensions


Day 3 Delts,Traps,Legs

Delts
seated military presses
seated arnold presses
standing dumbell raises
standing lateral dumbell raises
seated rear delt pull

Traps
heavy Barbell Shrugs
heavy Dumbell shrugs
forward/backward shrug rolls
cable flat bar pull ups(to chin)

Legs
heavy squats
leg extensions
hamstring extensions
calf raises
calf machine
hack squats


Day 4 OFF


I do 3 on 1 off. It takes me near 2 hours to finish my routine, resting about 45sec-min between sets. I have no problem spending 10 plus hours in the gym. I am happy and content when in the gym. Any thoughts or suggestions would be of great help, thanks guys.....

[210Beast]

Generally workouts should last around 45 minutes - 1 hour, anything over is usually considered overtraining.

[Wheelies]

Big weights=big muscles and strength. Like you said, you put on some size by pyramiding, but using 12 reps isnt gonna help strength. And by the looks of it you are over training like a mofo. You dont need to do 6 things for chest . When I first started lifting, I always did 4 sets of 4 different exercises for every body part, I made gains, but once I trained for a while, my body stopped reacting because I was overtraining. The only thing it didnt look like you are overtraining too much is back, but everything else is way too many things. I try not to be in the gym for over an hour, but I also go 5 days a week. If you decrease the number of exercises to a good 3 per bodypart, and no more than 3 sets per exercise(sometimes I do 3 for first, 2 for second and 1 for last), and do 4-6 reps, that will be the perfect combo for strenght and size gains, if all you want is strength, become a powerlifter, which a whole nother ball game. Oh yeah, you have to go to as close to complete failure as possible, so you will definitly need a spotter on chest days. So no more sissy 10-12 reps , ok.

[LakeMountD]

why are people so intent on using 423 different exercises per bodypart? there is no need..

pick one or two and stick with them.. and no dont choose tricep kickbacks or leg extensions.. pick compound exercises and real mass gainers..

[nhmike]

Originally posted by LanTHEman
Hey Guys, Whats Up? I have been lifting for years, but seriously for about 16 months now. I have been doing this routine for the last six months. I am a little worried about overtraining. Also my strength gains have not been great, but I have gained alot of size.

Your routine is geared far more for size than for strength. For strength, you don't want to do nearly as many sets per muscle group (for your chest workout you're doing 18 sets!!! Yikes!), and don't pyramid up. Do your warmups, and then go to your heaviest sets.

The workout you're doing right now (with lots of sets, short rest periods, etc. - but I'd say remove about half the exercises you're doing - pick maybe two major exercises for each muscle, and do a total of 8-12 sets) would be fine to do every now and then for a few weeks to overtrain your body intentionally, but you should then switch to a workout with considerably less volume (perhaps 6-8 sets per muscle group) for a few weeks, with longer rest periods between sets (perhaps 3-4 minutes). The longer rest will let your muscles rebuild their stores of ATP, so you can keep lifting heavy.

Also, don't do arms the day after doing back/chest. Actually, also don't do back/chest together. Your back is a huge muscle group. Focus on it (and its assistance muscles) in a workout, don't throw it in with an opposing muscle.

I do 3 sets for all lifts increasing in weight and lowering reps (12-8-6) if i can do more than 6 on the final set i will go to failure. I average 4-6 lifts per muscle group. Your legs deserve their own day too.

[LanTHEman]

thanks for the input

[kixazz2529]

in doing bench would doing set of 10-8-6-4-2(ad then one on max days) be ok or is that overtraing?
the rest of the stuff i would be doing on that dat would consist of only 3-4 sets of 8-10 reps

[Vendetta]

Originally posted by LakeMountD
and no dont choose tricep kickbacks

What is wrong with tricep kickbacks? They have helped my triceps like crazy. I still do pushdowns but you can actually feel your tricep tearing with kickbacks... what are you talking about?

[Wheelies]

For one , tricep kickbacks are a single limb movement, which means exerting all of you energy into one arm and cheating the other arm out of a quality set. For two, tricep kickbacks are hard to go heavy on, so you arent overloading your muscle. Try lying tricep extensions, kind of like skull crushers but you bring the weight back behind/above, your ahead. Pretty much the only single limb movement I still do are bent over dumbell rows.

[Lifting4swole]

You should eliminate you arm day, just throw in one isolation for your biceps and triceps on back and chest day and they will be worked plenty, after all it's all about compound movements right?

[Determinednoob]

+2 to necromancy