Charles Poliquin Training routine tip

[bjg7]

"Charles Poliquin Tip 97: Training twice a day the same muscle group is the fastest way to gains in strength and muscle. As a rule of thumb, intensive work (lower reps, more sets, faster tempos) in the morning, extensive in the evening (higher reps, slower tempos, more exercises)."

I kind of like the sound of this!!

How would you work this?? how many days a week / days off?? etc

[bjg7]

anyone??

[bigtallox]

"Charles Poliquin Tip 97: Training twice a day the same muscle group is the fastest way to gains in strength and muscle.

If that were true, all of my powerlifting and strongman buddies would train like that, but the fact is NONE of them do, not one, i.e. it's not only is it not the fastest, it's not optimal/effective either.

[Pin2Win999]

I respectfully disagree, and agree. I agree its not the best, because nothing is the best for everyone, but I have been doing a lot of reading on Charles Poliquin lately and he seems to know his stuff. Maybe I'm still just caught in an elaborate illusion or something, but everything I've read by him seems to be knowledgable and all backed up with scientific reasoning. Plus if half of what he says is a third as good as it sounds, he has tons of experience and knowledge in several different fields related to the weighttraining world.

There is probably more to this short little tip, as I have noticed he does stuff like this a lot. He will only give you part of the information, I guess so you want to come to his seminars (and pay him) to find out the rest. But basically, I'm sure there is some reasoning behind everything he says, I would just like to know what it is in this case.

So I guess I agree more than disagree, I'm just saying Poliquin doesn't just make uninformed misguided statements from what I can tell. He always has some reasoning to back up what he says.


Edit:
P.s.- Have you or any of your buddies actually tried this method? Just curious.
p.p.s.-I believe it would be effective, though not optimal without more information on this type of training (rest, long term schedule, days on/off per week etc.)

[SwiftyX]

Lol-iquin went insane quite a while ago.

[zephed56]

Lol-iquin went insane quite a while ago.

QFT

I came into this thread just to post that he is a nutbar.

[Pin2Win999]

Haha, why do you guys say he went crazy? I'll definetly admit I don't know everything about him, but I never heard of this. Could have something to do with the fact that about 90% of the reading I've done on him was (at least supposedly) written by him.

[a-dog]

not a practical routine for 90% of the adults in the world. who has time to go to the gym in the morning and the evenings on a consistant basis? Would it work if you could do it? I don't know, maybe short term the problem is I think a bunch of people would totally over train on this.

[jgreystoke]

I enjoy reading Poliquin, he is a very entertaining writer.

He also likes to put his clients through something that will make them gain over the next SIX SESSIONS(read more of his programs). Anything different from what you were doing will elicit short term gains, even if it is crap in the long run and unrealistic unless you have your own gym. I'm not cynical enough to suggest that all gurus make a career out of this.

The clients go home happy, even if they could have gotten similar gains from doing the exact opposite(so long as it was sufficiently different from their previous training program).

It doesn't matter if you gain more slowly by only training one session in a day, if you can sustain those gains for longer.

[Hut*Hut]

Poliquin really does hit out with allot of pish.

[GuyJin]

I enjoy reading Poliquin's stuff, but that doesn't mean I agree with it wholeheartedly. Training twice a day--the same muscles at that--may work for someone who has all the time in the world to recover AND his/her nutrition is spot on AND they have the genetics to support all that--but for the vast majority of us out there who work for a living and don't have time to rest and eat and recover, that 2x a day routine wouldn't be viable.

Poliquin is definitely knowledgeable--but what he pushes isn't always the best. He suggests certain concepts which some studies back up--but that doesn't mean they'd be workable for everyone.

[Wildtim]

His expertise is taking elite level athletes and eking that last percent of performance out of their already finely tuned bodies. That and writing sensational (in the definitive sense) articles that get attention because they are out of the norm.

[Pin2Win999]

I enjoy reading Poliquin's stuff, but that doesn't mean I agree with it wholeheartedly. Training twice a day--the same muscles at that--may work for someone who has all the time in the world to recover AND his/her nutrition is spot on AND they have the genetics to support all that--but for the vast majority of us out there who work for a living and don't have time to rest and eat and recover, that 2x a day routine wouldn't be viable.

Poliquin is definitely knowledgeable--but what he pushes isn't always the best. He suggests certain concepts which some studies back up--but that doesn't mean they'd be workable for everyone.

Good point, definetly part of how I feel as well. But then again, almost nothing is workable for everyone, and what anyone does will affect them differently than anyone else.

His expertise is taking elite level athletes and eking that last percent of performance out of their already finely tuned bodies. That and writing sensational (in the definitive sense) articles that get attention because they are out of the norm.

I agree with you both. That is also part of why I like his articles so much, I love to train in a manner that I can talk about and seem different and hardworking (although I prefer to actually work hard than just to seem like I do[just to clarify]).

[Hut*Hut]

His expertise is taking elite level athletes and eking that last percent of performance out of their already finely tuned bodies. That and writing sensational (in the definitive sense) articles that get attention because they are out of the norm.

Nail on the head.

[kdog1189]

I have seen this full routine written out before and it is indeed geared toward Olympic level athletes if IRC. The idea was to do 3 2-a-days and 3 1-a-days for two weeks and just destroy the body and then take a week off during which you just shove in protein and calories. The end of the 3 week cylce is supposed to yield the improvement, and I guess for the top of the line athlete this method could eek out that last bit like a poster above suggested.

[Kelei]

Poliquin's routine advice is intended for advanced lifters, in fact 90% of his clients are elite level athletes. It's possible to train twice per day if you can make time for it, no you will not overtrain if you arrange things properly.

Instead of performing 20 sets of an evening you might perform 10 sets in the morning followed by 10 sets in the evening, it's the same amount of volume for the day, you're simply splitting it up into two workouts. You're not going to overtrain simply because you performed your 20 sets over two sessions instead of one session, anyone who thinks otherwise should think harder.

Most people shouldn't be performing Poliquin's routines, there are better beginner/intermediate routines out there, I'd go as far as to say that most people will never progress past the intermediate stage even after 20 years of training.

[N@tural1]

Poliquin's routine advice is intended for advanced lifters, in fact 90% of his clients are elite level athletes. It's possible to train twice per day if you can make time for it, no you will not overtrain if you arrange things properly.

Instead of performing 20 sets of an evening you might perform 10 sets in the morning followed by 10 sets in the evening, it's the same amount of volume for the day, you're simply splitting it up into two workouts. You're not going to overtrain simply because you performed your 20 sets over two sessions instead of one session, anyone who thinks otherwise should think harder.

Absolutely agree. Increasing frequency is as simple as decreasing volume and/or intensity.