Need opinion on my exercise routine

I'm changing my routine that I was on for the past 6-7 weeks since I think I'm hitting a platea. My old routine was 5x5 and I got amazing results.

The new routine is to lose fat and gain muscle mass. By the way, I'm 26/Male/157lb.

Monday - Chest and Triceps

Incline Dumbbell Press 4x10
Flat Bench Press 4x10
Incline Dumbbell Flyes 3x10

Weighted Dip 3x10
Overhead Rope Extensions 3x10
Reverse Pushdowns 3x10


Tuesday - Legs
Squat 4x12, 10, 8, 6
Leg Press 4x10
Leg Extensions (Tripple Drop Set) 3x12
Stiff Leg Deadlift 4x10

Calf Raises 4x12
Seated Calf Raise(Heavy) 4x8

Thursday – Shoulders and traps

Military Press 4x10
Dumbbell Lateral Raises 3x10
Bent Over Reverse Crossovers 3x10
Shrugs 3x10
Upright Row 3x10


Friday - Back and Biceps
Lat Pull Down(Drop Set) 4x10
Seated Cable Rows 4x10
Bent Over DB Row 4x10
Straight Arm Push Down(Heavy) 3x5

Standing Barbell Curl 3x8-10
Inclined DB Curl 3x8-10
Hammer Curls 3x10
One Arm Prone Hammer Dumbbell Curl(heavy) 3x5

Wednesday/Saturday: Cardio/Abs/Rotator Cuffs/Forearms

Any suggestions?

Thank

that's a pretty good routine.  a few things i might suggest is that you go ahead and add another forearms workout on monday.  the forearms heal quickly and since you do legs on tuesday they get a whole day of rest.  also with your chest i would also add some decline presses, bar or dumbell really won't matter.  on back days i would throw in some standard deadlift, anytime you can do deadlifts the better.  maybe a little more cardio.  besides that just make sure you're getting enough protein and rest and you should be good.

awesome! Thanks for great comments!

Body part splits are good for 'chemically enhanced' body builders with years and years of experience, if you aren't a 'chemically enhanced' body builder with years and years of experience there are much better ways to train.

Breaking a workout up into 'body-parts' doesn't make any sense from a bio-mechanics standpoint, your body isn't just a bunch of random 'parts' thrown together than can be worked out seperately.  The human body spent millions of years evolving so that your muscles can work together to accomplish certain movements.

Your workout has WAY to many exercises, and WAY WAY WAY too many isolation movements and is poorly organized (you have 1 day for your lower body, which makes up about half the muscles in your body, and 2 days for abs and forearms, which make up a tiny tiny fraction of your muscle mass).\

Stick to the basics (squats, deadlifts, presses, rows, pullups, lunges), find a routine based on these exercises and designed by a professional.  Look into Stronglifts, total body training, ABBH, WS4SB or any of the routines melkor linked to in the sticky.

My first thought was that seems like whole lot of different exercises per day and may be more than is necessary.  My second thought is really a couple of questions:  (1) What do you do for your aerobic/endurance fitness (2 days per week seems low but depending on your goals might be ok)? and more importantly, (2) What are your specific goals with this program?

Relative to the second question, here is what I am getting at:  Everybody (male at least) that does strength training ostensibly wants to gain muscle and lose fat.  Beyond that, do you have specific performance or appearance goals?  For example, my two big activities that I really enjoy and destress with are whitewater kayaking and mountain biking.  However, because I let myself get fat and out of shape my ability to perform these activities at the level I wanted to really fell apart last year.  Besides that, I at 47, I was really starting to experience potentially bad health issues due to poor eating and exercise habits.  Consequently, my specific performance goals relate to improving my total body strength to improve my kayaking and mountain biking performance and increasing my endurance/aerobic capacity.  Along the way, this is greatly improving my overall health indicators such as resting heart rate and BP.  At 47 and married, I am not as concerned with how big my biceps or chest are or how chiseled my abs look, those these might be perfectly valid goals for you.

My current "routine" includes total body weight lifting 3x/week (doing 3x5  set/reps on 4 or 5 multi-joint exercises per day), heavy emphasis on core strengthening, particularly rotational strength for kayaking, and some type of aerobic activity nearly every day.  This might include walking/running with the dog, mountain biking or kayaking.  Since the current rep scheme is emphasizing strength/power development, when I plateau, I am going to switch to a high rep approach (12-15 reps per set) to work on muscle endurance.  This again will help the kayaking and mountain biking performance.

Having specific goals, whether they are performance based or appearance based, will help you determine the best routine for you.

Original Post by floggingsully:

Body part splits are good for 'chemically enhanced' body builders with years and years of experience, if you aren't a 'chemically enhanced' body builder with years and years of experience there are much better ways to train.

Breaking a workout up into 'body-parts' doesn't make any sense from a bio-mechanics standpoint, your body isn't just a bunch of random 'parts' thrown together than can be worked out seperately.  The human body spent millions of years evolving so that your muscles can work together to accomplish certain movements.

Your workout has WAY to many exercises, and WAY WAY WAY too many isolation movements and is poorly organized (you have 1 day for your lower body, which makes up about half the muscles in your body, and 2 days for abs and forearms, which make up a tiny tiny fraction of your muscle mass).\

Stick to the basics (squats, deadlifts, presses, rows, pullups, lunges), find a routine based on these exercises and designed by a professional.  Look into Stronglifts, total body training, ABBH, WS4SB or any of the routines melkor linked to in the sticky.

 first off, the whole "chemically enhanced" is kind of an insult.  secondly the reason you're able to do forearms and abs twice is that those muscles heal faster since they are smaller.  the legs being a large muscle group need more rest.  plus you say he's doing too many exercises when you mention the things he should do are all ready listed in his routine.  splits do work, it lets you focus on certain muscles while giving each optimal time to heal.

Awful lot of redundancy... four variations of bicep curls? And leg presses and leg extensions after squats?  I doubt you need that much volume.  I would think you'd do better to focus on quality rather than quantity - i.e. put your all into heavier, deeper squats and DLs and ditch the leg machines, do some weighted pull-ups (ok, back and bi's) and cut out some of the bicep curls.

Or you could just try it for a month and see how it goes - that's the best way to find out what kind of results you'll get. :)

What did your 5x5 program look like, by the way?

Original Post by turnthequietup:

Awful lot of redundancy... four variations of bicep curls? And leg presses and leg extensions after squats?  I doubt you need that much volume.  I would think you'd do better to focus on quality rather than quantity - i.e. put your all into heavier, deeper squats and DLs and ditch the leg machines, do some weighted pull-ups (ok, back and bi's) and cut out some of the bicep curls.

Or you could just try it for a month and see how it goes - that's the best way to find out what kind of results you'll get. :)

What did your 5x5 program look like, by the way?

Thanks for your reply. I guess I'll give it a try for a month to see what kind of results I get...

My 5x5 was abit lighter in terms of "redundancy". Like for chest, I did incline/decline press + fly. For back and legs, did pull down, squat, DL, press. For biceps, did barbell curls, hammer curls and for triceps, I did pushdown + one of these every other week (skull crusher OR rope extention).

Thanks

Alirezan - What are your goals?  If they are performance-oreinted you probably do not need the amount of redundancy in your routine.  If you are an aspiring bodybuilder, that is a different story since each exercise works slightly different portions of each muscle group.

Original Post by rwnorth:

Alirezan - What are your goals?  If they are performance-oreinted you probably do not need the amount of redundancy in your routine.  If you are an aspiring bodybuilder, that is a different story since each exercise works slightly different portions of each muscle group.

I'm no bodybuilder! I'm a skinny guy who wants to gain abit more muscle and definition! That's all...I'm also naturally skinny (definitely not "chemically enhanced" as some like to call it!). Maybe you guys can suggest what I should remove and what I should include?

Thanks all!

You might try stronglifts.com or some variation of Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength program.  I haven't read Starting Strength (yet), but it's supposed to be really, really good. Both programs are based around a 3x weekly full body weight routine, and both recommend drinking a gallon or so of milk a day (if you're trying to put on mass in a hurry).

Original Post by turnthequietup:

You might try stronglifts.com or some variation of Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength program.  I haven't read Starting Strength (yet), but it's supposed to be really, really good. Both programs are based around a 3x weekly full body weight routine, and both recommend drinking a gallon or so of milk a day (if you're trying to put on mass in a hurry).

Wonderful! I'll look at that...Thanks for your suggestion!