Q's for Johnathan Fass

[big angry hippo]

2 Q's for bipennate (I thought I recognized your name with your hook grip article...I have a suscription to Men's Fitness as well as many other mags and go to their site quite often)

1) I am familiar with your distaste with split routines but I've read over and over again that they are good for intermediate/advanced lifters to build size and strength (those of whom include bodybuilders attempting to sculpt what would be a winning physiques or 'beach muscles' ). It seems to me spending 45 mins-1 hour a day on a full body workout just won't cut it with similar goals (granted, I don't go out and do more than one bicep curl or isolation exercise per session but society's got me and many others believing big arms are ideal). So my question for you is this: for natural bodybuilders who are hitting that plateau, would it not be logical to overload muscles and dedicate more time to them so that it will take you to new heights that the full body workout cannot reach?
The inspiration for this question arose from reading the criticisms on the article written by Tony Gentilcore (posted by Cynic).

http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1086975

A couple of their quotes from the criticisms:

"Whether you call bench pressing horizontal pushing instead of "Chest day" doesnt take away from the effectiveness of the exercise.

Old school lifters just grouped the exercices under a different name

Horizontal Push = Chest day
Horizontal Pull = Back day
Vertical Push = Shoulder day
Vertical Pull = Back day
Quad dominant/Squat based = Quad day
Hip dominant/Deadlift based = Hamstring day."

and

"1) more advanced lifters sometimes need seven to ten days to properly recover...

2) body-part split routines can be very useful programs depending on a lifters current goals, lifting experience, how much time they can spend in the gym, and how much recovery they need...

for example, if my current goal is to squat 700 lbs then a 45 minute full body routine isn't going to cut it...hell it takes almost 45 minutes to build up to a 700 lbs squat (I've only got ~one hour to work out four days a week)...it makes sense for me to divide things up at this point in my training..."

Okay and question 2:

Do you have an effective workout routine (push/pull) for an intermediate/advanced lifter?

 

[bipennate]

Hey Hippo...I have been CRAZY busy working on things this past month, but i didn't forget about your Q's!

So...As a general rule of thumb, I don't beleive in the use of anything other than full body workouts or simple splits, such as upper/lower or body push/pull 4 day splits for the average, general lifter. There are a million reasons why, but you can look at what I wrote here for a more detailed explanation (a post that I made on the MH forums):
http://forums.menshealth.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/855109121/m/626103323/r/803107723#803107723

"Whether you call bench pressing horizontal pushing instead of "Chest day" doesnt take away from the effectiveness of the exercise.

Old school lifters just grouped the exercices under a different name

Horizontal Push = Chest day
Horizontal Pull = Back day
Vertical Push = Shoulder day
Vertical Pull = Back day
Quad dominant/Squat based = Quad day
Hip dominant/Deadlift based = Hamstring day."

The problem with that argument is that it's not really true: horizontal push, horizontal pull, quad dominant. etc, is a scheme devised to break up movement patterns in Upper/Lower splits, which is NOT the same as a bodybuilder muscle-based split workout. Two completely different things, based on very different concepts and techniques. The original poster was creating a straw argument.

"1) more advanced lifters sometimes need seven to ten days to properly recover...

No they don't, not if they are using the proper methods of routine design. Olympic Gold Medalist Tara Knott works out up to 10 times each WEEK for the sport of weightlifting. I'd consider her advanced...

2) body-part split routines can be very useful programs depending on a lifters current goals, lifting experience, how much time they can spend in the gym, and how much recovery they need...

for example, if my current goal is to squat 700 lbs then a 45 minute full body routine isn't going to cut it...hell it takes almost 45 minutes to build up to a 700 lbs squat (I've only got ~one hour to work out four days a week)...it makes sense for me to divide things up at this point in my training..."

Trying to build up to a 700 pound squat gets into the realm of sport-specific conditioning, such as a powerlifter's workout. If your goal is a 700 pound squat, then an upper/lower or Westside Barbell template would work well, which still offers the ability to increase volume without sacrificing frequency. And the poster is wrong: warm-ups are relative to the strength of the individual and the system. I don't know how someone warms up for 45 minutes, no matter what they're attempting to accomplish. The fact of the matter is that for purposes of strength, frequency is far more important than volume (again, look at any Olympic weightlifter's routine to figure that out), so the example is fairly poor.

I know Tony G, actually, so I'll see if he'd like to add anything to this for you

As far as an effective routine for an advanced lifter, there are many. Take a look here, and give it a try!:
http://www.t-nation.com/findArticle.do?article=244anti2

 

[Cynic]

Trying to build up to a 700 pound squat gets into the realm of sport-specific conditioning, such as a powerlifter's workout. If your goal is a 700 pound squat, then an upper/lower or Westside Barbell template would work well, which still offers the ability to increase volume without sacrificing frequency.

I'm working toward a 400lb squat. Over on JP, the race is in the deadlift, but I'd real happy to squat 400lbs.

I know Tony G, actually, so I'll see if he'd like to add anything to this for you

Yeah, Tony is a good guy. He kicked my ego in the ass because I wan't implementing MM or foam rolling and since I did start it, the incident of injury and PWO soreness has gone done. I also feel a bit more flexible.

 

[bipennate]

From Tony:
"At the expense of signing on another forum, all I can say is that you hit the nail on the head my man! I couldn't have said it better myself..."

And there you have it!