ExRx.net

Background: I've been lifting off and on for the last ~18 years. The first few years were good and fairly consistent. Several years off... then back into it off and on. The last 10 years have been more off than on due to injuries, living in a remote location without facilities for a few years in the middle, and a chronic illness over the last few years. The illness has improved and I have been lifting consistently for the last 3-4 months. I feel like a novice as far as my body looks, but I have the lifts down pat since I've been doing them since I began.

Now I'm thinking of increasing my workouts to 4 days a week. I do the 2-day push/pull split and want to continue that one. I don't want to change my food intake but would like a little more weight loss. Cardio does not interest me as much as moving weights. I'm never in the gym more than an hour at a time.

Is this a good idea or a bad idea?

So why exactly do you want to increase volume? And how much were you planning to do it? Weight loss is a tricky thing. Best results come from great intensity, or very high volume resistance training, or high intensity running. And diet of course.

As for your novice looks, I would recommend intensity, but lets hear more from that beofre I draw conclusions.

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Prove the impossible!

I want to increase volume because I enjoy the endorphine high that comes afterwards and all its benefits. I also would like to lsee if my weight drops a little more without having to change my diet (I love my flintstone steaks). I always go "balls to the wall" . I don't know any other level of intensity so I can't up that any more (dropping workouts won't help increase intensity enough to negate the diminishing returns). Though I do train without a spotter so I always leave enough gas not to drop the bar on myself... barely.

When I say increase volume. I mean instead of the 2 day split being done 3 days a week rotated over a fortnight, I will do it 4 days a week.

Say A is Push, B is Pull. Currently the roster looks like this: XAXBXAXXBXAXBX
I mean to change it to: XABXABXXABXABX (each of those was over a fortnight with the first day being a Sunday)

Some lifting days I will have to miss due to travelling for medical appointments but that is every 2nd or more weeks.. more towards maybe every 4-6 weeks.

So you want to increase your split to 4x week? That's fine with me. There are few things to consider, but I bet it will work for you and help your gains. Just remember to get enough rest from the week, and listen to your body. Your plan looks to be alright. In the end you will know yourself what works better for you.


With intensity I was referring to your set/rep scheme. Are you doing 3-5 reps with multiple sets or more like 8 to 12 reps with a couple of sets?

Great to hear that you got the attitude and motivation with you.

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Prove the impossible!

sure why not.
really.

Oh I do a warm-up set of 15 at about 1/2 working weight. I then do 2 sets of between 6 and 12 reps (if its a weight I haven't lifted before its the lower end around 6 to 8). I rest only for 1-2 minutes between sets. I'm going for hypertrophy. I'm happy to adjust this... what are your thoughts?

if hypertrophy is your goal then yes, definitely increase the volume. As a general rule, you should do 3-5 sets of 3-5 exercises per bodypart. This is more guideline than rule, so while you would want to do 3-5 exercises a week for your chest, you wouldn't need that many for your arms seeing as they get used so much in pushing/pulling movements. 3 sets of curls/extensions at the end of a session will be fine.

That doesn't necessarily mean you have to jump on some crazy bodybuilder routine, you can split it up however you want. I personally divide my training into upper/lower sessions as opposed to the more traditional bodybuilding splits where you train one bodypart at a time.

I would recommend the 5/3/1 routine by Jim Wendler, using the "Boring But Big" assistance work template. Packs on size a treat while getting you stronger on the big lifts which is always a good thing.

Hope that helps

Here you are describing level of effort, not intensity. Intensity has to do with loading, usually in terms of a percent of 1RM. So when someone says they want to increase intensity, they often mean changing from something like 5x5 to something like 3x4 with heavier weight on the bar.

Here you're describing training density, not volume. Amount of training in a given period of time is density. Volume is usually used to described the number of reps of a given lift in a training session. So increasing volume would be going from something like 3x3 to something like 4x6 with lighter loading.

Intensity and volume are usually inversely related--when one goes up the other goes down., given equal (balls to the wall!) effort.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Thanks for correcting my misuse of words. Now what do you think about increasing volume and density?

The words point us to concepts.

You have to experiment with what works best for you. Go ahead. I can't say whether it will be the best thing for you, but it might be!

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Cheers all. I'll be giving it a try. I think the challenge is going to be keeping it under an hour... 6 exercises, min 4 sets each (including warm-up set - which I'll keep since doing those have reduced my injuries significantly). Maybe I'll stop counting the 10 min warm-up and 10 min warm-down as part of that hour...

yes. do that
And dont worry too much about the hour.

Here's my new philosophy:
Let your progress towards your goals determine the efficacy of your program.

Well today was the first day of the increased volume and density workouts. I did work sets of 6 reps, 6 sets per body part, push day, except 3 sets of 12 for triceps. Definately takes over an hour even with only 60 sec rests. Gym closed before being able warm-down and it was raining so I couldn't walk or jog. I'll have to do some light recovery work in the morning.

I also learnt that when you don't do barbell squats and lunges for years, its hard to get back into them. I suck at them at the moment, but hardly anybody else does them at my gym, so in a year or so it will be worth it. I've been doing plenty of leg presses and the like so it wasn't my quads that sucked but my form was only just right and I was nervous as hell so could only do work sets of 60kg lunges and 40kg squats

don't worry about your workouts taking longer than an hour. My upper body sessions take about an hour and a half and I recover just fine

Yeah, don't worry about it. the "one-hour rule" isn't really a rule. Just a thought.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan