Workout Routines and Splits

Workout routines are what exercises, how many sets, how many reps etc. that you do for each muscle. For example, 3 sets of the flat bench press, 3 sets on the incline bench press, and 2 sets of flat bench dumbell flyes is an example of one of the many chest weightlifting workout routines. A workout split is a term given to how you split up your workout. What days you do what muscle on. For example, doing biceps back and legs on Monday, and doing triceps shoulders and chest on Thursday is a workout split. Here i will give you some sample workout routines, the routine I use, and tell you how to make your own workout routine.

One rule when making weightlifting workout programs is to make sure to split it so that you aren't overtraining. Doing chest on Monday, then triceps on Tuesday, then shoulders on Wednesday will overtrain your triceps. Why? Because just about every chest and shoulder exercise works the triceps secondary. And almost every back exercise works the biceps secondary. So, you would need to do 1 of 3 things when making your workout routines and splits:

1) Work chest, triceps and shoulders on the same day, and biceps and back on the same day so that it's ok if the secondary muscles get worked that day, because your doing them anyway.
2) Separate those muscles that work a secondary muscle so that they are far enough apart not to overtrain you. For example, do Chest Monday, triceps on Wednesdays, and shoulders Friday... and biceps Monday with chest, and back Wednesday or Friday.
3) This is personally what I prefer, and do myself. Do chest and triceps Monday, and shoulders Thursday, and back and biceps together on Friday.

Sample Splits

Coming up with weightlifting workout routines and splits and programs isn't really rocket science, once you understand the basics you can create your own. But, here are a few sample split routines and programs off the top of my head I have either used at one time, or are commonly used by other people

Monday - Chest/Triceps
Tuesday - off
Wednesday - Biceps/Back
Thursday - off
Friday - Shoulders/Legs
Saturday - off
Sunday - off

Monday - Chest/Biceps
Tuesday - off
Wednesday - Shoulders/Legs
Thursday - off
Friday - Back/Triceps
Saturday - off
Sunday - off

Monday - Chest/Back
Tuesday - Shoulders
Wednesday - off
Thursday - Biceps/Triceps
Friday - Legs
Saturday - off
Sunday - off

Remember, these are just sample programs. Some people like to workout on the weekends, and I don't. So in all the samples I made them off days. It all depends on what days you have time to workout and/or when you want to workout which is why these are just samples, not splits you have to use.


Sample Weightlifting Workout Routines

This is hard. There are so many exercises for each muscle, and so many ways to split them up and make a routine out of them. So instead of listing 10,000 workout routines, I'll just list what I think are the most effective muscle building exercises for each muscle and later on you can decide which to use in your own workout routines.

Chest
Flat Bench Press
Incline Bench Press
Flat Bench Dumbell Flyes
Incline Dumbell Flyes

Back
Deadlift
Lat Pulldown (or weighted pull ups)
Seated Cable Row
Bent Over Barbell Row
Bent Over 1 Arm Dumbell Rows

Biceps
Standing Barbell Curls
Preacher Curls (with dumbells or barbell)
Seated/Standing Dumbell Curls

Triceps
Tricep Press Down
Dips
French Press

Legs
Squats
Calve Raises

Shoulders
Seated/Standing Military Press (with barbell or dumbells)
Lateral Raises
Shrugs

Abs
Abs are an important muscle and should be worked, but most people are just soooo confused when it comes to ab workouts. So, for more information on how "important" ab workouts are, and how to put abdominal exercises into your workout, click here.


My Weightlifting Workout Routine And Split

I've tried a bunch of different workout routines, and this one is probably my favorite. Remember, I'm not selling this. It's just what I do. I'm not saying because I do it and it works for me, that you should do it and that it will work for you.

Monday - Chest/Triceps
Tuesday - Legs
Wednesday - off
Thursday - Shoulders
Friday - Back/Biceps
Saturday - off
Sunday - off

Chest
Flat Bench Press 4 sets
Incline Hammer Strength Machine 2 sets
Dumbell Flyes 2 sets

Back
Deadlift 3 sets
Lat Pull down 3 sets
Seated Cable Row 2 sets

Biceps
Standing Barbell Curls 3 sets
Preacher Curls (with dumbells) 1 set

Triceps
Tricep Press down 2 sets
Dips (weighted) 2 sets

Legs
Squats 4 sets
Leg Extension 2 sets
Leg Curl 2 sets
Seated/Standing Calve Raises 5 sets total (2 or 3 sets each way)

Shoulders
Seated Military Press (with dumbells) 4 sets
Lateral Raises 3 sets
Shrugs 3 sets


*Note, on all exercises I do 6-10 reps. As I increase the weight, I decrease the reps. For example, if I'm doing dumbell military presses, it might be 60lb dumbells for 8 reps, then 65lbs for 6 reps.

Now, some questions you might have about weightlifting workout routines, splits, programs and what I do.

Why do you do the incline hammer strength machine and not the incline bench press? Well, I used to do the incline bench press, but I never felt right on it. I can't really explain it, but I couldn't get into a groove so to speak. So I went to the next best thing to free weights (by the way, free weights are the best thing for building muscle mass) which are hammer strength machines. They are the closest thing to free weights, and I happen to love the incline hammer machine, so I use it.

Why do you do so little? Wouldn't you be better off doing 10 sets for biceps or doing 15 sets for the chest? Nope, I tried that and it didn't work. After trying a bunch of different workout routines and programs, I discovered that the one I am using now works, so I use it. 10 sets for biceps might work for you but it doesn't for me. For more information on this, read the Important Facts section where I explain this in more detail.

If you did for example, biceps and back on different days, or triceps and chest on different days, would you do more for the secondary muscles, biceps and triceps? This is hard to answer. You see, I never did triceps on a different day than chest, or biceps on a different day than back. Like I said, this routine works for me, so I stuck with it. But I would guess, if I did them on different days, I would probably end up doing a few more sets for biceps and triceps.