Best Intermediate Routine

explain why PPL is ""complete shit"" if the goal is aesthetics, and then back your position up with a picture of your physique to lend your position credibility

5/3/1

I've made good gains using Layne Norton's PHUL but instead of the prescribed rep scheme I just use the c6w scheme for the squat, bench, deadlift. I just knock off one of the bench sessions from c6w if it says to do it more than twice a week.

yea good place to start bra will defeintely see good gains on it. and with plenty of heavy compounds? hope your not adding anymore to it

So far I have this. I basically mixed-and-matched with other PHUL routines, and I've been told what I came up with is pretty good.

>Upper Power
3x5 Bench
3x5 OHP
3x8 Weighed Dips
3x5 Pendlay Rows
3x8 Weighed Pullups
Ab Wheel

>Lower Power
3x5 Squats
1x5 Deads
3x8 Box Jumps
3x8 HLR with weight

>Upper Hyper
3x12 DB bench
3x8 Close Grip Bench
3x12 Facepulls
3x12 Pulleys
3x8 Weighed Chinups
3x12 Lat Raises
3x12-15 Hammer Curls/EZ bar curls
3x12 Tricep Ext.
Ab Wheel

>Lower Hyper
3x12 Squats (+ dropset if I feel like it)
3x12 legpress
3x12 Back Ext.
3x12 Hamstring Curls
3x12 HLR with weight

Opinions? I reached 1/2/3/4 already, so that's no problem

>those arbitrary rep and set schemes

fucking newbies get me

>arbitrary
Like I said, I mixed and matched and basically took the reps/sets from established PHUL routines. And besides, this is aimed towards me, and my goal is to have fun. I'm not gonna do PLing or OLY comeptitions, so I'm trying to make this as fun as possible.

An option is some 4 day split, built PRIMARILY around the same main barbell lifts you've been doing, with assistance lifts. Even for size/aesthetics, you'll still want to increase your lifts, because if you aren't, you probably aren't getting any bigger either.

Something like:
Monday
-Squats 5x10 starting at about 60% of your max
-OHP 5x5 80% of your max
-Curls 3x10, use a weight that isn't easy but doesn't require pelvic thrusting nonsense or anything, the point is to work biceps

Tuesday
-Deadlifts 5x3 70% ish of your max
-Bench 5x10 60% of your max
-Dips 5x8
-Maybe some shoulder isolation. Lateral raises for sets of 8 or 10 or something, if you want more direct deltoid exercises. Or do some barbell rows, if you want more upper back training, or just really want rows in your program

Thursday:
-Squat 3x5 70% of max
-Push Press 3x5, since you probably don't have any clue of your max with this lift, and don't know how you'll specifically respond to it in recovery, start light. You'll want to think you had AT LEAST a couple more really solid reps left in each set. If the first time feels too easy, you can always add more weight now that you're more experienced with it.
-Chin ups 3x10, 3x8 if you can do that but not 3x10. Assisted chin ups if you can't do 3x8 on your own weight. 3x5 chin ups followed by 2x3 negatives (jump up to the top of the rep and lower yourself slowly) if you don't have access to an assisted chin up machine. Lat pulldowns 4x8 if nothing else.
-Close Grip Bench 3x8, probably start with half your bench max to get a feel for it.

Saturday
-Deadlift 1x3 80% of max to start
-Bench press 3x5 80% of max
-Curls 3x8 (Should be heavier than Monday)

You could do Saturday on Friday to save your weekend, I'd just prefer to have a day in between the heavier days.

Add 10 lbs to your squat sets each week. Drop the 5x10 to 5x8 and then 5x5 as the weight demands.

I've been running a modified version of Candito's 6 weeks for almost 4 months now, 3 cycles. Gains are amazing and they keep coming steadily.

You basically follow the standard program regarding the main lifts (bench, squat, deadlift) and the main accessories of your choice regarding sets, reps and weights. This because the frequency and intensity in the program is really well thought out. What you are going to change is the volume.

Where you steer form the default program is the secondary accessories, or "optional exercises" as Candito calls them.

Basically, for the first week or two you only do two or three optional exercises. For instance, on upper body days you can do incline db flyes, side raises and some curls. Then the next upper body day you switch it up a bit and you do some other pecs exercise, like incline db press, rear delts, and again curls. For lower body days, just leg extensions and leg curls are fine.

You're going to slowly raise the volume with each progressing week. On the second week, on U days, you can start doing 4 or 5 optional exercises, like for example incline db flue, side and rear delt raises, curls, maybe some tricep work if you feel like it. Also keep on mind that you CAN add more exercises to L days, but it's not really optimal, at least for me.

Once you get to 6/7/8 optional exercises on U days, you're pretty much going to keep them at that number from then on.
Yes, unless you do some supersets or giant sets, workouts might take a longish time, and there's a LOT of volume. But you're gonna recover just fine, if you are sure to eat a lot.

Also, if you ever fail a required rep, don't lower the 1RM just year as Candito says. Instead, check if you're resting and eating enough, and if you fail again, remove some "optional" exercises. Only if you fail again do you lower the 1RM.

Trust me, I know it looks retarded, but I have made the biggest gains in my life, both in size and strenght.

Steve Cook Big Man on Campus

Add 10 lbs per week to the Saturday deadlifts, doing a double + single and then three singles as the increasing weight demands.

Add 5 lbs a week to all the "pressing" sets except the close grip bench press (that's more of an accessory, and you don't want to be grinding that into the ground). Shrinking down the Tuesday bench press like you do with Monday squats, cutting Saturday bench press to 3x3 when necessary, cutting OHP to 5x3 when necessary, and push presses to 3x3 when necessary. Once all of this starts to stall out, take a week where the first half is basically a few easy sets of squat/bench/OHP/deadlift scattered on Monday and Wednesday, and test new maxes on Friday/Saturday, and restart based on that.

You could drop either dips or close grip bench if this turns out to be WAY too much triceps stress all the time for you to deal with.

Also, this is just a general suggestion. I think 4 days of training per week is optimal for most intermediates that aren't on steroids, as you get a fair amount of rest AND you're never more than 48 hours from your next workout, so you're always at an increased level of protein uptake. You COULD do similar things across 5 days, or cram it into 3 days, depending on the schedule of other life shit. What I wrote up assumes a low bar squat. If you're squatting high bar, you could probably increase your deadlift reps on Saturday (two triples, one set of five, even a five and a triple, etc), or add straight legged deadlifts or glute/ham raises, IF you can do them for sets of 5 or more, on Monday or somewhere else, in order to get more glute/hamstring work that might be relatively lacking compared to doing low bar squats.

The key points are:
-Main barbell lifts
-Sets of 8 to 10, possibly twelve for accessory nonsense
-Main lifts taper/pyramid into heavier weights with fewer reps per set.
-Dealers choice of accessories, really, but if it wasn't listed in the Useful Assistance Exercises chapter of SS, it's PROBABLY not terribly useful. Roman Chair sit ups being an exception. Roman Chair sit ups are what SHOULD be your first option for abdominal targeting, should you feel the need to do specific ab exercises.

A program that isn't based on something stupid and arbitrary like whether one considers an exercise to be a "push" or "pull," for starters.

Push and pull are goddamn irrelevant nonsense definitions for training anyway. Muscles ONLY actively exert force to pull together, they don't forcibly extend. From the view of the weight, EVERYTHING is a push. Even a deadlift is raised by our hands and fingers looping under the barbell and PUSHING up on it. So ultimately whether you consider an exercise to be a push or pull is completely subjective of how you particularly want to define the goddamn words and apply them to training, and is irrelevant.

What IS relevant is what muscles are involved, to what extent, how much force they can produce in the movement (dependent on how heavy the movement can be weighted), and the metabolic response caused by the set-rep ranges.

The only reason PPL is popular is because it allows anyone to throw an assbrained grab bag of nonsense into a program, give it a trendy label, post it on R*eddit, and get upvoted for it.

To articulate
The "optional" exercises (i keep writing like this because they are actually non optional at all) are, on upper body days:

All exercises are usually for 3/4 sets of 8/12 reps
-incline db flyes
-incline db press
-side raises
-rear delt raises
-facepulls
-db curls, hammer curls, 21s
-skullcrushers
-tricep push downs
-50 chin ups

I also have a dedicated back day on one of the lower body days.

Again, this is a lot of volume and a lot of frequency. This is why you need to use the first time you run the program as a test of sorts, slowly raising the volume so you get accustomed to it. And again, rest and nutrition are key. Also get some creatine if you haven't already

sounds like a Travis Scott knockoff

Also a photo of your license, your gym card and your natty card.

Which license?

Texas Method is a highly regarded intermediate strength routine. I was able to run it for a couples of years with slight variations and making good gains.

Your creatine license, please.

Found another dumbass tripfag to avoid and ignore.

Whatever you do OP don't listen to this dumbass.

How am I supposed to have a creatine license AND a natty card, fool?

What sources or programs this program was inspired/influences by?

Bro, it's just labelled PPL don't take it so literally.
It's designed to give each section of the body trained 48 hours rest atleast before working it again, you still complete all of the workouts you posted before in PPL. You're an idiot if you think PPL doesn't get results.

Not the guy you were writing to but i'm coming up on the end of ICF and while I don't want to get much bigger, I do want to maintain strength (and I have made some great strength gains)

My biggest problem is I need to cut. I have some fat to get rid of.

I'd imagine on a cut, i'd drop the number of sets... ?

Texas methid

Tixas method

Nice one. But seriously post pics and stats dude. I've seen a couple of your posts and they make sense, but you contradict a lot of suggestions I've gotten from the bro I work with that benches 415

>PPL is always, ALWAYS complete shit
no.

German Volume Training if you're a filthy fraud.

Anything GZCL really.
Fantastic progression methods.

>barbell lifts
No shit
>pyramid scheme
Is a meme
>Roman chair sit up
Why exaclty?
>8-12 sets
Per muscle per workout, need more specificity?

Anyway shit meme advice. The main takeaway here is everyone needs to do what works for them and experience the journey with iron.