In my last article, I uncovered why lifting weights three days per week is the absolute best training frequency. If you haven’t read that post then make sure to check it out here. It’s important that you first understand the power behind strength training on an every other day basis.
Now in this article, I will be exploring the training concepts that have allowed me to build incredible strength and an absolutely chiseled physique. Just take a look below! I’m walking around at roughly 180-185 lbs at single digit body fat and have built up to some ridiculous lifts. What’s crazy is that I’ve actually been actively trying to stop myself from gaining more muscle to keep my frame trim and versatile. In fact, I do very little back training today, because my lats grow like crazy from these training techniques.
Muscle Gain becomes predictable
You see, with this training approach, muscle gain becomes very predictable. Each session you’ll be lifting heavier with a protocol that will maximize muscle growth better than anything you’ve ever tried before. As a result, many muscle groups will respond so well that they’ll invariably hit a point when they’ll become too big. This has been the case for me and quite a few others!
Building up my weighted chin ups, standing press and incline bench press with this routine has led to a huge increase in upperbody size. Because of this, I’ve actually had to switch to maintenance mode to avoid getting my physique any bigger! This routine is the fastest and most effective way to gain the required muscle size for the Greek God Physique. After which, you’ll want to cut back on the number of sets per exercise to only 1-2 for muscle groups you don’t want to get bigger.
First Things First
For this protocol to work, we first need to hack your training down to the essential. The more exercises you’re doing and the more fatigue you’re generating, the more you’re sabotaging your ability to make consistent strength gains. One way to tell if you’re doing too much training is to evaluate how you feel at the end of your strength training workout. Each session you should finish feeling powerful and on top of the world. This strategy allows you to come back to the gym each week stronger than ever. If you’re feeling trashed and exhausted then you need to reduce your training volume.
I recommend using one to two exercises per muscle group and then focusing on progressing on those exercises as fast as possible. I’ve found that using fewer movements results in a faster rate of strength gain. One of the reasons why people struggle to gain strength on their chest is because their chest workout consists of bench press, incline bench press, decline bench press and chest flyes. In essence, they’re hitting their chest with way too much volume and consequently, the strength stimulus starts to become diminished with excessive amounts of exercises and sets.
Embrace minimalism, it will foster greater strength gains and therefore continued muscle growth! When you’re adding 10-15 lbs to your weighted chin ups and incline bench press each month, you’ll be gaining plenty of muscle size. Furthermore, when these two movements increase in strength, all similar exercises will also increase. Therefore getting your basis covered with less movements will lead to better results
Key Movements
My favorite exercises are as follows: Incline Bench Press, Standing Shoulder Press, Lateral Raises, Weighted Chin ups, Barbell Curls, Skull Crushers, Sumo Deads/Hang cleans and Single Leg Squats. You can then structure these exercises into two simple workout routines.Workout A = Chest, Shoulders and Triceps. Workout B = Back, Biceps and Legs
Workout A:
Incline Bench Press
Standing Press
Skull Crushers
Lateral raises
Workout B
Weighted Chin ups*
Sumo Deadlifts or Hang Cleans
Barbell Curls
Bulgarian Split Squats
*When adding weight to chin-ups, you absolutely need to use a high-quality weight belt that won’t get in the way or distract you from pushing hard during the set.
The Power of the Two Day Split
Spreading your workouts over two days is extremely effective at gaining strength and building muscle. You get to hit each movement once every four to five days. This provides the perfect amount of rest and recovery. Training a muscle more often than every 4 days tends to lead to poor recovery. This is because the local nerves that fire a particular muscle group require about 3-4 days to fully recharge.
Training a muscle once per week with a three day split routine can also work, but your progress will be slower since you’re training each movement four times over the course of a month instead of six times with the two day split. This makes the three day split the ideal approach when undergoing a diet since recovery is hampered with a lower calorie intake. As well, the three day split works well for advanced lifters who have less room for strength gains.
Lastly, the three day split can work well if you want to focus on increasing one to two muscle groups while maintaining the rest of your physique. In the Greek God Muscle Building Program most of the routines involve a two day split for maximum progress on the key lifts. There’s also a bonus manual with a three day split routine that works great once you’ve hit ‘great’ level lifts.
Closing Thoughts
In Part 2 I will be discussing the most effective set and rep scheme to promote maximum muscle growth while getting stronger week after week. In fact, many strength training approaches actually make strength gains harder than they need to be while also limiting your ability to promote as much muscle growth as possible. We will be avoiding these mistakes and using a training approach that works better than anything I have ever tried before. So stay tuned for part 2.
Oh and if you want my full blown course on building the Greek God Physique then be sure to pick up the Greek God Program. This course is packed with several different workout routines that I customized to add muscle aesthetically while building some pretty insane strength. You’ll also learn my strategic nutrition and supplement protocols that make eating for pure muscle gain simple, practical and downright enjoyable.
