Thread: Help with adapted workout routine

I'm a 43-year-old male and experienced lifter. I used to be an athlete but suffered severe damage to my leg as a teenager from bone cancer leaving me with a knee that doesn't bend. Despite the limitation, I still enjoy lifting but can only do upper body. I do daily therapy on my legs, but that is a different topic. Since I can't do leg days but love working out, I fell into a pattern of possibly overtraining upper body in previous years following this routine:

M - push high weight
T - pull high weight
W - swim, abs, leg PT
T - push high rep
F - pull high rep
S - swim, abs, leg PT
S - rest

After getting some pain and tendonitis from having the same joints worked six days in a row, I took five months off then switched my workout routine to two days a week using a workout program called "The Muscle Building Workout Routine on aworkoutreoutine dot com (I'm not allowed to post links yet since I'm new here. It basically goes like this for me since I can only do the upper days:

M - full upper body A
T - abs, leg PT
W - rest
T - full upper body B
F - abs, leg PT
S - rest
S - rest

I have to say I love this routine and my joints are very happy. I am a little bummed, though, that I'm only working out twice a week. I have read quite a bit here and on the web about the optimal number of times per week to work a muscle group to maximize gains, and two seems to be the most populate answer. If that's true for me, then I have found my workout and I will have to accept the ceiling that I seem to have hit with size and strength. I am very curious, though, if I would get better gains with this exact same routine, but three days a week instead of two. I would do Monday, Wednesday, and Friday in the gym then leg therapy and abs at home on the other days. If this is not likely to lead to more gains, then there's not point, I just feel like I have more to give in a week than what I'm doing now.

There are lots of very experienced lifters here, and I would love to hear your opinions. Thanks in advance!

Without seeing the program, given your past overtraining and assuming you're natural, you're prob better off just splitting up each Upper Body day into 2 workout days if you want to work out 6x/week. It's about finding the right overall volume that works best for you, not necessarily # of workout days/week.

5 months off due to pain and tendonitis shouldn't be something that happens in your routine.

Originally Posted by air2fakie

Without seeing the program, given your past overtraining and assuming you're natural, you're prob better off just splitting up each Upper Body day into 2 workout days if you want to work out 6x/week. It's about finding the right overall volume that works best for you, not necessarily # of workout days/week.

5 months off due to pain and tendonitis shouldn't be something that happens in your routine.

You are correct I'm natural. One other clarification I should have stated is that the 5-mo break was also due to gyms being closed, but I used it as a break since I've been lifting for so long.

If you were to split the 2 days into 4, would you split by push/pull?

Also the workout can be found at (sorry for being cryptic) aworkoutroutine dot com/the-muscle-building-workout-routine/

Originally Posted by gleflar

You are correct I'm natural. One other clarification I should have stated is that the 5-mo break was also due to gyms being closed, but I used it as a break since I've been lifting for so long.

If you were to split the 2 days into 4, would you split by push/pull?

Also the workout can be found at (sorry for being cryptic) aworkoutroutine dot com/the-muscle-building-workout-routine/

Thanks, I'm too lazy to copy & paste but I get the idea. I'd personally do Push/Pull, but if you're splitting 2 Uppers across 4 days, you could easily find good ways to mix it up too. Whatever your preference is... if you stick with the basic setup over time you'd likely want to change things up every so often anyway.

Originally Posted by air2fakie

Thanks, I'm too lazy to copy & paste but I get the idea. I'd personally do Push/Pull, but if you're splitting 2 Uppers across 4 days, you could easily find good ways to mix it up too. Whatever your preference is... if you stick with the basic setup over time you'd likely want to change things up every so often anyway.

How about this:

PUSH - MON/THU
------------------------------
Flat bench - 3x8
Incline dumbbell - 3x8
Decline bench - 3x10
Military dumbbell - 3x10
Fly - 2x15
Skull crusher - 3x12
Shoulder raises - 3x12
Triceps rope - 3x12

PULL - TUE/FRI
------------------------------
Lat pull hammer - 3x8
Hammer row - 3x8
Pull ups - 3x10
Cable row - 3x10
Reverse fly - 2x15
Incline curls - 3x12
Shrugs - 3x12
Preacher curls - 3x12

Originally Posted by gleflar

How about this:

PUSH - MON/THU
------------------------------
Flat bench - 3x8
Incline dumbbell - 3x8
Decline bench - 3x10
Military dumbbell - 3x10
Fly - 2x15
Skull crusher - 3x12
Shoulder raises - 3x12
Triceps rope - 3x12

PULL - TUE/FRI
------------------------------
Lat pull hammer - 3x8
Hammer row - 3x8
Pull ups - 3x10
Cable row - 3x10
Reverse fly - 2x15
Incline curls - 3x12
Shrugs - 3x12
Preacher curls - 3x12

It kinda looks you doubled the total Upper volume rather than simply split the given volume into push/pull. Regardless, I'll defer to you on what you can handle since you said you're experienced - also since you don't have to deal with lower body recovery.

Given the straight set programming and same routine across both push/pull days, you should make sure you know how you plan to manage intensity/progression.