Once you’ve built a decent base, using beginner principles and methods, you can move on to a more goal-focused routine, that is based on principles for advanced athletes.
Principles you will see in the advanced workouts section.
- Split principle
- Priority principle
- Sets until failure
- Isometric contractions
- Contrast principle
- Cyclicality
Okay so before we kick off, let’s get a couple of things clear.
- If we go back to the “Cyclicality” principle, we can remind ourselves that gaining muscle and burning fat cannot be done simultaneously, especially for natural athletes.
This is why, it’s important to have the so-called “Off-season”, “On-season” and transition period.
- The off-season (Muscle gaining period) lasts for around 75% of your yearly cycle (8-9 months). This is the period of time, during which we use significantly higher intensity and powerful bodybuilding principles like sets until failure. This period is also characterized by the higher calorie intake. However, we should refrain from over-eating, to avoid excess fat gains.
- The on-season (Fat shredding period) lasts for about 25% of your yearly cycle (2-4 months, depending on your starting shape). During this period, your training sessions are characterized by the higher levels of density, caused by the decrease in weight, increase in reps, and decrease in rest times. This is for the sole purpose of retaining the muscle you previously gained, as much as possible.
- The transition period allows us to smoothly enter the new off-season, without gaining all the fat back in an instant (avoiding the yo-yo effect). Each week, we gradually increase our caloric intake and slowly make a transition to higher levels of intensity. This period usually lasts anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks, depending on how long the on-season was.
- In order to optimally stimulate our musculature, we need to switch from a 2 day Upper/Lower split, to a 3-day split. The 3-day split allows us to train LESS muscle groups every workout (Usually 2 groups per workout). This means that we can use more exercises and focus completely on the involved muscle groups, even at the end of the workout (where you usually get distracted and just go through the movements). Using this variation of the split principle, we let our body recover and hyper-recover the muscle fibers. The 72-86-hour frame between workouts, allows us to activate the musculature during it’s state of hyper-recovery, which is the peak state of recovery.
- Last but not least- Prioritize and expose your weaknesses. Enough said.
Let’s start building a sample workout.
Today, we will build an ‘advanced workout plan’ for Dan. Dan is a 22 years old, skinny, tall man, with little to none background in sports. One year ago, Dan decided to make a change for good and started visiting the gym.
He found out about MeanMuscles, and after a solid 8 months of reading, understanding and practically applying the principles he read on this informational platform, Dan made progress.
Dan was already 8 kilograms heavier. He could lift some decent weights on most of the compound movements and has successfully increased his cardio endurance. However, Dan just LOVED to train arms, and they got a little out of proportion with the rest of his body.
Still, he looked aesthetic because he didn’t completely neglect all his other body parts, but he was obviously arm dominant.
Dan’s strong and weak points (From Strongest to weakest)
- Biceps
- Triceps
- Chest/back
- Shoulders
- Quadriceps
- Calves
Now that we know what the first and last priorities are, we can move on to the actual workout, which is a typical Push/Pull/Legs workout, that would fit the individual’s profile, presented above.
| Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Monday |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chest, front and side delts, triceps, sprints | Back, bicep, rear delts | Quadriceps, hamstrings, lower back, calves | Rest, posing | Monday | Thursday | Wednesday | Rest, posing, repeat |
You should already know that by now, but, warm up is mandatory.
We are giving you two variations of the Monday and Tuesday workouts. Beginners can start with the first one, as the second one is more advanced and is based on the combined approaches principle.
| Monday | ||
|---|---|---|
| Body Part | Exercise | Repetitions |
| Chest | Incline barbell bench press | Set 1- 50-60% of 1RM – 15 repetitions |
| Set 2- 70% – 10 repetitions | ||
| Set 3- 75% – 7 repetitions | ||
| Set 4- 80% – 4 repetitions | ||
| Set 5- 85% – until failure | ||
| Flat dumbbell bench press | 2 sets of 10 repetitions | |
| Chest fly machine | 2 sets of 15 repetitions – Good stretch and contraction, normal pace. | |
| Shoulders | Dumbbell shoulder presses | Set 1- 10 repetitions |
| Set 2- 8 repetitions | ||
| Set 3- 6 repetitions | ||
| Set 4- Until failure | ||
| Dumbbell lateral raises | 3 sets of 15 repetitions | |
| Triceps | Overhead dumbbell triceps extensions | 3 sets of 10 repetitions |
| Machine triceps dips | 2 sets of 12 repetitions | |
| Sprints |
These workouts are done twice a week, after the weight workout (Monday and Friday for this specific routine). It’s recommended to do your sprints on a running track (400m), or somewhere you can measure the distance you’ve ran. After a proper warm up, we do 6-8 laps in the following fashion: 110-140 meters of sprint, we build up maximum speed up until the 20th, 30th meter and try to maintain it for the next 80-110 meters. After these 15-20 seconds of sprinting, we do a light jog or walk until the end of the lap (290-260 meters). Then we rest, until we feel recovered for the next lap, which is done in the same fashion. Sprints are the only type of running that has a positive stimulus for muscle growth, due to the fact the biggest tension is observed during the 15-20 second range of intense running at maximum speed. This fashion of training has a positive effect, when it comes to aesthetically developing the lower body. The biggest load during sprints, falls on the weak muscle groups in our lower body (Mainly the hamstring-glute separation and the calves, which, are in fact problematic groups for most bodybuilders) |
|
| Tuesday | ||
|---|---|---|
| Body Part | Exercise | Repetitions |
| Back | Wide grip pull-ups | 4 sets until failure |
| Barbell rows/T-Bar rows | Set 1- 50-60% of 1RM – 15 repetitions | |
| Set 2- 70% – 10 repetitions | ||
| Set 3- 75% – 7 repetitions | ||
| Set 4- 80% – 4 repetitions | ||
| Set 5- 85% – until failure | ||
| V bar vertical lat pulldowns (Narrow grip pulldowns, using the cable rows extension) | 4 sets of 10-12 repetitions, good stretch and contraction, normal pace. | |
| Dumbbell pullovers (Elbows slightly bent to engage the lats more) | 3 sets of 15 repetitions | |
| For the back dumbbell pullovers exercise, we use a significantly lower weight, goal is to get a good stretch after we’ve used a heavy load on the previous exercises. | ||
| Rear delts | Rear delt dumbbell flys | 3 sets of 12 |
| Biceps | Straight bar bicep curls | 3 sets of 10 |
| Machine preacher curls | 4 sets of 12 | |
advanced workout based on the “combined approaches” principle
For this workout, we can use the same weekly scheme, however, we observe a slight change in the fashion, in which the exercises are done.
| Monday | ||
|---|---|---|
| Body Part | Exercise | Repetitions |
| Chest | Flat barbell bench press | Pyramid- 15,12,10,8,6 |
| Incline barbell bench press + Pec deck | 4 sets | |
| For the incline bench press, we go for 8-10 reps with moderate intensity, followed by significantly higher intensity and reaching failure on the pec deck. | ||
| Dumbbell flys | 2 sets of 15 repetitions | |
| Shoulders | Dumbbell shoulder presses | 4 sets of 10 |
| Lateral raises + front raises (Dumbbells) | 4 sets – Again, moderate and high intensity, 12-15 and 6-10 repetitions respectively. | |
| Triceps | Overhead dumbbell triceps extensions (One arm) | 4 sets of 10 |
| Machine triceps dips + skull crushers | 4 sets – Moderate/high intensity with 10-12 and 6-8 reps respectively (Do not reach failure on skull crushers, this is an exercise that puts great tension on the triceps tendons) | |
| Tuesday | ||
|---|---|---|
| Body Part | Exercise | Repetitions |
| Back | Pull ups | 4 sets until failure |
| Lat pulldowns + T-Bar rows | 4 sets- Moderate & high intensity for 12 and 8 reps until failure respectively | |
| Cable rows | 3 sets of 10 reps | |
| Rear delt flys (Dumbbell) | 3 sets of 15 | |
| Pullovers | 3 sets of 15 reps | |
| Bicep | Straight bar bicep curls | 3 sets of 12 |
| Preacher curls + Cable curls (Front double bicep curls) | 4 sets, moderate and high intensity for 10 and 8 reps respectively. | |
| Wednesday | ||
|---|---|---|
| Body Part | Exercise | Repetitions |
| Legs | Bodyweight squats | 4 sets of 15 |
| Barbell squats | 4 sets of 12 | |
| Leg presses + leg extensions | 4 sets, moderate intensity on both exercises, 15 and 12 repetitions respectively, focus on peak flexion on the second exercise. | |
| Dumbbell lunges | 3 sets of 12 | |
| Romanian deadlifts + laying hamstring curls | 4 sets, moderate and high intensity for 10 and 8 reps respectively. | |
| Calves | Standing + seated calf raises | 5 sets of 15 – high intensity, 15RM. |
Posing
In case if you missed it, please make sure to read our article on ‘Bodybuilding Posing’.
Gaining complete control over your musculature, is one of the most important things you can do as an advanced trainee. Posing and stretching also gives that fine detail and round shape of the skeletal muscles.
You can pose and stretch in between your sets during a workout. This will help you stay focused and prepared for your next set.
Complete posing workouts (Rotating all the mandatory poses) can be done after every workout, and on rest days.
Summary
As an advanced athlete, your goal is to get used to a yearly training cycle, that includes a muscle gaining, fat shredding and transition phase. You also get used to extreme workloads and reaching failure.
Your cardio workouts switch from cross running to track attack in the form of intense sprints, which are the perfect hypertrophy boost, especially for the lower body.
You perfect your physique and the way you show it by consistently doing posing sessions, in between and after the workouts, as well as on rest days.
The workouts given in this section are just ONE option. The exercises in those workouts might work optimally for one person, but not so well for another. The important thing is to keep the same weekly scheme, principles and volume/intensity of the workload.
Other than that, you can experiment with other exercises, to see which ones work best for you. We, at MeanMuscles, gave you OUR picks for the best exercises for each muscle group- These picks are a product of year long experience in the gym, and feedback of our online and one-on-one clients.
Stay aesthetic!
