MEGA workout Back, Biceps & Legs

Transcript:

Welcome to episode 5 of Muscling In !

A few weeks ago I changed my routine, I went from the 3 day split from the Greek God Program to the 2 day split MEGA workouts. The reason I made the change was so I can train the core movements more frequently and to include more volume.

So far, I’m loving it.

In this video I’m doing the B workout – Back, Biceps and Legs.

We start off with weighted chin-ups.

My progress on weighted pull-ups has stopped recently (probably because I’m gaining weight now) so I switched back to chin-ups.

A good lesson I learned from Greg is that trying to progress on a movement that’s been stalling for a few weeks almost never works. Part of it is physiological. Performing the same exercises in the same fashion over and over bringing about a condition called monotonous overtraining that causes a maladaptation of the neuromuscular system.

But more important than that in my opinion is the psychological effect of boredom. If you’ve been stalling for a few weeks on a certain movement, I bet you are no longer excited to do it. What’s more is that, you may actually expect to fail to progress on it.

The mind has a very powerful effect on your body. You may actually be weak just because you expect yourself to be weak.

Changing your core exercises from time to time keeps your training exciting and gives your neuromuscular system a fresh stimulus so you can make continuous gains.

The second exercise: Incline Dumbbell Curls.

My arms have always been a strong point due to genetics, so I never really had to do strict isolation work for my biceps.

So far, in the two and half years I’ve been training, I’ve only done standing dumbbell curls and standing barbell curls.

But I wanted to stick to the program as much as possible so I started doing Incline Dumbbell Curls. This is a very important lesson actually, that I want to address quickly… Stick to the program you’re following.

I get many emails from guys following one of the Kinobody programs or another popular program out there that tell me how they want to make some changes to it. And if that’s alright.

Listen, if what you’ve been doing on your own didn’t get you nowhere, what makes you think you can improve a program set up by a really experienced coach?

My advice is this: Follow a program exactly as it’s laid out until it no longer works. Then you can make changes to it. Usually you’ll have to wait quite a bit of time until it no longer works, which is good.

Exercise number 3 – Squats.

I decided to start doing squats again for this A/B split. The reason I stopped doing squats a few months ago was because I was ego lifting, I was using bad form on the last rep of the set. I was caving my left leg in so I can push more weight.

This lead to a weird pain in my left hip that wasn’t going away and it scared the shit out of me.

So I stopped doing squats and did leg press instead for 5-6 months.

My hip feels fine now so I’m going to start doing squats again, but I’ll be much more strict with form.

In this workout and the last one I used a lighter weight, to get used to the movement again. Also instead of doing Reverse Pyramid Training as usual, I’m doing straight sets. In this video I did 6 sets of 5.

Before doing RPT I first need to figure out what my 5 rep max actually is so I’ll know what weight to use in my first set.

Moving on: Bent Over Rows superseted with Rear Delt Flyes.

The program actually asks for Cable Rows but I’m doing Barbell Rows because the Cable Row machine in this gym is ALWAYS busy. And I really don’t like waiting after someone when working out.

The reason I do rows and rear delt flyes in a super set fashion is to hit the rear delts harder. They work during pulling movements as well so you can deplete them easier if you hit them with higher reps right after rows.

I find these incredibly hard to do. As you noticed I’m struggling with 5kg dumbbells and I’m not even hitting the required reps.

The last exercise, Cable Curls.

Again, I’ve never done this exercise until now either and I find it pretty difficult.

Using a cable, the tension on the biceps is continuous so you get fatigued much quicker and you can’t lift as heavy as using a barbell.

People always seem to argue about which biceps exercise is better but I find this argument completely pointless. It’s not the exercise itself that leads to muscle growth, it’s the progress you make on it.

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The Program that built my physique

If you’re looking for a muscle building program I recommend you check out The Greek God Program. Greg designed it to help you build proportionate mass and gain strength while staying lean. It’s based on training certain key lifts once every 4-5 days.

Check out my one year transformation with it here.

I’m now doing the MEGA workouts from the program. They still have you train with high frequency but you’re also doing slightly more volume which helps trigger sarcoplasmic growth.

Click here to read more about it