Trying to decide what routine I should pursue for optimal hypertrophy. I'm around intermediate level for strength, so I have a good base, but I'm trying to decide if a 1x a week split with greater volume/variety per session, a full body with focus on compounds, or a moderate PPLR type of approach is best. I've tried all and here are my observations so far:

1x a week split ("brosplit"):
-I noticed a lot more hypertrophy in my arms and shoulders when I actually gave them direct stimulation (compounds = arm gains appears to be a meme in my case)
-I felt more motivated to really hit whatever session it was hard knowing that I wouldn't touch it again for a week
-Feel less tired in daily life because I have ample time to rest
-Didn't feel like I needed a full 7 days to rest smaller body parts, but also realize more isn't always better
-Schedule gets fked up whenever work is more demanding and I can't make it to the gym that day

Full Body
-Much easier to program and stick to (consistent days each week). Don't feel horrible about missing a session since entire body was trained earlier that week
-Felt relatively fresh during workouts because I wasn't doing 3 other variations of a body part for tons of volume
-Have time to do chit besides be a gymcel, including cardio, stretching, etc. since I have 2 off days during the week that don't involve lifting
-Feel less stress/sore day-to-day than PPL because overall less volume per body part
-Hard to get variety in unless I spend 2 hours in the gym on my workout days (I cannot)

PPLR or PPL 2x a week
-Felt like the right mix between getting variety (i.e. training arms directly) without wasting time doing worthless isos (i.e. 3 different curl variations)
-Saw very solid strength gains and some decent hypertrophy gains in smaller body parts that I didn't get w/ full body
-Feel tired and sore constantly in daily life on PPL. My sleep/resting heart rate is actually quite a bit worse when I run PPL cycles than it is on full body and def bro splits
-Requires lots of time in the gym and little room for non-gymcel exercise

It seems like PPL is the move and that's what's most recommended for pure gains, but I'm wondering if brahs who lift agree or have different experiences from mine.

You aren't suggesting the same day every time for full body, are you? Also would definitely want some direct arm training mixed in still (maybe I'm just nitpicking your words).

I personally would probably go for PPl out of those 3. Just feels like a reasonable way to split things up while getting enough frequency/not going overboard on individual workouts.

Would also fuk with FB, but I feel like it can be a lot of thought/can be tricky since body parts recover at different speeds. A traditional bro split is just too infrequent imo.

One thing I'd also toss out is the gentleman's split (coined by Natural Hypertrophy on YouTube). It's 4 days of U/L + a day of arms/shoulders. Haven't actually been able to try it yet bc I'm a cripple, but I like that it lessens the volume on upper days (that's what I hate about U/L), and it gives me some time to focus on what are weaker (for me) and faster-recovering muscle groups

For me, if you can rest and recover enough, PPL x2 is the way to go. You can even space it out so it's across like 9 days or whatever.

PPL
PPL
PPL
rest
PPL
PPL
PPL
rest
rest

or wherever you need an extra rest day.

Personally I do a bro split spread out over like 1.5 weeks because I can't deal having full body fatigue all day every day anymore.

What matters is volume per week, not volume per session, and only if you can recover from it by the next session enough to do more reps.

How many sets you can do depends on your muscle glycogen capacity, which increases with experience. Beginners do about 9 sets per muscle group per week. You can gradually increase to 20 per week as you get more experienced.

You can recover from more volume with 2x per week than 1x per week.

How many sets you should do depends how close to failure you go, and you need to get there every week or so to know, or just stop when your last rep takes twice as long as your first few, which is where you are 1-2 reps away.

If you go to failure, do fewer sets. Do not continue if you feel warn out. Leave with a light pump. Tension, not damage, causes growth. Damage actually slows growth because you first must fix the damage.

Upper/ Lower 3-4 times a week.

Focus on strength for 5-6 weeks. Offload for 1-2 weeks and do hypertrophy for a month. Rinse repeat.

For longevity I'd say drop the strength all together and just hit the 10-15 rep range for everything with perfect form. As a natty this will be enough to get you jacked and aesthetic and won't make you look much different compared to when you do strength work.

Honestly doing strength work belongs to athletics and power-lifting. For any other case it's not worth it in my opinion. I'm 30 now, did tons of strength in the past and I'm already starting to pay for it. Lower back issues, broad feet etc. Wish I never loaded more than 50-65% 1RM on anything tb f h.

less is more ymmv

70% week 1 block
Deadlift
Push
Pull
Lower
Off
80% week 2 block
Deadlift
Push
Lower
Pull
Off
90% week 3 block
Dead
Push
Pull
Lower
Off
Week 4 test 1rm
Dead
Off
Push
Off
Lower
Off
Take new 1rm x .70
70% week 1 block
Repeat

This isn't exact but you get where I'm going, obviously altering movements and accessory work depending on your goals

Haven't lifted in a few years but ppl was best for me with a good diet.

All true.
And I dont like soreness either, though a little sometimes is ok. I just look at whether my reps are going up, and whether I feel recovered 2 days later, and whether I feel worn out after the gym or on a happy cloud.

Instead of a traditional PPL, I would go with:

Major chest, minor shoulders, tris
Major back, minor legs, bis
Rest
Major shoulders, minor chest, tris
Major legs, minor back, bis
Rest
Rest

Do PPL rest Upper Lower rest. Repeat.

Lmao at retards who voted for brosplit for a natty

Either PPL or FB is the only way as a natty. I opt for FB, but both r good

Full Body every other day. Or if you want a more set schedule, 3 days a week, with the day before the 2 days of rest being a bit more intense either in weight or volume.

Seriously as a natty it doesn't make a difference, just stick with whatever keeps you consistent.

Bro split, PPL, Upper/lower, Full body etc.. seriously makes NO difference.

Pull up every study, anecdotal story you have. I can guarantee you that if you got identical triplets and put one on a bro split, PPL and full body, after a year no-one would be able to tell the difference by looking at them.

As a natty, the workout you should use is the one you can stick to consistently and more importantly progress on. Don't spend money or time on which program will give you that best gains, save your money and stop stressing out thinking you are missing out on gains because you picked the wrong program.

Diet,
Genetics
Program

or Genetics
Diet
program

Whichever one you most enjoy and keeps you coming back.

Certainly with my history as a natty lifter the gains come when I have volume high + eating right.

I second the guy saying don't bother with "strength" work. Plenty of sets and plenty of reps.

PPL since I don't recover from leg workouts in 1 day

This. Doesn’t matter what you choose if natty

Monday: Chest/Biceps

4 sets of Incline Dumbbell Press, 8-10 reps
3 sets of Bench Press, 8-10 reps
3 sets of Incline Flies, 8-10 reps
3 sets of Chest Dips until failure
3 sets of Barbell Curls, 8-10 reps
3 sets of Preacher Curls, 8-10 reps, then drop the weight to half, and push out another 8

Tuesday: Legs/Calves

4 sets of Squats 8-10 reps
3 sets of Lunges 8-10 reps
3 sets of Leg Press 8-10 reps
3 sets of Leg Extensions till failure
3 sets of Leg Curls 8-10 reps

Calves are self explanatory, just use some of the machines till failure, a lot of reps, feel the burn.

Wednesday: Back

3 sets of Lat Pulldowns 8-10 reps
4 sets of Deadlifts 8-10 reps
3 sets of Bent Over Rows 8-10 reps
3 sets of Dumbell Rows 8-10 reps
3 sets of Hyperextensions 8-10 reps

Thursday: Shoulders/Triceps

4 sets of Shoulder Press, alternate with Barbell & Dumbell every week 8-10 reps
3 sets of Upright Rows supersetted with Lateral Raises 8-10 reps
3 sets of front raises 8-10 reps
3 sets of Lying Rear Delt Raises 8-10 reps
3 sets of Close-Grip Bench Press 8-10 reps
4 sets of Pulldowns 8-10 reps
3 sets of Skullcrushers 8-10 reps

Saturday: Full Body

3 sets of Deadlifts 8-10 reps
3 sets of Squats 8-10 reps
3 sets of Clean and Jerk 8-10 reps
3 sets of Weighted Pull ups 8-10 reps

Don't over complicate it.

Just stick to a program you love sticking too, that's half the battle, then make sure your diet is right (which is more difficult). Then make sure you are making progress in the gym by either increasing the number of reps or increasing the weight.

The minutiae of details some of you guys get into debating which one is optimal is mute, null, void, inconsequential.

Time plus consistency plus good diet = results

Lifelong natty, pretty elite.

I train each bodypart about once every 10 days. Each exercise is one set only, but it's one hell of a set.

You forget the most important factor, INTENSITY.

Look up Arthur Jones, Mike Mentzer, John Little or Ellington Darden if you're interested.

Squat and deadlift everyday *******

Chest, shoulders and tris
Back + bis
Legs
Rest and then repeat whenever I feel.



Could be 1 day rest or 4 days rest. Sometimes I do back, bis and legs the same day and just train two days a week

It’s not that important what your program is, just find what you enjoy/can manage, stay consistent and apply progressive overload

Whatever you enjoy srs

Really just copy and pasted zyzz's split

He forgot the most important part

Can confirm upper/lower split works great. Did it 6 days/week with the final two days just being a light day and saw great progress

This is the right response. I trained natty from 19-26 and experimented with all methods and the best routine to choose is one that you enjoy and one that you will be consistent with. There is no point in following a routine because "studies say" if you hate doing it and don't enjoy it.

Try them all and see what you enjoy.

Have to agree. In short, frequency is just a way to pace out your volume to enable recovery between sessions. Frequency for the sake of frequency isn't worth chasing. For some people it can help them get in more quality sets by reducing per session volume, for others it can end up being regressive if recovery time is not adequate. You have three variables to play with: intensity, volume, and frequency. The extent to which you adjust any one of them can affect the others.

I meant full body as in full body 3x a week with a day of rest in between (the traditional way of looking at it). I'm leaning towards this because I'm really fatigued from PPL rest repeat cycles. I tried it this week after doing FB last couple of weeks and am noting that my sleep and daily energy levels are way less. Have you found good ways to program FB for more advanced trainers that isn't strength-oriented and not for complete beginners? It seems like anything hypertrophy-focused is always UL or PPL and anything intermediate FB is powerlifting oriented.

I'm also debating just doing Push and Pull with quads on push, hams on pull. Only problem with push pull is push is way harder and time consuming of a day (Squats, Bench, and potentially OHP too). It could be a good balance though because it's kind of full body, but with more room for volume/individual body parts.

Been training 15 years. 10+ natty and since then enhanced. Tried all lifting styles/routines. Starting Strength, Madcow, PPL(2x), dogcrapp, UL, PHAT, PHUL, PPL/UL, Bro split, FST7, and finally what I'd call the 'Pro split'. (A more intelligent version of the bro split).


At nearly 35 years old there are only two routines I'd consider.
-Bro split/pro split.
-Upper/Lower where you train 4 days per week.

It really depends on your goals and what your trying to accomplish.

In my opinion PPL style training is extremely effective. IF you can devote your time to sleep/rest/eating/training and are 'enhanced'. If your lacking any of those its going to be hard to balance volume/intensity/progressive overload/recovery. You can either have volume or frequency. Doing both is extremely hard to pull off.



The best training style for me is 4 day's per week. Mon/Tues and Thur/Fri. 60 minute workouts. Add in some stretching as well cardio/conditioning and massages on your off days and its the best balance for aesthetics/ performance/health.

Interesting. So you think bro split is better for natties over full body? I don't think I'm cut out for PPL anymore. I'm pretty much sore all the time and it's too much gymceling for my taste. I love lifting, but I'm old now and cardio/stretching matter a lot too. I basically want to remain strong, but care a lot more about general health/feeling good over just gainzzz and aesthetics like I did in my 20s. Even heavy squats, etc. are fking me up a lot more, and this is despite the fact that I eat cleaner and drink a helluva lot less than the prior decade.