Training Splits - How Do I fit Shoulders in?

[juggy38]

Thank you

Its not that i CANT... its that i blast chest pretty hard, then finish with biceps and either my grip is gone or ive been in the gym for 3 hours, am out of time and need to go into work.

Gotcha, well here’s the thing with shoulders....they are mixed fibers, responding well to both high rep and heavy loads. But do to the insertion/origin, they rarely get severely damaged, and recover pretty quick. So you could literally do something like

Day 1:chest day (do a high incline bench), then 3 sets of cable laterals)

Day 2:back day (3-4 sets rear delts)

Day 3ff

day 4: arms + 6-8 sets of middle delt
Day5: legs + 3-4 sets of rear delts
Day6: off

repeat.

chest dAy your getting about 6 sets of shoulders with the incline pressing and laterAls, back day your getting a lot of rear delt volume with rowing and rear delt woek. Arm day you got more gas to hit shoulders with 6-8 sets, then leg day hit rear delts again 3-4 sets. That’s about 20 sets a week for shoulders which is ALOT of volume...hell you might need to cut it down to 12-15 sets. And you don’t waste a day, and not fuck up your other bodypart training

 

[xpoc]

If you like to split by body part (bro split) then don't think of your DELTS as a muscle. Instead, consider delts as 3 muscles. Front and side delts on "push" days and rear delts on "pull" days. And when you dissect them like that, all of a sudden the idea of a big muscle group DELTS becomes 3 small ones with each head generally only needing 1 exercise each. It is nothing more than a mind hack.

 

[joos23]

Gotcha, well here’s the thing with shoulders....they are mixed fibers, responding well to both high rep and heavy loads. But do to the insertion/origin, they rarely get severely damaged, and recover pretty quick. So you could literally do something like

Day 1:chest day (do a high incline bench), then 3 sets of cable laterals)

Day 2:back day (3-4 sets rear delts)

Day 3ff

day 4: arms + 6-8 sets of middle delt
Day5: legs + 3-4 sets of rear delts
Day6: off

repeat.

chest dAy your getting about 6 sets of shoulders with the incline pressing and laterAls, back day your getting a lot of rear delt volume with rowing and rear delt woek. Arm day you got more gas to hit shoulders with 6-8 sets, then leg day hit rear delts again 3-4 sets. That’s about 20 sets a week for shoulders which is ALOT of volume...hell you might need to cut it down to 12-15 sets. And you don’t waste a day, and not fuck up your other bodypart training

What do you like for middle delts?
I've never trained like what you had suggested, but I do love the set up and makes total sense.

 

[pharma1]

Why not just modify your current split slightly. you train 3 days now. So hit your chest and bis, change legs to your 2nd day to give the upper joints/ligaments a day of rest. Hit your back/tricep day. Then day 4 hit shoulders and arms again. Rest day or two. Then repeat.

Or you could structure that into a 7 day schedule if really desired. You could do
M - Chest/Bis
Tues - Legs
Wed - Back/Tris
Thurs - Rest
Fri - Shoulders and arms
Sat -Rest
Sun - Rest.

 

[TheOneAlone]

Push ( Chest compounds/delt accessory movements)
Pull
Legs
Push (shoulder compounds/chest accessory movement)
Pull
Legs

or

chest and arms
Back and delts
Legs
Repeat

 

[Alzadosghost]

As often as humanly possible!

 

[brutus69]

the question should be, when do u fit in chest?
i almost never see big capped delts. chest all stickin out, big biceps.....dinky delts. all sloped and narrow lookin. john meadows look.
makes em look narrow and just not good..
i'd rather focus on delts and fit chest in after. a few cable flys after delts and im done.

 

[showstopper83]

Gotcha, well here’s the thing with shoulders....they are mixed fibers, responding well to both high rep and heavy loads. But do to the insertion/origin, they rarely get severely damaged, and recover pretty quick. So you could literally do something like

Day 1:chest day (do a high incline bench), then 3 sets of cable laterals)

Day 2:back day (3-4 sets rear delts)

Day 3ff

day 4: arms + 6-8 sets of middle delt
Day5: legs + 3-4 sets of rear delts
Day6: off

repeat.

chest dAy your getting about 6 sets of shoulders with the incline pressing and laterAls, back day your getting a lot of rear delt volume with rowing and rear delt woek. Arm day you got more gas to hit shoulders with 6-8 sets, then leg day hit rear delts again 3-4 sets. That’s about 20 sets a week for shoulders which is ALOT of volume...hell you might need to cut it down to 12-15 sets. And you don’t waste a day, and not fuck up your other bodypart training

Great advice bro, this was super helpful- what do you think of, say 2 sets each of standing dumbell press, lateral dumbell raises and front raises on Chest day... and 3-4 sets of shrugs on back day?

I dont think ive ever worked out rear delts in my life lol

 

[showstopper83]

Driving to gym this morning I got to thinking more about your shoulders.

One person, who being a mature bodybuilder, brought up his shoulders
was Hawkmoon and he even provided visual proof. He did not go into great
detail but I think he alluded to intensity of effort (my words). The is a before
and after foto on this forum somewhere. Remarkable.

If he sees this I hope he responds with some more detail. Or you might
want to PM him with your question. He is one of the nicest guy you could
ever meet, a great guy with loads of knowledge who has been in the game
a long time.

Hope this helps.

PS. Working out 6 days a week is a bunch. I don't know how you do it.
Most, if not all would make better progress on less. This being my opinion.
1 day a week per body part, dedicated to shoulders, especially as you
get older seems to me too little as some atrophy may be at play but I
don't know.

Ive seen Hawkmoon's avatar, that speaks enough of his shoulders

 

[beans]

I have horrible delt genetics, but whats worked for me is doing chest/ delts together. 3 chest movements, 2-3 delt movements.
usually,
incline press prime/ smith or db 2 sets
flat press 2 sets
cable flyes incline/ standing/ seated. 2 sets
then delts
laterals always first, either cable or db, (i superset these with banded up and overs, killer, last set i finish them with as many lateral partials as possible)
3 sets
shoulder press machine/ prime/ smith/ or db 1 rp set 15
then a rear delt movement higher rep 2x20-25

i try to pair delts with chest also so i limit wear and tear on shoulders to 1 day a week. if your chest is better than delts, maybe do push starting with shoulders first, then do chest.

 

[qbkilla]

the question should be, when do u fit in chest?
i almost never see big capped delts. chest all stickin out, big biceps.....dinky delts. all sloped and narrow lookin. john meadows look.
makes em look narrow and just not good..
i'd rather focus on delts and fit chest in after. a few cable flys after delts and im done.

This. My goal is to look as good and aesthetic as possible, to me that's big delts and not overpowering pecs (the look I most often see is a massive chest and flat delts).

So for me 0 direct sets for chest and 15 per delt head. My chest hasn't shrunk or turned to titties by not directly working it.

 

[juggy38]

Great advice bro, this was super helpful- what do you think of, say 2 sets each of standing dumbell press, lateral dumbell raises and front raises on Chest day... and 3-4 sets of shrugs on back day?

I dont think ive ever worked out rear delts in my life lol

ok, well IMO on chest day with OH pressing there’s no need for front raises. The anterior delt is getting hammered on every movement your doing that day. So if you want to bring up anterior delts, do front raises on a different day, and add that volume to middle delt or rear delt. Like you could do

chest+ rear delt/middle delt,

back day+ anterior delt.

and this is if your anterior delt is severely lagging. MOST guys that overhead press Will need no anterior delt isolation, but it’s individual and if you want to bring up those quickly, do them away from chest/OHP day

 

[TheOneAlone]

This. My goal is to look as good and aesthetic as possible, to me that's big delts and not overpowering pecs (the look I most often see is a massive chest and flat delts).

So for me 0 direct sets for chest and 15 per delt head. My chest hasn't shrunk or turned to titties by not directly working it.

Would you guys say focus more on the upper chest and upper shelf in general? I have rounder looking pecs and hate it. Most say to focus on upper chest to fix this

 

[qbkilla]

I doubt you can change the shape of pecs, maybe dips to bring up the lower. But imo if you have a big chest and lagging delts (me,) any direct chest work won't improve the "look". I just make app the sets I would do for chest into delts. Example bench press, do oh press instead, or high incline. Then destroy the sides and tests with frequency and Volume.

 

[Elvia1023]

I have always done Chest/Bi's, Back/Tri's and Legs... my chest and back days are too brutal and long to add shoulders in

Should i just do a 6 day, 4 w/o split with a Shoulder day thrown in there, or 5 w/o in 7 days, M & Thu Chest/Bi's, Tue & Fri Back, Wed Legs and Sat shoulders?

Am i good to make consistent gains working 1 body part every 6 days?

There are many things you could do. The suggestion of Chest/Back - Off - Shoulder/Arms - Legs - Off - Repeat was a good one so you could do that. Although you wrote you hit chest and back hard so you are left with the same issue you have for chest and shoulders with that split. You simply need to add in a separate day or you need to do both in the same day. I personally would just go with push, pull and legs and learn you can still train to the max and include both chest and shoulders you just have to keep an eye on overall training volume.

I do push and I usually start with shoulders and they are in the form of 1-2 lateral movements and 1 front or pressing movement. I include rear delts mainly on back day. You don't even need to do a direct shoulder press movement. An example you could do some lateral raises then start some incline presses then some flyes and a flat machine press or dip movement. Today I done 2 forms of lateral raises then 1 working set of standing barbell presses for higher reps. I moved to an incline smith press, db flyes, machine press then to merge chest ands tri-ceps I done 2 working sets of dips (the 1st focusing on chest and the 2nd tri-ceps) then 1 working set of db tri-cep extensions (you could do skull crushers etc) and 1 working set of tri-cep pushdowns. You don't need to be in the gym for 3 hours to get that done. You can hit your shoulders super hard with 2 working sets of lateral raises (2 variations) then either a front raise or vertical press fro another 1-2 working sets then move to chest and do 3-4 exercises and 4-6 working sets then some quick tri-ceps for 2-3 working sets.

 

[tkav1980]

Chest/bis
Legs
Off
Back
Shoulders/tris
Off
Off
Repeat
Heavy and intense

 

[b-boy]

My split almost my entire 30+ years lifting

Monday - chest and triceps
Tuesday- back and biceps
Wednesday- off
Thursday - legs
Friday - shoulders, traps, calves
Saturday and Sunday- off

Right now just because I wanted to isolate arms by themselves (I do this when dieting)

Monday - chest
Tuesday - back
Wednesday- legs
Thursday- off
Friday - shoulders, calves, traps
Saturday - Arms
Sunday- off

My workouts are NEVER over 45 min except the occasional leg day

 

[tkav1980]

My split almost my entire 30+ years lifting

Monday - chest and triceps
Tuesday- back and biceps
Wednesday- off
Thursday - legs
Friday - shoulders, traps, calves
Saturday and Sunday- off

Right now just because I wanted to isolate arms by themselves (I do this when dieting)

Monday - chest
Tuesday - back
Wednesday- legs
Thursday- off
Friday - shoulders, calves, traps
Saturday - Arms
Sunday- off

My workouts are NEVER over 45 min except the occasional leg day

Hey b-boy, what’s your reasoning for separating calls from leg day? Phil H had me do that and I never gave it any thought.

 

[juggy38]

Hey b-boy, what’s your reasoning for separating calls from leg day? Phil H had me do that and I never gave it any thought.

because after quads and hams you will half ass the calves work.

 

[tkav1980]

because after quads and hams you will half ass the calves work.

Which is why Dante put quads last on leg day. I think it went hams, calves quads in DC. I’ve never had an issue half asking calves.
but again, b-boy may have a different reason for this.