Part 1 of this article established that in the initial years of training, the fastest route to muscle growth is to focus on compound lifts (multi-joint) and to work the body as one. This is great for the novice trainee with lower strength levels, butless effective once strength levels begins to increase.

In order to maintain continued growth (hypertrophy) in any muscle group, heavier loads and greater volumes are required. With that comes equally longer recovery times. Performing exercises such as heavy squats and deadlifts, places a tremendous amount of strain on the central nervous system. So after performing a heavy deadlift workout on a Monday using 350 plus lbs for multiple sets and repetitions, it is not possible to walk back into the gym on the Wednesday expecting to perform that same workout, fully recovered. Studies have shown that it can take anywhere from 7 to 10 days to recover from a training session performing deadlifts using those kind of loads. If you are a novice trainee working with a modest amount of weight (100 lbs at 4 sets X 6 reps) and you feel great a couple of days later, you would more than likely able to re-train that muscle group 48 hours later with a 105 lbs load.

Getting stronger is a two fold process. During the initial stages of strength training (6 weeks) increases in strength are a function of the brain becoming more efficient at sending messages to the working muscles. We don’t see a lot of visible muscle growth even though we are getting stronger; increases in strength are primarily based on neural efficiency. The second part of this process is the reward of muscle growth. In order for the body to account for the increased demands being placed upon it, it must increase the size of its skeletal muscle through growth in the size of its component cells. The recovery process varies depending on load, volume and the particular muscles being worked. Generally speaking, upper body muscles have a tendency to recovery and regenerate faster than lower body muscles. This can be attributed to the fact that the lower body muscles can handle a lot more tension (weight) than the upper body and will therefore have more muscle damage, requiring more time to heal and repair.

There are a number of different workout schedules that can be performed. I have seen trainees who have a lot of time to train who will isolate each major muscle group over a 5 day period (e.g., Day 1: Chest, Day 2: Back, Day 3: Legs, Day 4: Shoulders, Day 5: Arms, Day 6: Off, then repeat the cycle). They perform an inordinate amount of volume on each muscle thus requiring 5 or 6 days to recover before they can be trained again. This is an extreme example and it is not very realistic. Most people lead busy lives and don’t have the time or the desire to spend their life inside of a gym.

For my clients who have reached the stage where full body workouts are not as effective as they once were, I recommend breaking up their routine into an upper/lower body split. This way their upper and lower body will get hit twice a week. During one lower body session the emphasis would be placed on some version of a squat (front squat/back squat/split squat) and the other day would focus on a deadlift variation (barbell deadlift/trap bar deadlift/Romanian deadlift). The two upper body sessions would focus on different variations of presses, rows and a little assistance work thrown in to hit lagging body parts and the smaller stabilizer muscles. With this type of training split they get the best of both worlds– time to get in a sufficient amount of volume to elicit muscle growth and an opportunity to recover between workouts. The added bonus is that they now have the ability to hit these muscles twice a week. Training a muscle more frequently will lead to more muscle mass and greater strength gains assuming that it has fully recovered from one session to the next.