splits vs total body

[morris]

hi everyone - i am looking for some input.

i was reading woman's health mag yesterday and specifically an article about women and exercise. the article recommended no splits, just 2 total body weight workouts each week, mostly with compound moves. the rational was "you are not a body builder." well, i am not a body builder. i do not aspire to be one. i like total body, or total upper body workouts, but i also liek splits. i love the variety. currently i am doing ff's jan rotation after 1 month of her dec rotation. i like how strong i feel. i will probably do a total body rotation after, but i was curious as to why it seemed so negative to do splits. what is the rationale? also, does sts have any total upper or total body workotus or is it 3 months of splits?

thanks for you help. my goals are really to stay lean, keep challenging my muscles, and enjoy my workouts!

 

[nancy324]

I don't know, but I'm going to guess. A total body workout moves faster then a "body part" workout. Workouts that move faster are more like cardio, or can even be cardio workouts. The article is probably assuming that women want to use lots of calories to get slim. And, let's face it, if you ask most women what they want from exercise, weight loss will usually be at the top of the list. I bet they're referring to something like that.

 

[JeanneMarie]

I don't understand why it has to be one or the other.

I do both, alternating as I feel like it.

 

[morningstar]

I read this article, and it purely p***ed me off. The whole freakin' point of the article that surrounded this woman's advice was that personal training should be expert and personal to a particular client, not one shoe fits all. This woman's advice was geared only to women that want to lose weight, not gain muscle. Yes, compound exercises and total body workouts are good for burning fat; however, isolation exercises and splits really build muscle. You don't have to be a body builder to want to gain muscle and strength. And not everyone has weight loss as a goal. Muscles burn more calories than fat anyway, so building muscle helps with weight loss goals.

Note that they didn't give this woman's credentials - just that she owns a gym. Well, as the accompanying article pointed out, just owning a gym or even being a personal trainer doesn't mean you have a clue about fitness.

Now, it so happens that I prefer total body workouts, but I hate compound exercises. So my overwhelming preference is for total body workouts that work each muscle in isolation, working each body part to failure before moving on to the next one. But I know that my body will respond best to my constantly changing it up. So I do rotations that are constantly changing and my muscles never know what I'm going to throw at them next. Sometimes I do splits, sometimes I do total body, sometimes circuits, sometimes I mix everything up and do three workouts in one day. Right now I'm more on a cardio kick while I am doing CLX, so that is different for me.