xtrain upper body

[SaraFit]

Since I'm new to weights, I could be super duper wrong but I thought chest, triceps, and shoulders were supposed to be worked together and then back and biceps together. This is how I've been doing Total Body Trisets So I was wondering why the upper body for xTrain is divided up as it is with bis/tris and then chest, shoulders, back? I'm sure it'll make more sense when the calendar is available, are you supposed to use both disks and do all upper body the same day?

 

[mrsprincess07]

In weight lifting, there is no defined list of what can be worked together when it comes to splits. Chest and Triceps are typcially worked together because they are "push" muscles whereas biceps and back are "pull" muscles. But for the sake of muscle confusion and shaking up the routine, it's always a good idea to switch up your pairing. You can have splits that only work 1 muscle group per session and some that work 3+ (Upper and Lower splits for example). You can have push vs pull splits or pair shoulders with legs that way the shoulders (a smaller muscle group) don't fatigue when working larger groups like back or chest as they are (shoulders) a secondary muscle group; your larger muscles being primary or isolation muscles for that matter are primary (overhead tricep extension is a "primary" exercise working the tricpes but the shoulders assist making it a secondary).

Long and the short, muscle confusion is good and once you become more experienced with lifting weights, you will find there are so many ways to split your workout, it's almost endless. Then you get into the total body workouts and circuits on top of that. Variety is the spice of life. Varying your lifts also helps to focus on muscle weakness and imbalances too. There are many reasons to switch it up from time to time.

 

[SaraFit]

Thank you MrsPrincess! I think I got distracted while writing my post and left some out, oops. I heard that you shouldn't do bis/tris the day after chest/back/shoulders then would that be correct, because the bis/tris are used for some chest/back/shoulder exercises (well maybe depending on which ones Cathe choses) and this would lead to over training? I fully trust Cathe has an awesome plan and xtrain will be great; just trying to figure out if it is something I should preorder as a whole (or ask for Chrsitmas) as I'm already over my fitness budget for the year. I really love good deals though, so tempting, my wallet keeps yelling at me, "don't do it sara, don't click submit!"

 

[SNM Videos]

XTRAIN Muscle Groups

Hi SaraFit,

There are advantages and disadvantages to every method of working out. This is also true when selecting which muscle groups to work on a given day. You're correct in that you would not want to work your triceps the day after working chest and shoulders as chances are you already worked your triceps on your chest and shoulders day. In XTRAIN we always have a rest day between workouts where assisting muscles were used the day before or we do a workout that doesn't use the same muscles like a lower body or cardio workout.

The advantage of the muscle group combination you mentioned (DAY #1: chest + triceps + shoulders) and (DAY#2: Back and Bi's) is that you're working the main muscles and the assisting muscles on the same day and this means you can work out again without a rest day between the two workouts. The disadvantage of this method is that since you're using a lot of the same assisting muscles for different muscle groups during the same workout this can negatively prevent you from working your larger main muscles. For example: If you burn out your shoulder muscles you will not be able to work your chest muscles as hard as you should. If you burn out your triceps this will affect your ability to do exercises like shoulder presses for your shoulder muscles. But again every method of training has both advantages and disadvantages, so don't think I'm knocking the method you use. As you know we have used this method in a lot of videos of ours.

XTRAIN is based on undulating periodization. The advantage of this type of training is that we use a lot of different types of workouts to offset the pros and cons of the different training methods. Just as you shouldn't put all of your money in one company in the stock market, you also shouldn't train the same way every week. When you mix things up you avoid plateaus and overuse injuries and you will find in the long run that you will also achieve your fitness goals much more quickly.