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It seems everyone in the gym is working out for mass. I know this because they use the bodybuilding split approach I.e. A body part or two per day per week. While there is nothing wrong with this if you’re trying to get as big as possible, this method is less effective if you’re after a lean and athletic body. I will talk about a more effective approach, in my opinion, that I use to remain lean. ( I think using a full-body workouts will greatly increase the chances of building an athletic body that not only looks good but is effective as well, not entirely unlike the one above.)
Training Like an Athlete
An athlete working out is all about efficiency and how their workout can translate into the playing field. There is no time spent wasted on building muscles for show but purely effectiveness, They also know that the body does not work in isolation at any time. They train movements not muscles. Therefore, training like an athlete means targeting all the movements possible throughout the whole body such as hip extension, pulling, pushing, etc. instead of singling out body parts separately a la bodybuilders. This totally goes against the aim of bodybuilding, Bodybuilders are mainly concerned with “show muscles” i.e. muscles to exhibit, which there is nothing wrong with, but does not always mean functionality, even in real life. For example, who is most likely to catch a bus they are running for: the bulked-up bodybuilder or the fit guy with an athletic physique? I would assume it would be the latter. Bodybuilders are concerned with lifting with a high volume and intensity to break down the muscle fiber in a muscle group. After the workout, the muscle then needs to rest to repair itself and for this to happen there has to be enough protein and nutrients present. Hypertrophy then sets in after a period of time, if done properly.
Strength Training Splits
The opposite of bodybuilding is functional training. Functional training has a lot of definitions but one of the best I’ve seen says that “Functional strength training involves performing work against resistance in such a manner that the improvements in strength directly enhance the performance of movements so that an individual’s activities of daily living are easier to perform.” Couldn’t have said it better myself. The whole idea is improvement of our movement patterns on and off the playing field. This type of training considers all the different types of movements available at a joint or muscle group and uses the best possible exercises to mimic the performance movement. For instance, a deadlift would be more transferable in helping you pick something up from the floor than leg extensions. This is the type of best workout splits I have practiced right from the start. I had a short stint with the “body part per day” approach but I found I could not adjust to it and had to change quickly back. My approach to strength training then depends on the season. During the in-season I try to work on purely maintaining strength levels so follow a purely functional training approach. During the off-season i.e. summer I try to use a bit of both that is, I like to build strength but use bodybuilding techniques to make certain muscle groups look bigger. That’s for another post but for now, we will look at functional training for an athletic body.
Bodybuilding workouts Vs. Functional Training Workouts
The approach of blitzing a muscle group hard per day and then neglecting that muscle group to let it repair and grow is the purpose of bodybuilding. A split workout is used to do this and its setup to work out the entire body over a couple of days. Therefore, a 3-day split would take 3 days to hit each body part and 4 would take 4, etc. When training functionally, your body trains for the perfection of specific movement patterns and strengthening the muscles involved in those movement patterns. When bodybuilders train on the other hand, though they may gain some strength, they also gain a relatively high amount of mass. This may also happen when training functionally, usually in beginners when their body is adjusting to the workouts, but when it does happen it is purely to improve performance. Bodybuilding creates mass which usually is detrimental to performance because it does not always serve a purpose.
A bodybuilding program is easy to create because it is so common even to the point where people think it is the default way to train. An example of a 3-day split could be:
Day 1) Back, Biceps (“pulling muscles”)
Day 2) Chest, Shoulders, Triceps (“pushing muscles”)
Day 3) Legs, Calves, and Abs
Day 4) Rest
Functional Training Program
• Incline bench press
• Pull-ups / Inverted rows
• Bicep curl to press
• (Triceps pull-down)/Close Grip Pushups
• Squats/ Deadlifts
• Physioball leg curl
• Planks
This workout is repeated over 3 – 4 days a week and it works the whole body and involves all the major muscle groups in one workout which is actually time-saving because you don’t have to worry about one body part. And for the case of variation, it is easy to switch exercises around because there are bodyweight alternatives to the exercises. Training the body repeatedly in this manner with strength as the main aim helps to keep the workout time short but increases effectiveness. In short, when we keep the reps low and the load heavy, we increase strength without mass and then shock definition into our muscles. It’s a win-win. There are great resources all over the web regarding functional training. One workout that really incorporates full-body compound movements is the StrongLifts 5 x 5.
Full-Body Workouts
I have a few of the E-Books to give away, so if interested you could leave me your e-mail address and I will gladly send it your way, as a gesture of goodwill for being a member of this site. One of the best places is at Craig Ballantyne’s TT Fat Loss blog which has some of the best on full-body workouts that use mainly compound exercises. In fact, he has a workout made just for athletes that incorporate pulling, pushing and all other movements required. It has an interval training routine that can help to improve stamina as well as torch fat. I got a link that gets it for under $10 for Lean Athlete Fitness members. If you give the “TT for Athletes” workout a go, please tell me how it goes for you. I bet you will be pleasantly surprised at how effective this workout is in getting you more athletic and torching your bodyfat.
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