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[Kasinator]

That's right! I finally have gotten enough time to sit down and write the expert level workout.

This program is specifically designed to gain serious muscle mass. I suggest this for people who have been lifting weights for at least a year or have already hit a plateau for the other two workouts. You will grow, you will be sore, but by con day, you will be in the best shape of your life!

Equipment: This workout will require either a gym membership, with the optional equipment of a digital timer, a weighted vest, and a jump rope.

Difficulty: 10/10 - It only is supposed to get harder form here. From this point on, the only way you get stronger is to test your limits both physically, and mentally. What do I mean by this? I ask you to use your brain as much as your brawn. To question your routine, your form, your diet, and so many other things.

Results: In the past five months of doing this program, I have gained a remarkable 5lbs of muscle, and had I adjusted my routine to break plateau, I know I would have gained more. My bench press went from a week 115lbs, to almost 200lbs with no signs of slowing down.

Important Things to Remember:

-Check this out with your doctor: I Don't want anyone here to get hurt.

-Nutrition: You WILL NOT get bigger or stronger without correct nutrition. I am updating the posted nutrition guide to help further understand proper nutrition for muscle gains. If you have no problems with the workout, you will have to test yourself here for the best results.

-Good Form: You are lifting heavy loads in this program. I am asking people to keep their egos in their proper place, and to lower their weight for the sake of good form, and a full range of motion. Proper form will increase strength, muscle growth, and prevent serious injury.

-Modify Exercises That Are Harder, or Are Becoming Easier to do: A lot of exercises on here are hard to do, That is expected here. However, some exercises will need a spotter or will have to be replaced, because setup will become more difficult as you up your weight. An example being the dumbbell shoulder press. Once you are unable to bring the weights up to begin the exercise, You will either require a spotter, or the use of a machine.

-REST: At least seven hours or more is demanded here. If you do not rest, you will not recover properly. Not only is this unhealthy, but you will not make your gains.

Final Notes: This workout below is not set in stone, If you are capable of making a better routine yourself, go for it! If you can construct a similar workout at home, awesome! If you are getting bored with this routine, feel free to change it up! Just think of this routine as a template. Dividing the exercises with a body part for each day to maximize rest, and thereby maximize your results.

Workout Schedule*:

For the first month, Follow this routine to the letter. After each set, "rest" for 2-3 minutes while you spend 1.5 minutes doing a form of good cardio. Jumping ropes, run in place, whatever your fancy. This is the easy part.

Week 1 of month two, you will up the weight so you will perform a maximum of 3-5 reps. If you you go past this in one of your sets, you will add weight. Remember to keep your form above everything else.After each set, "rest" for 2-3 minutes while you spend 1.5 minutes doing a form of good cardio. Jumping ropes, run in place, whatever you want to try.

Week 2, you will go back to the normal routine from month one. just add weight if you go beyond the reps. After each set Rest 2-3 minutes spending at least 1.5 minutes doing good cardio.

Week 3, you will be doing the first half of the routine doing the 3-5 reps, resting 2-3 minutes while doing the 1.5 minutes of good cardio once again. The second half of the routine, your will go back to the regular routine, this time with only 30 seconds rest. If you need to lower your weight to keep up, so be it.

Week 4 onward you will use the weight you used for 3-5 reps, and try to get up to the 8-15 reps the standard routine recommends you reach.

Day 1: Chest
Day 2: Back
Day 3: Legs
Day 4: Shoulders
Day 5: Triceps
Day 6: Biceps
Day 7: Rest

* Abdominal training will be explained later due to the preferential nature of desired results.

Day 1: Chest Routine

* Barbell Bench Press: 3 sets of 8-12 reps
* Incline Dumbbell Press: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Smith Machine Incline Bench Press: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Cable Crossover: 3 sets of 10 reps
* Incline Dumbbell Flyes: 2 sets of 10 reps

Day 2: Back Routine

* Pullups: 3 sets of 10 reps
* Bent Over Barbell Row: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Wide-Grip Lat Pulldown: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Seated One-Arm Cable Pulley Rows: 2 sets of 10 reps
* Close-Grip Front Lat Pulldown: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Straight-Arm Pulldown: 3 sets of 10 reps

Day 3: Legs Routine

* Leg Press: 6 sets of 10 reps
* Barbell Lunges: 3 sets of 12 reps
* Thigh Adductor: 3 sets of 10 reps
* Seated Leg Curl: 3 sets of 10 reps
* Thigh abductor: 3 sets of 8 reps

Day 4: Shoulder Routine

* Dumbbell Shoulder Press: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Lateral Raises: 2 sets of 10 reps
* Military Press: 2 sets of 8-10 reps
* Rear Delt Raises: 2 sets of 10 reps
* Upright Barbell Rows: 2 sets of 10 reps
* Dumbbell Shrugs: 2 sets of 15 reps

Day 5: Tricep/Bicep/Forearm Routine

* Barbell Curl: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
* Triceps Pushdown - V-Bar Attachment: 3 sets of 10 reps
* Concentration Curls: 3 sets of 8-10 reps
* Weighted Bench Dip: 2 sets of 12 reps
* Alternate Hammer Curl: 2 sets of 10 reps
* Standing Bent-Over Two-Arm Dumbbell Triceps Extensions: 3 sets of 12 reps
* Palms-Down Dumbbell Wrist Curl Over A Bench: 2 sets of 8-10 reps

Day 6: cardio and ab routine

30 minutes of good cardio Plus your ab routine of choice.



The Abs:

In order to get abs, you need to do a lot of cardio to show them. From there, you need to decide if you want muscular or toned abs. for muscular, you need to do weighted abs exercises. I do six sets of 8 reps or 3 reps on the machines for muscle, depending on the week. for toned abs, I do 6 super sets of twisting situps, and weighted leg ups for 25 reps each 3 times a week every other day. Thats it. Nothing fancy huh? It really doesn't need to be.

Well, I hope this helps Everyone. May you reach, and exceed your goals.

[Kasinator]

Extra writing space for future!

[Kasinator]

another piece of extra writing space for the future!! XD

[ElricChaos]

Thanks for posting this! I'm definitely trying this one out.

[Giant Alucard]

I'm doing the 531 Muscle program myself for my muscle gain. For the most part I've heard awesome things about it. I'm gonna doing three alternating muscle workout days (mon,wed,fri), with crossfit in between (mostly using my weighted vests and arm bands, which will be between 40-80 lbs exta), and then I have sand bags and a weighted slammer medicine ball. And I've never used the situp machine myself, cause I never feel like I get a good workout from it. I'd rather use a inclined bench and use a 20 lbs medicine ball oe higher plate and use those for resistance. I have no doubt you'll see awesome results on yours though man, cant wait to see the results!

[therob127]

Might try this out after I've finish my workout and did a couple weeks of really high reps(20-25) to change it up. I like the idea of this workout but I never get to the gym enough to do a 6 day split. I usually do a combo split routine of:

Day1: Chest/Biceps
Day2: Legs/shoulders
Day3: Cardio/Abs
Day4: Back/Triceps

[Rjr3412]

Why aren't dead lifts in your back or leg routines? Important exercise is important!

[Kasinator]

Originally Posted by therob127

Might try this out after I've finish my workout and did a couple weeks of really high reps(20-25) to change it up. I like the idea of this workout but I never get to the gym enough to do a 6 day split. I usually do a combo split routine of:

Day1: Chest/Biceps
Day2: Legs/shoulders
Day3: Cardio/Abs
Day4: Back/Triceps

Not a bad workout I must admit. This could work easily as an in between for the inter mediate and expert. My only problem Is for a bulking program, they want you to do too many reps and too few sets. But I really cant knock it unless I give this a try. However a lot of information on Bodybuilding.com is helpful, a lot of it can be misdirection. Catering to bad advice such as "clean" bulking and cutting, and convincing you to get their supplements. Remember it's more than okay to question things, even if they seem like ridiculous questions. Questions like: why so many reps? Why so few sets? If I'm trying to gain muscle mass should I really do cardio every day? Bodybuilding and fitness isn't necessarily complicated, But that does not mean it requires little to no thinking either. Again I will point to Mike Mentzer on this (thanks distantarray for telling me about him). He was a intelectual first, and a bodybuilder second. He thought about why body builders in his time who were exercising so much and eating so well, were dying before reaching 60 due to heart attacks. He wondered why despite training for long periods of time he wasn't growing muscle. He then figured out the answers to both of these questions was gross overtraining.

My point is find the one that works.

Why aren't dead lifts in your back or leg routines? Important exercise is important!

While I do see the merit of dead lifts, I have the feeling some newbie will come on this board and do this exercise despite my warnings of this not being a beginners workout and possibly break his back doing a dead lift. I will admit I do not do dead lifts, but I do work my lower back with barbell squats.

[therob127]

Originally Posted by Kasinator

Not a bad workout I must admit. This could work easily as an in between for the inter mediate and expert. My only problem Is for a bulking program, they want you to do too many reps and too few sets. But I really cant knock it unless I give this a try. However a lot of information on Bodybuilding.com is helpful, a lot of it can be misdirection. Catering to bad advice such as "clean" bulking and cutting, and convincing you to get their supplements. Remember it's more than okay to question things, even if they seem like ridiculous questions. Questions like: why so many reps? Why so few sets? If I'm trying to gain muscle mass should I really do cardio every day? .

The workout changes as your progress through it. Starting from high reps and low sets to low reps high sets. For example weeks 4 and 10 are 5 sets of 4 reps and weeks 5 and 11(I'm on 11 right now) are 6 sets of 3 reps. It gets really hard and heavy these weeks. I've definitely seen an improvement in mass and strength over the course of this program. Of course workouts are different for everyone. I'm probably going back to my 4 day split after my couple of high rep weeks.

What I did in the past was do the same sets and reps for 3-4 weeks, but changing the exercises every week, and then change the sets and reps. Ex: 3 sets of 10 for 3-4 weeks and then do 3-5 sets of 3-5 reps for 3-4 weeks followed by 3 sets of 15-20 reps. I liked this because I didn't feel like I was locked into workout for an extended period of time and could change my routine if I wanted to. However, I did enjoy having a workout already planned out so it took the guess work out for me.

[Kasinator]

Originally Posted by therob127

The workout changes as your progress through it. Starting from high reps and low sets to low reps high sets. For example weeks 4 and 10 are 5 sets of 4 reps and weeks 5 and 11(I'm on 11 right now) are 6 sets of 3 reps. It gets really hard and heavy these weeks. I've definitely seen an improvement in mass and strength over the course of this program. Of course workouts are different for everyone. I'm probably going back to my 4 day split after my couple of high rep weeks.

What I did in the past was do the same sets and reps for 3-4 weeks, but changing the exercises every week, and then change the sets and reps. Ex: 3 sets of 10 for 3-4 weeks and then do 3-5 sets of 3-5 reps for 3-4 weeks followed by 3 sets of 15-20 reps. I liked this because I didn't feel like I was locked into workout for an extended period of time and could change my routine if I wanted to. However, I did enjoy having a workout already planned out so it took the guess work out for me.

sounds to me then you know what you are doing Awesome! I did see the changes throughout the workout period, so I did see what you were talking about. Though might I suggest you try your 4 day split routine with my suggested 4 week rep change?

[Rjr3412]

Originally Posted by Kasinator

While I do see the merit of dead lifts, I have the feeling some newbie will come on this board and do this exercise despite my warnings of this not being a beginners workout and possibly break his back doing a dead lift. I will admit I do not do dead lifts, but I do work my lower back with barbell squats.

Fair enough. Waaaaay too easy to hurt yourself with them.

I would suggest though finding a time to do a little more lower back focus. It should help bring in those stabilizers even more for your squats.

One variation that can be good, especially if you aren't fond of dead lifts are romanian deadlifts. (I believe thats what they're called.) Basically instead of setting the bar down each time and requiring some knee bending and potential back curving, instead you only bend at the waist and keep the bar off the ground through the whole set. Small change but it can make a big difference.

[therob127]

Originally Posted by Kasinator

sounds to me then you know what you are doing Awesome! I did see the changes throughout the workout period, so I did see what you were talking about. Though might I suggest you try your 4 day split routine with my suggested 4 week rep change?

I was actually thinking about doing that.

[Kasinator]

I made significant changes to this routine. take a look!