New to HST

[mftii42069]

Ok, I thinking about starting an HST routine. I have been doing max-ot for about a year and have really enjoyed it. I made solid consistant gains in size and strength. Here is the issue, my joints hurt. I enjoy being in the gym as many days during the week as possible. Here is what I am wanting to know about. How much volume can i pack into a week. Here are two lists of workouts that I plucked from the max ot routines I have done. They are interchangable with other excercises but this is the list I would start with if i could in the order i would like to do them in.
M W F
DB Incline
dips
DB shoulder press
Side lateral raises
Rear lateral raises
Barbell Shrugs
Squats
Stiff legged Dls
Skull cruchers
V-Bar tri pull down

T TH S Sunday off
Pull ups
Bent over rows
Leg Raises
Cable crunches
Weighted crunches
Standing calves
Seated calves
Close grip curls
Wide curls

If I could make this work in 2 week blocks, I would start HST tomorrow... There would be almost the same amount of rest between body parts but you would only trulely get one day off. This is a noob look at my routine thread but I havent seen a list that I liked and havent found much if anything saying how much volume is allowed and whether a split like this would work. Any help is greatly appreciated, thanks

 

[grunt11]

First if you’re switching from Max-ot to HST you’re in for a huge psychological shock. At least that’s how it was for me from 15 years ago when I was powerlifting using a program, which looked a lot like Max-ot, for hardgainers out of a book called “Mass.” So just be prepared because HST at first is going to make you feel like you’re not doing anything.

Second what’s hurting about your joints? Depending on what’s wrong you may not want to have too much volume to go along with the increase in frequency. Like you I would prefer to exercise every day, the least I’ve done on HST is 5 days a week usually 6 and at the beginning 7 for most of the first 2 cycles. During the early parts of the first two cycles I was even hitting each body part once a day 7 days a week and started to show very noticeable (i.e. other people notice them) gains in about 5-6 weeks but I was also coming off a 15 year layoff, which leads to volume.

You can fit as much volume as your body can recover from which only you can determine. In the past I’ve gotten good results out of keeping a core set of compound exercises I always use and adding in isolation (especially arms) in the beginning of the cycle and tapering them off as the weights get heavy. I felt that way I was getting the most out of the full cycle including the 15s.

The routines you’ve posted include a lot of isolation exercises which tend not to be very efficient at building mass especially in full body routines. However, if you feel you already have a good foundation from your Max-ot then there’s nothing wrong with isos, just remember that there not going to be as efficient at building mass as heavy compounds.

Also, where’s the conventional Deadlift. I can’t think of a better single mass building exercise than the Deadlift and possible also the best at building functional strength. Many body builders may shy away from it but as a foundation builder I don’t think it can be beat.

 

[Totentanz]

If your joints are hurting then you should cut back the volume and take it easy for a cycle, maybe even two, and work on strengthening up your joints and connective tissues. This would mean lower volume, fewer exercises. Remember that muscles typically gain strength faster than joints and everything, so... a cycle or two to let them catch up to your muscles would be a good idea, especially since if you are in this for the long run, you need to always be thinking about a year down the line when it comes to joint health. I don't even mess around with it anymore. If my wrists, elbows or shoulder start hurting, I drop back the volume and let it recover before I start pushing real hard again.

Also, as grunt said... you have a lot of isos. I see you hitting the shoulders like four or five different ways but not hitting the larger muscle groups as hard. Why are you hitting all these tiny muscles so much but taking it so easy on the big muscle groups?

 

[mftii42069]

THanks for the replies!

I think that the pain in my joints is caused by doing low reps high weight. Its mostly my knees and elbows/forearm. I am 5'8" 170 lbs and around 12% BF. My goal on each set is 4 reps. I did 1125 on leg press 4 reps on my first set last week. I have heard and i think now have experienced that lifting that kind of weight for a prolonged preiod of time can be hard on the joints.

All of the excercises that I posted there are from the current max ot routine i have been doing for about 4 months. There are maybe one or two on there that i did not include into the routine. None of which included DLs. The prior max ot routine i did, did include Dls. I figured that these were the excercises from the routine that i have been doing that I could not live without. My thing is that I dont have enough experience doing a lot of different routines. I am not sure what excercises I can substitute in and not lose muscle that I have worked hard to get. All i want is to be in the gym as much as possible and continue building in the same way that I have been for the past year but in an HST routine.. I have always done a routine that included both combination excersises and iso excersises. Never one that had either exclusively. I would really like to try HST, i just dont want to attempt to build a routine, realize in a couple weeks that something isnt right, and go back to what i was doing. Do you guys have an idea of an existing routine that has a lot of volume and would show similar results to Max ot? I have zero problem doing compound excersises instead of isos. I just want everythin to get hit as much as possible. Any help would be great, thanks!
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