How to Create Your Own Workout Split

There is no such thing as the best workout split. The best workout split is the one that will help you stay the most consistent and achieve your goals. For example, someone might achieve better results on a four-day split than on a five-day split or vice versa.

When creating a workout split, we must take into account our lifestyle, ability to recover, frequency, genetics, weak points, strong points, and schedule.

The split you create should aim to hit every muscle group at least once to three times a week, with no more than 10 working sets executed per muscle group. The current literature suggests that hitting a muscle group two to three times a week rather than once is more optimal, but it is completely up to your discretion. You should distribute your exercises so that you work on your strong muscle groups once a week and areas of weakness two or three times a week. Furthermore, I cannot emphasize this enough: perform only straight sets. Avoid succumbing to the fallacies prevalent in gyms or on social media, such as Myo-Reps, Rest-Pause, forced repetitions, drop sets, or Supersets and Tri-Sets. They will not stimulate more muscle growth as is often believed.

Most common splits: Full body, Push-Pull-Legs (PPL), bro split, Upper-lower, four-day split, and creating your own.

After you have chosen your split, it is now time to choose your exercise selection.

Back

I recommend performing four back exercises a week. Two biasing the upper back and two biasing the lats.

Here is a sample back workout:

1. Iliac lat pulldown: One set of 7-10 reps

2. Thoracic lat cable row: One set of 7-10 reps

3. Chest supported T-Bar row (upper back emphasis): One set of 6-9 reps

4. Straight bar pulldown: One set of 7-10 reps

Chest

I recommend performing two to four exercises for the chest a week. One to two biasing the clavicular head (upper chest), and one to two biasing the costal and sternal head (low and middle fibers). If your chest is a weakness, prioritize single-joint movements such as flyes.

Here is a sample chest workout:

1. Pec Deck: One set of 5-8 reps

2. Incline Smith Machine Press: One set of 5-8 reps

3. Costal cable press: One set of 7-10 reps

Shoulders

I recommend performing three exercises for the shoulders a week. One biasing the anterior deltoids (front delt), one biasing the lateral deltoids, and one biasing the posterior deltoid (rear delt).

Lastly, I cannot stress how important it is to perform shoulder presses and lateral raise variants in the scapular plane. You also want to make sure you are training your posterior delts with a shoulder abduction of about 45 degrees so you can fully shorten them.

Here is a sample shoulder workout:

1. Anterior delt press: One set of 5-8 reps

2. Dumbbell lateral raise: One set of 7-10 reps

3. Rear delt fly: One set of 5-8 reps

Arms

I recommend performing three arm exercises a week—one for the biceps and two for the triceps.

The long head makes up the majority of your triceps, so I suggest performing mostly movements that bias the long head.

Here is a sample arm workout:

1. Cross body tricep pushdown: One set of 7-10 reps

2. JM Press: One set of 5-8 reps

3. Seated dumbbell curl: One set of 6-8 reps

Legs

I recommend performing six leg exercises a week. Three for the quadriceps, two for the hamstrings, and one for the calves.

Here is a sample leg workout:

1. Leg extension: One set of 7-10 reps

2. Leg press: One set of 5-8 reps

3. Pendulum Squat: One set of 5-8 reps

4. Seated leg curl: One set of 6-9 reps

5. Stiff-legged deadlift: One set of 5-8 reps

6. Donkey calf raise machine: One set of 7-10 reps

Reference:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27102172/