Advantages of Full-Body Routines For Beginners

If you have already taken the step and finally you have decided to enroll in the gym, first of all, congratulations. This will be the best decision you will take to strengthen the health of your body. But do not eat cravings, because during the first day you come across a sea of doubts about the type of exercises that you can perform and how often you do it. It is normal, because nobody is born knowing.

The best thing you can do in this case is to advise you in the best way possible and for this we are going to help you a little, or well, maybe quite. Assuming you’ve ever done any discipline that allows you to gain muscle mass as crossfit, calisthenics or lifting weights, then read this carefully.

The most effective way to start gaining muscle, is through full body exercises. You may already be familiar with them, because in the last few weeks we have been talking about it more often than usual. As we have already explained, full body exercises to do at home differ from weider workouts in the type of exercises performed. Its name says it all, “full-body: full body,” meaning that you work all the muscles of the body in the same training session. Weider routines, on the other hand, are characterized by multi-articulation or isolation exercises in which one or two muscle groups are focused on the same training day.

You are probably also related to concepts such as “chest / arm” or expressions so common to many students as “today I touch leg, tomorrow I touch back and biceps”. For that is precisely the type of Weider training, which focuses on the work of a few muscle groups to give way to the growth of lean mass.

With full-body routines, full body workout and is undoubtedly the best choice to start training if you do not have a pre – conditioning base. The reason for this is because as already explained in the article on the number of repetitions ideal for hypertrophy, a novice can achieve impressive results in the first months of training. To give you an idea, performing these types of routines up to a total of 3 times a week, accompanied by impeccable food and adequate rest, you can achieve a growth of up to 1 kilo lean mass every month, especially if you have a genetics Predisposed for muscle gains.

Why do full-body routines?

At first, it is common to see in the gym many novices make the same mistake over and over again. The term novato applies to all those people who train with weights and can see progressions in a linear way, that is, when lifting with loads that increase progressively and then decrease for a small period of time to increase again and still Continue to see results.

Generally, all people who have started training in the gym are considered novices (unless previously practiced a similar discipline) and to be able to overcome this barrier to finally be considered intermediate, requires a constant training of at least 6 months.

Therefore, a newbie, while you can stick to the norms of weider training, is not the most recommended. Firstly because the muscles are not prepared to withstand a more isolated work, which increases the risk of injury significantly and undoubtedly many discomforts when carrying out the insurrections as excessive pain or bad postures that would only lead to frustration and therefore , To the abandonment of the training.

With the full-body avoid these problems, because although they are also considered as intense training, at the same time are much more bearable, since each exercise involves a greater number of muscles to combat with the loads used. Despite this, this will be enough to stimulate muscle fibers and thus gain muscle mass gains of up to one kilogram every month if you have the best of the genetic.

As linear progressions fail to show results (approximately six months, although this varies from person to person) it will be time then to pass weider types to increase the stimulation to the muscles worked and thus to continue with the progression.

Many users, based on their training routines such permanently, as if this were the only existing method of training, leaving aside even better routines, such as the “Full Body” we discussed today. This situation can be due to several causes, like for example:

• Many may think that other types of methods such as Full Body are “novices”, because neophyte users are recommended these types of routines, with greater frequency and intensity with a lower volume.


• With Weider routines you get that much-prized feeling of muscle congestion. To say that muscle congestion is the swelling muscles suffer from increased blood flow due to the need to maintain the energy and oxygen supply as well as the elimination of metabolic wastes during physical activity. Increased muscle congestion does not always mean better results.


• The Weider routines foster the emergence of shoelaces, which suggests that many more shoelaces have, greater our muscular development. The onset of muscle soreness is not indicative of the effectiveness of training, because its appearance is closely related to the experience that the individual has in a given practice. For example, the first day that you perform a new exercise, the stiffness will be accused, but as you adapt to it, these are disappearing, even if the intensity is greater.

Therefore, it is important to dispel the idea that many have that the Full Body routines are for beginners, this type of training is the most remarkable in terms of increased strength and muscle mass, the key is to carry out a correct training schedule to adapt it to our fitness level. With regard to higher levels of “muscle congestion” and “stiffness”, these are not always synonymous with effective training.

Focusing and routines “Full Body”, explaining that these are multi – joint use basic exercises involving large muscle groups in one session. It is based on the idea of training the body as a whole face to be more functional, rather than as the sum of the parts. With this it is possible to stimulate a greater muscular mass in a single training. The muscle groups are again “attacked” after 2 or 3 days although they do not usually coincide neither exercises, intensity, nor a number of sets. The intensities that are handled in this case can range from 60-65% of 1 RM to 85-90% of 1 RM .

That said, the aim of this article is to focus on the benefits that “Full Body” routines will bring us in order to improve our body composition, as well as in relation to our strength levels. My idea is not to belittle other routines, like Weider in favor of “Full Body”, since both have their advantages and disadvantages. Just pretend to bring the reality of other training methods that can be even more effective.

Advantages of full-body routines

If we compare it mainly with the divided routines, we can observe the following remarkable advantages:

• Good planning for beginners: if you are going to start moving now dumbbells, choosing a full – body routine you will bring great benefits when recovering after each training session. In addition, gains in lean mass and strength are quite noticeable and if you’ve just started the gym is a very good choice


• Noticeable strength gains: thanks to the frequency that has this kind of routine, progress in increasing strength is usually very good. It rests enough and necessary to be able to realize sessions really intense.


• DOMS: as in the T / P routines, in this type of training do not usually appear shoelaces. I repeat, stiffness is not a symptom of progression. For example: if we perform a hundred bicep curl lifts with a 2Kg dumbbell, we will get high congestion and probably stiffness the next day, but this does not generate hypertrophy or gain of strength.


• Optimal fat loss: when our intention is to lose fat and set a good routine to follow is a full – body that allows us to increase our strength to maintain lean mass as possible. In addition we can organize two heavy days and one day of metabolic circuit.


• Best to gain strength: generally the types of routine oriented force are based on this system, some examples are mentioned in the article on force: 5×5 Madcow, Jim Wendler 5/3/1 and many others of which I speak later.


• Compatibility with other sports: such routines can be reconciled with any other sports area whether deprotes groups such as football, basketball, handball, or more individual like tennis.


• Good hormonal response: for muscle mass growth occurs, there are three very important hormones that influence this: testosterone, growth factor (IGF-1) and growth hormone GH. With this kind of full – body routines it generated a great demand increasing levels of these anabolic hormones, superior to that produced training by groups divided.


• Training based on multi – joint exercises, which require a large muscle mass to be executed, causes a great segregation and growth hormone testosterone to. This contributes to greater muscle development.


• Produced a minor damage to the muscle fibers compared to the Weider system, this allows a complete recovery between sessions (48-72 hours), being prepared to receive a new stimulus. Many times, people do not progress because they are not recovering from one session to another.


• The fact of being a training of about three days a week, is going to suppose a total volume much inferior to the one of other routines. Therefore, it is ideal for people who lead a very busy life, taking less time to meet its obligations. Or, for people who practice some sports, this being an ideal system to incorporate into the training program, always taking into account the recovery periods.


• With this type of training, each of the major muscle groups are stimulated at least three times a week , this entails greater specialization in the different exercises we conduct, and it will be a faster build muscle mass.


• The “Full Body” system will allow you to distribute your sessions throughout the week of the way that best suits you, with no impact globally on the routine. Since every day of training a full body session, if one day we can not train, we can always do the training the next day without any problem. If we did this with Weider routines, we would have to do a restructuring with the goal of working all the muscle groups in the week, or leave some without training.


• With this method, our Central Nervous System have time to recover, so pregnant avoid fatiguing day after day, which will affect training intensity.


• Given the above, this method has an excellent distribution to increase force levels. There are many programs designed by prestigious coaches that are more than proven to be very effective: Routine Rippetoe-5 × 5 for beginners, Routine force 5 × 5 intermediate (Bill Star), Routine of force 5 × 5 advanced (Bill Star And Glenn Pendlay), among others.


• For individuals who want to train at home , this type of training is conducive to this, as it allows us to work using more global exercises without much material to make them .


• Since this is a routine low volume (+/- 3 days a week), it is ideal for those who are on a diet of calorie deficit in order to lose fat percentage. This type of training will provide them with the necessary stimulus to maintain muscle mass without overwork, which could be counterproductive to achieve their goals. In addition, by varying the components of the training load (volume, intensity, density, frequency and duration), this routine will be a good choice for those who want to lose weight, as an alternative to another type of cardio.

Disadvantages of full-body routines

The disadvantages of these types of routines are similar to torso leg routines, from my point of view should not be considered like this:

• False belief little progression: being routines that allow both muscular rest, often thought that not having large muscular congestion during training and subsequently to rest both our progress will be less and this is totally false.


• It requires good planning: if our intention is to train for two days straight, we must know how to choose the right intensity according to our body. Being routines that require a lot of intensity, our SNC must rest the necessary between one session and another.

Example of full-body routines

One of the great advantages of full-body routines is that they take much less time to be done, because when distributing work all muscle groups , is given the necessary time to each group between each exercise before involving again The same fibers, causing the waiting times of up to two minutes to be completely zero.

To make matters worse, the possibility of progressing with body-weight exercises makes this kind of workout excellent for practicing at home, so there are no longer any pretexts such as lack of money or time to go to the gym.

An example of exercises that we can include in a full-body routine to perform at home, are the following:

• Pushups: Excellent to develop chest muscles and arms, specifically, the triceps. At the same time other parts of the body are involved, such as the shoulder and abdomen. If you can not do them do not worry, because we have an excellent guide with which you can progress in your push-ups until finally you can execute them impeccably.


• Squats: The essential for the development of lower – body exercise. Involves legs, calves and buttocks.


• Dominated or rowing: For growth back and biceps. If the dominates are difficult to realize at the beginning, we can try with the dumbbell rowing or inverted rowing to have a similar development.


• Plates: Excellent to have an abdomen strengthened without jeopardizing the lumbar area with typical crunches.

Knowing this, we can plan a routine so completely easy. It involves performing three to five circuits with the four exercises, performing between 8 and 10 repetitions per exercise to hypertrophy. For example:

Circuit 1:

• Push-ups: 10 – 12 reps


• Squats: 10 – 12 reps


• Dominated: 8 – 10 reps


• Plates: Until reaching the fault

Circuit 2:

• Push-ups: 10 – 12 reps


• Squats: 10 – 12 reps


• Dominated: 8 – 10 reps


• Plates: Until reaching the fault

And so on to complete the circuits. Ideally, do this routine three times a week, such as Monday, Wednesday and Friday, taking on Tuesdays and Thursdays for some cardio routine and take advantage of Saturday and Sunday to rest without neglecting food.

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