4 day texas

[Nogearoridea]

Hi, I am watt do the 4 day Texas Method and have made this, could anyone tell me what I could change. Thanks

Monday

Squat @ 5X5 @ 90% 5RM
Deadlift @ New 5RM
Back Extensions @ 5X10

Tuesday

Bench @ New 5RM
OHP @ 3X5
Pull Ups @ AMRAP X 3

Thursday

Squat @ New 5RM
Deadlift @ 1X5 @ 90% 5RM
Ab Work

Saturday

Bench @ 5X5 @ 90% 5RM
OHP @ 3X8
Squat @ 2X5 @ 75% 5RM
Chins @ AMRAP X 3

Squat X3
Bench X2
Deadlift X2
Press X2

[chrisza]

I'm running a 4 day TM right now and have the upper body day before the lower. So far it's great as I feel like I have a full tank of gas at the start of each workout vs 3 day full body. Your 3rd squat day usually isn't programmed in a 4 day split, but only you can tell if it's working or not. Otherwise, looks like a solid setup.

Mine is:

Sunday

Press intensity rotating rep PR's
Bench CG 5x5
LTE 3x12

Mon

Squat 5x5
Chins

Wed

Bench intensity
Press 5x5
Dips 3x12

Thurs
Squat intensity
DL 1x5 top set then 1-2 backoffs - 10%
Chins

2-3 days week HITT on bike.

[Alex Ptacek]

Hey man. A couple of changes I would make.

First, I would do deadlifts for 2 sets of 5 on the 2nd deadlift day. Take out the squats on Saturday, too. I assume you are focusing on bench and not the press?

[Frankie]

Sounds pretty retarded to do a bench PR and then try and do volume work on the press on the same day.

[Alex Ptacek]

Sounds pretty retarded to do a bench PR and then try and do volume work on the press on the same day.

It isn't. I PR'd my bench intensity and Press 5x5 for multiple weeks. People think doing heavy deadlifts after volume squats is stupid, too. Your body adapts.

[chrisza]

Sounds pretty retarded to do a bench PR and then try and do volume work on the press on the same day.

It's not bad at all. Your only doing a few reps 1-6. It's actually way easier to do vs volume squats 5x5 or whatever and then volume bench/press on the same day.

[Andrew Jackson]

Hi, I am watt do the 4 day Texas Method and have made this, could anyone tell me what I could change. Thanks

Monday

Squat @ 5X5 @ 90% 5RM
Deadlift @ New 3-5RM
Back Extensions @ 5X10

Tuesday

Bench @ New 5RM
OHP @ 3-5X5
Pull Ups @ AMRAP X 3

Thursday

Squat @ New 5RM
Squat @ 2X5 @ 80-85% 5RM
Deadlift @ 2X5 @ 85% 5RM
Ab Work

Saturday

OHP @ 5RM
Bench @ 5X5 @ 90% 5RM
Chins @ AMRAP X 3

Squat X3
Bench X2
Deadlift X2
Press X2

Edits in bold above. I would only add the back off sets if you're not making progress on your top work set.

[Frankie]

It's not bad at all. Your only doing a few reps 1-6. It's actually way easier to do vs volume squats 5x5 or whatever and then volume bench/press on the same day.

It isn't. I PR'd my bench intensity and Press 5x5 for multiple weeks. People think doing heavy deadlifts after volume squats is stupid, too. Your body adapts.

I appreciate your guys opinion and experience but comparing a squat then bench or a squat and then deadlift are not the same thing.

Alex, it sounds like your progress on the press and bench petered out after 'multiple weeks', so maybe not a great programming idea or even a long enough study duration?

Now that I have slept on it I realized I had probably wrongly assumed at a glance that the OP valued progression on the Press as much as the other 3 lifts - it looks like he just wants to use the press as an accessory and throw in some random pressing like a bodybuilder would for variety. Fair enough, but if we are talking about pure strength gain on all 4 lifts I still contend that this program is indeed: retarded.

Even after Andrews' adjustments I still just can't see any logic behind this program, reading it is like staring at a Magic Eye that just won't come into focus. What exactly is wrong with proper TM?

[Andrew Jackson]

What do you define as “proper” TM?

[Ryan Hirschman]

Sounds pretty retarded to do a bench PR and then try and do volume work on the press on the same day.

Amazing; I’m sure this is exactly the type of feedback the OP was looking for.

To the OP: Your 4 day split looks pretty good. I’ve been running a four day upper/lower TM split since the end of March (after I competed in mid-March), and absolutely love it. I agree with the comments that have been mentioned, especially getting rid of that 3rd squat slot on day four, and only adding it back in once you need back offs on intensity day (just do a top set of five on the intensity day for as long as you can, w/o backoffs). The other thing I would say about the overall setup is to consider doing the upper body days before the lower body days. Squats and DLs will most assuredly cause enough fatigue to adversely effect your upper body day, but the upper opposite is less true. This is probably more important for someone like me who trains m/t/th/f, and not as big of a deal for you since you have that extra day off between your third and fourth training sessions. Furthermore, I was given the excellent advice of putting my intensity DL set BEFORE volume squats, especially if your DL gets stuck.

Not sure if you are familiar with the Barbell Logic Podcast (you should be, it’s awesome), but they did an episode on the four day split, which you can find HERE. Also, Andy Baker has put out a lot of great info on the four day split, and you can check out one of his articles HERE.

Feel free to check out my training log Attempting to go from HirschMAN to HirschMACHINE, and you can see how some of my choices were terrible, and some were [probably] a little better. Good luck with your program, and let us know how it goes!