2 Reasons Why Your Weekly Split Should Begin With… SHOULDERS AND TRAPS!!!
We’ve talked about the importance of utilizing bodybuilding splits for your health and fitness journey.
There’s no need to go over the benefits of that style of training over and over again.
It used to piss me off when people would fight with me tooth and nail on whether or not split training or training like a “bodybuilder” was superior.
The truth is that as with all things, it’s not all black and white. You don’t “have to” commit to doing only one thing or only the other. There is a gray area.
Sometimes it is better to focus on full body training, especially when you are just starting off and don’t know anything about your body.
Once you have made some progress utilizing full body workouts, you are going to want to start utilizing split training.
Split training enables you to hammer each individual body part with specific exercises for each body part in a structured format.
What used to annoy me about a lot of “full body” advocates was that a lot of these people were unhappy with their physiques and had gone years without making any progress. And yet when I suggested to them that they should go to “the other side” (split workouts), they would still want to argue and send links to studies that didn’t mean a damn thing.
But people are going to do what they are going to to. That’s reality.
As someone who loves fitness and can “talk shop” all day long, I have a new suggestion for you.
2 Reasons Why Your Weekly Split Should Begin With… SHOULDERS AND TRAPS!!!
Shoulders and traps are important to the initial impact of your frame. Why not start the week off with them?
1. Shoulders + Traps = Frame
When people say they want to get bigger, of course they mean they want to get bigger overall. No one wants to develop an imbalanced physique.
However, when they visualize themselves as being bigger “someday”, what are they really thinking? Where are they really looking?
They are looking at the top of the frame, the traps and the shoulders.
I am going to keep this very simple for you. When people initially look at you and your frame, they see the width of your shoulders and the development of your traps.
When people notice imposing size or imposing frame, this is the first thing they notice.
You ever hear about someone who talks about lifting for years but laments at the fact they still don’t have that WOW factor. People cannot tell that they lift. They aren’t imposing and they blend in with the crowd.
The answer to their problem is frame. They need focus their efforts on developing an imposing frame.
Shoulders and traps need to be worked and like any lagging body part, they need to be prioritized and worked early.
Day 1 is a good place to start.
2. Momentum
This applies more so to the lazy pieces of shit who “can’t” go to the gym for whatever reason.
I don’t understand how someone “can’t” make it into the gym but I am becoming more empathetic as I age so perhaps I can see where they are coming from.
Momentum can be a bitch. It’s very easily to start rolling off the cliff. It’s very difficult to start climbing up the mountain.
One thing that often prevents people from even getting their training week started is that simply choose the wrong body part for Day 1.
If you don’t have a lot of willpower in the first place, does it make sense to start off Monday with a long leg or back workout? Of course not.
That doesn’t sound fun, not even for the hardcore.
As with anything that requires momentum, sometimes all you need to do is start small.
If you “can’t’ make it into the gym, take the pressure off of yourself. Just start small.
Start your week off with a 30 minute shoulder and trap workout.
Get in. Get to work. And get out.
My Current Shoulder/Trap Work Out
I wrote this article as someone who has fully embraced Day 1 as my shoulder/trap day.
I don’t train nearly as hard/heavy/often as I used to but that’s okay because I put in the work and it will continue to pay off for the rest of my life.
My lifting days are anywhere from 30-45 minutes. Shoulders/traps are no different.
Here is the current workout I am doing every Monday morning.
Shoulders
Rear Delt Cable Flys: 3*15
Bent Over DB Laterals: 4*15
One Arm DB Front Raises: 3*15
Seated Shoulder Press Machine: 3*15
Traps
Standing DB Shrugs: 2*25
Check out the original SBS article on shoulder training here.
If you are interested in going “trap heavy” and really building up that powerful neck, I highly recommend you check out our Monster Traps program here.
Other than that, thanks for all the love and support. You all mean so much to me 🙂
P.S. – Our new Facebook Group (LOOKSMAX MASTERMIND), is gaining a nice little following, you should check it out.
Episode 1 of the new podcast was a lot of fun and we got some great feedback. Check that out here.
4 Comments
Good shit. Been starting out with shoulders for just this reason will have to throw in some trap work as well. Also been focusing more on rear delts after reading your shoulder training article, been making a difference. Makes perfect sense. Same with split training. Been leaning more and more to weight training for aesthetics and doing things like boxing and BJJ for “real world strength/applicable strength”.
That’s awesome bro!
This is why I love your blog so much Sonny! All your fantastic advice – girls, mindset, life – is rooted in bodybuilding 🙂
I was actually one of your “full body zealots” the first 1-2 years I started lifting 😀 And honestly I say I kind of regret it, it has definitely set my physique back (it didn’t help I injured my knee during that period and also was swamped with schoolwork but whatever). Once I started reading your blog though I realized I needed to take a step back and truly evaluate what adjustments I needed/need to make to my training to get the results I wanted, as opposed to training the way I wanted. My physique is still a work in progress and I have only started lifting really lifting consistently for a bit under a year, but I’m just putting in the work and enjoying the process.
1) That being said, one thought on the “full body vs split training” debates:
I actually train FULL BODY right now (Hurting Bombs style). I would argue that one should look at “full-body” (done right with the goal of building your physique & looking jacked, which is the main reason most guys lift anyways but somehow are reluctant to admit that…) as another form of split training. The problem with the generic full body workouts (usually this is Starting Strength/Stronglifts or a very similar style of program) is that: a) They are intended for total beginners who need a STRENGTH BASE b) as such they are very MINIMALISTIC which is usually helpful for beginners so as to prevent them from overloading themselves with different shit but over the long term minimalistic training only yields minimalistic results (learned this the hard way…).
I like to think of “full-body” workouts as a split where you are “shuffling” the different bodyparts. The idea being that rather than hit a bodypart with high volume in one session, you employ frequency to achieve the volume over the course of the week. At this point the volume vs frequency is personal opinion (I kind prefer frequency right now) and based on what works for you. But don’t be mistaken I will definitely experiment with the traditional split training later in my lifting career.
The bottom line I would make for people starting out: please don’t be dogmatic and have an “either-or” mindset, like Sonny has said time and time again find out what works for you.
2) Back to the article in hand, here’s another reason why I believe one should absolutely prioritize shoulders and traps AS A NATURAL: this goes back to the “wow” factor, if you look at the physiques of juicers and compare them to naturals, what stands out? You immediately notice they have much better developed traps and delts! The reason being that those bodyparts have a high concentration of androgen receptors and thus they tend to blow up due to high T levels. The reality is, as a natural, you may probably never achieve that “juicy” shoulder/trap look to the extent of roiders. As a result, it only makes sense to focus even more on your shoulders and traps over the entire course of your lifting career, they truly need time and dedication to look fantastic.
Sorry that was a lot I wrote but I like talking about this stuff haha 🙂 Would love to hear what you think!
Great comment. Thanks for the feedback. Yes. I would agree that everyone should dabble in full body especially in the beginning.
TBH even later on, let’s say after 6+ years of training it’s good to revisit those full body workouts. At the very least, it switches things up and shocks the muscle.
Another thing to keep in mind is that full body workouts, when done with taxing exercises (ex. incorporating squats/deadlifts) is a great way to keep the heart rate up as well.