Skip to main content

High-Frequency Dumbbell Training for Mass and Power

 Building Mass and Power/Strength with HFT + Dumbbells Combo


The great Reg Park overhead pressing a pair of dumbbells


In my last post, I outlined a brief, basic, (somewhat) hard full-body, 3-days-per-week program using ONLY dumbbells.  For this post, I'd like to outline a  high-frequency training (HFT for short, hereafter) program using primarily dumbbells to build mass, power, and strength.


The MASS is going to come about on this program from the sheer amount of total work performed in the course of the week.  When a lot of lifters -at least the ones I've worked with over the years - first take up HFT, they typically complain because it doesn't seem as if they are doing enough at each workout, or they don't think that they are training enough.  But the sheer frequency of the workout program really does add up.  After several weeks on the program, when most of the lifters I've worked with begin putting on muscle at a rate they hadn't been doing before, often while eating less, the complaining stops.


The STRENGTH will be built on the program also from the high-frequency, but, in the case of the strength built, it will be the daily practice of performing the same exercises (or ones very similar to each other) on a near-daily basis, as opposed to the total workload, that will build impressive strength.


When designing a HFT regimen, it's important to pick exercises that allow you to train very frequently (3+ days per week).  Squats, Olympic lifts, overhead presses are all good choices.  Deadlifts, barbell curls, bench presses (and other exercises that directly work the lower back, the biceps, or the rotator cuff in a supine fashion) are NOT good choices.  If you can substitute dumbbell replacements for the barbell versions of squats, quick lifts, and overhead work, then you have even better exercises for HFT.


Please keep in mind that what follows is an example of a week of workouts.  For the first week, feel free to follow it verbatim, but changes will need to be made (at least, after a couple of weeks) eventually in order to keep your body healthy and your strength/mass gains rolling along.  (If you decide to follow this program and have any questions/concerns after a couple of weeks of training, please shoot me an email or add a comment, and I will try my best to get back in touch in a fairly timely fashion.)


Monday:

Dumbbell Front Squats: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

One-Arm Dumbbell Clean and Press: 3-5x2 - work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double

One-Arm Thick Bar Dumbbell Deadlifts: 3-5x2 - Work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double.  This exercise, unlike deadlifts of the two-handed variety (both barbell and dumbbell) puts far less stress on the lower back and lumbar muscles, therefore making it ideal for highly-frequent training.

Barbell Curls: 3x3 (straight sets)


Tuesday:

Dumbbell Front Squats: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

One-Arm Dumbbell Snatches: 3-5x2 - work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double

Weighted Chins:  3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

Flat Barbell Bench Presses: 3x5 (straight sets)


Wednesday:

Dumbbell Power Cleans (two-handed): 3-5x2 - work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy double

Dumbbell Front Squats: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

One-Arm Thick Bar Dumbbell Deadlifts: 3-5x2 - Work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double


Thursday: OFF


Friday:

Dumbbell Front Squats: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

One-Arm Dumbbell Clean and Press: 3-5x2 - work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double

One-Arm Thick Bar Dumbbell Deadlifts: 3-5x2 - Work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double


Saturday:

Dumbbell Front Squats: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

One-Arm Dumbbell Snatches: 3-5x2 - work up over 3 to 5 sets (each arm) to a heavy double

Weighted Dips: 3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple

Weighted Chins:  3-5x3 -  work up over 3 to 5 sets to a heavy triple


Sunday: OFF


Monday: REPEAT





Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Feel free to leave us some feedback on the article or any topics you would like us to cover in the future! Much Appreciated!

Popular posts from this blog

Marvin Eder’s Mass-Building Methods

  The Many and Varied Mass-Building Methods of Power Bodybuilding’s G.O.A.T. Eder as he appeared in my article "Full Body Workouts" for IronMan  magazine.      In many ways, the essay you are now reading is the one that has had the “longest time coming.”  I have no clue why it has taken me this long to write an article specifically on Marvin Eder, especially considering the fact that I have long considered him the greatest bodybuilder cum strength athlete of all friggin’ time .  In fact, over 20 years ago, I wrote this in the pages of IronMan magazine: In my opinion, the greatest all-around bodybuilder, powerlifter and strength athlete ever to walk the planet, Eder had 19-inch arms at a bodyweight of 198. He could bench 510, squat 550 for 10 reps and do a barbell press with 365. He was reported to have achieved the amazing feat of cranking out 1,000 dips in only 17 minutes. Imagine doing a dip a second for 17 minutes. As Gene Mozee once put ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Old-School Muscle-Building Once More

Learn the Training Methods and Workout Programs of the Silver Age Bodybuilders      What follows is, in many ways, nothing more than an extension of some of the subjects I have been discussing in recent articles, such as Part 3 of my ongoing Tailoring Your Workouts series, and my other essays on The Old-School Way , Effective Full-Body Training , and How to Train Through the Soreness . Enter Old-School      Old-school bodybuilders knew how to build muscle.  In many ways, I think the training methods and workout programs they utilized were a lot better than the routines of the modern bodybuilder.  I also realize that modern bodybuilders—many of whom have larger, sometimes much larger, muscles than their old-school counterparts—might scoff at such an idea.  After all, hasn’t training evolved in the last few decades?  Don’t modern bodybuilders know more about the “science” of hypertrophy than bodybuilders whose heyday...
4 comments
Read more

The Mighty, Massive Arms of Franco Columbu

  The Arm Training Secrets of an Old-School Bodybuilding Legend   Columbu in his heyday      “The average person who wants to see how well built or strong you are will inevitably say, ‘Make a muscle.’   Such folks aren’t interested in your lat spread, huge pecs, or rippling abdominals.   They want to see you roll up your sleeve and display a bulging biceps.   It’s the main attribute that sets you apart from the average man or athlete and identifies you as a muscle man!” ~Franco Columbu [1]        As I was searching for an article of mine in an old Iron Man magazine, rummaging through my many issues, I happen to come across the article “Franco Columbu’s Mighty, Massive Arms” by Gene Mozee.   It was in his regular feature “Mass from the Past” from the ‘90s that always outlined the training regimens of many of the “old-school” bodybuilders from the ‘70s or before.   Truth is, they were invariably just...
1 comment
Read more