Full-Body vs. Split Workouts: Body Composition Changes Favor Volume-Equated FB Workouts in Trained Athletes

Full-Body vs. Split Workouts: Body Composition Changes Favor Volume-Equated FB Workouts in Trained Athletes

1rm bench build muscle build strength full body lose fat performance split routines split training squat training volume volume

I guess that most of you will be training according to a split workout, right? You can do so many great bench press and biceps curl variations on "International Chest + Biceps"-Monday... awesome, right? Ok, enough of the sarcasm and back to the science. In this case, a recent study by scientists from the National Research Institute in Warsaw, the Sports Performance Research Institute New Zealand, the Bond University in Australia and the University of the Sunshine Coast.

Said study was conducted by Crewther et al. and published recently in the Biology of Sport. It examined the effects of two equal-volume resistance-training protocols upon strength, body composition and salivary hormones in male rugby union players.

You can also incorporate full body training into your periodization schemes.

30% More on the Big Three: Squat, DL, BP!

Mix Things Up to Make Extra-Gains

Linear vs. Undulating Periodizationt

12% Body Fat in 12 Weeks W/ Periodizatoin

Detraining + Periodization - How to?

Tapering 101 - Learn How It's Done!

The scientists used a crossover design, involving 24 male rugby players (mean age 29.8 ± 6.8 years; height 179.5 ± 7.9 cm; body mass 92.9 ± 12.2 kg) with at least 2 years of resistance-training experience (3-4 times per week) who completed a 4-week full-body (FB) and split-body (SB) training protocol of equal volume during the competitive season.

"Both training approaches involved 3 weekly sessions (Monday, Wednesday and Friday) completed between 1600 to 1800 hours. Training involved 8 repetition maximum lifts for selected exercises, performed for 3-6 sets with rest periods of 60-90 seconds between sets and exercises. In the FB protocol, all muscle groups were ex ercised during each of the 3 weekly training sessions, while in the SB protocol only a sub-set of the muscle groups was exercised dur ing each session. The prescribed exercises included; back squats, leg curls, leg press, bench press, bent-over row, pull downs, shoulder press, bicep curls and calf raises. To equate for training volume, the total number of repetitions prescribed each week were identical (i.e. FB training = 21 exercises, 2-3 sets × 8 repetitions; SB training = 13 exercises, 3-6 sets × 8 repetitions). The 2 protocols are commonly used in research and practice and these were incorporated into the weekly schedule of the study population to improve the ecological validity of our findings. A standard warm-up was performed before all training sessions comprising of basic exercises performed with increasing intensities and stretching of the major muscle groups [18], with the athletes self-selecting the inten sity and duration of stretching" (Crewther. 2016).

One repetition maximum (1RM) strength, body composition via skinfold measurements and salivary testosterone (T) and cortisol (C) concentrations were assessed pre and post training.

Figure 1: Rel. changes in strength (1RM in bench presses and squats) and body composition (body mass, body fat (%), fat mass and fat free mass) during the FB and SB training phases (Crewther. 2016).

As you can see in Figure 1, the FB and SB protocols improved upper (7.3% and 7.4%) and lower body 1RM strength (7.4% and 5.4%) to a similar extend. The data in Figure 1 does yet also reveal that the full body workout had a slight edge in terms of its effects on the body fat percentage and total fat mass of the subjects and reduced the latter by 0.5% and 3.6% more than the split training.

Figure 2: Post training period (not immediately post-workout) changes in hormone concentration (Crewther. 2016).

Whether or not this is related to the hormonal changes in Figure 2 is questionable, but it is at least worth mentioning that the testosterone to cotrisol (T/C) increased only (+28%) after the FB training. As the scientists point out,

"slope testing on the individual responses identified positive associations (p ≤ 0.05) between T and C concentrations and absolute 1RM strength in stronger (squat 1RM = 150.5 kg), but not weaker (squat 1RM = 117.4 kg), men" (Crewther. 2016),

a result that does not exactly make it easier to decide whether the hormonal differences were corollary or causative for the differential effect on the body composition of the athletes. What is quite clear, though, is that even within a short window of training, both, FB and SB protocols, can improve strength and body composition in rugby players.

In that, the scientists rightly point out that "[t]he similar strength gains highlight training volume as a key adaptive stimulus" - a result we've encountered in numerous previous studies, as well. What is "news", though is that the program structure (i.e. FB or SB) had a measurable influence on the the body composition and hormonal outcomes, of which the latter were only partly (namely in the strong athletes) related to the strength gains.

Blood flow restriction could also have a place in your periodization plan.

Bottom line: If you are asking me if you should trash your split training routine now and switch to full-body workouts, my answer may surprise you: "No!" Even though, or rather because the study population is significantly more representative of the average SuppVersity reader than in many other studies... what? Well, you will probably train at a significantly higher volume per muscle part, when splitting (in the study this didn't change), the results could thus be completely different for you than they were for the subjects in this volume-equated FB to SB comparison.

Furthermore, we cannot exclude that the subjects benefited from a novelty effects that occurred, because the full body workout was a welcome change from their own regular split routines (we can safely assume that 90% of trainees with more than 2y training experience train according to a body part split). This, in turn, could yet be a reason to answer the previously stated question in the affirmative: "Yes, switch to a full body split, but do it not once and forever, but temporary, as part of a well-planned periodiziation routine." | What do you think? Comment on Facebook!

References:

• Crewther BT, Heke TOL, Keogh JWL. The effects of two equal-volume training protocols upon strength, body composition and salivary hormones in male rugby union players. Biol Sport. 2016;33(2):111–116.

Creatine and Bicarbonate - A Worthwhile Combination: Supplements Exert Great Individual and Small Combined Effects on HIIT Performance Test in Nine Well-Trained Men

Creatine and Bicarbonate - A Worthwhile Combination: Supplements Exert Great Individual and Small Combined Effects on HIIT Performance Test in Nine Well-Trained Men

baking soda bicarbonate creatine high volume mean power peak power performance sodium bicarbonate total volume total work volume

The results of a Wingate test cannot be translated 1:1 to any sports.

You will probably remember my article about the combination of creatine and bicarbonate. Mixing both is basically what the producers of "buffered creatine" supplements do. Albeit with amounts of bicarbonate that may affect the uptake of the latter and offer benefits if you have to load as fast as possible, but won't have individual performance effects (learn more).

Other studies I've likewise covered in the SuppVersity News in the past showed both significant as well as borderline significant and non-significant beneficial effects of combining creatine and bicarbonate for a performance enhancing double-whammy in trained individuals.

You can learn more about bicarbonate and pH-buffers at the SuppVersity

The Hazards of Acidosis

Build Bigger Legs W/ Bicarbonate

HIIT it Hard W/ NaCHO3

Creatine + BA = Perfect Match

Bicarb Buffers Creatine

Bicarbonate Works for Most(!) Athletes

Against that background it is not surprising that a recent study by Griffen et al. (2015) found similarly ambiguous results. The study investigated the effects of creatine and sodium bicarbonate coingestion on mechanical power during repeated sprints. To this ends, nine well-trained men (age = 21.6 ± 0.9 yr, stature = 1.82 ± 0.05 m, body mass = 80.1 ± 12.8 kg) participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, counterbalanced, crossover study using six 10-s repeated Wingate tests.

Before each of the performance tests, the participants ingested either a placebo (0.5 g/kg of maltodextrin), 20 g/d of creatine monohydrate + placebo (Cre), 0.3 g/kg of sodium bicarbonate + placebo (Bi), or coingestion  (Cre + Bi) for 7 days, with a 7-day washout between conditions. Participants were randomized into two groups with a differential counterbalanced order. Creatine conditions were ordered first and last. The participants individual mechanical power output (W), total work (J) and fatigue index (W/s) were measured during each test and analyzed using the magnitude of differences between groups in relation to the smallest worthwhile change in performance.

Figure 1: Subject allocation.

Yes, the washout period could be a problem: With only nine participants you have to do crossover study, but in view of the results of previous studies (McKenna. 1999), which report washout times of 4 weeks, the scientists would have been on the safer side if they had planned for a washout of 28, not just 7 days. Now you may argue that not all subjects started "on" creatine, so that the residual effect could average out. The problem, however, is that the significance of the results of a study with only nine participants gets impaired with every subject who was in a creatine group before being randomly assigned to one of the placebo + X groups, so that the researchers would have had to order all the creatine conditions last, not one first and the other last, as it is depicted in Figure 1 and described in the full text of the study.

As the data in Figure 2 tells you, both, the creatine (effect size (ES) = 0.37–0.83) and sodium bicarbonate (ES = 0.22–0.46) supplementation, resulted in meaningful improvements of all three indices of mechanical power output compared to placebo. Now what we are really interested in, though, is what the combination of the two did...

• In general, the coingestion provided "small meaningful improvements on indices of mechanical power output (W)" (Griffen. 2015) 
• The previously mentioned advantage was yet only seen when comparing sodium bicarbonate (ES = 0.28–0.41) with the combination treatment; a similar beneficial effect was not seen compared to creatine alone

This does obviously mean that the addition of bicarbonate to creatine did not result in meaningful increases in power output in this particular exercise test.

Figure 2: The only relevant advantage of combining both creatine and bicarbonate was seen for the total work done (orange bars, see orange arrow); this however is also among the most relevant measures for real athletes (Griffin. 2015).

What it did do and that's what we actually take bicarbonate for is to "provided a small meaningful improvement in total work (J; ES = 0.24) compared with creatine" (Griffin. 2015) - or, in other words, anyone who does not just one, but several all-out sprints (and that's almost every athlete) will see a small but meaningful performance increase, one that may make the difference between victory and defeat (see Figure 1, orange bars).

The increase in PGC-1a expression you get if you do HIIT w/ sodium bicarbonate and the correspondingly increased stimulus for mitochondrial biogenenesis is a hitherto often overlooked benefit of "baking soda" supplementation | learn more

Disappointing? I would not say so, which significant improvements in response to both supplements and a potential "game changing" increase in the total work the subjects were able to perform on the cycle ergometer during the repeated Wingate tests, both supplements have proven their efficacy and the potential benefits of combining them. Benefits the Griffin et al rightly call "small", but "meaningful" in the conclusion to their recently published paper.

The fact that these benefits may not be as exorbitant as some of you may have hoped for does not imply that the combination of creatine and bicarbonate supplements is useless. In view of the overall small study size (low number of subjects even for a crossover study), the problem with the washout and the specificity of the exercise - who knows what the results in the gym or on a football field would have looked like, thus, future studies are warranted | Comment!

References:

• Barber, James J., et al. "Effects of combined creatine and sodium bicarbonate supplementation on repeated sprint performance in trained men." The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 27.1 (2013): 252-258.
• Griffen, C., et al. "Effects of Creatine and Sodium Bicarbonate Co-Ingestion on Multiple Indices of Mechanical Power Output During Repeated Wingate Tests in Trained Men." International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism, 2015, 25, 298-306.
• McKenna, Michael J., et al. "Creatine supplementation increases muscle total creatine but not maximal intermittent exercise performance." Journal of Applied Physiology 87.6 (1999): 2244-2252.