Thoughts on the Texas Method Split Template

My old routine that I was on since the end of my Starting Strength days, continued into Texas Method, was laid out thusly:

Monday: Volume Squats, Volume Bench/Press
Tuesday: Accessory Day, RDLs, Chin-ups
Wednesday: Light Squat, Medium Press/Light Bench, curls etc.
Friday: Intensity Squats, Intensity Bench/Press, Deadlifts

I’ve now spent two weeks on a Texas Method Split Template. If you’re not familiar with the Split template you can read more about it in the Texas Method: Advanced by Justin Lascek (buy HERE, highly recommended). It looks like this:

Monday: Upper Volume, Bench/Press, accessory work
Tuesday: Lower Volume, Squat, accessory work

Thursday: Upper Intensity: Bench/Press
Friday: Lower Intensity, Squat and Deadlift

My program based on this template has looked like this:

Monday: Press 3×5, Bench 3×5, Pendlay Row 3×8
Tuesday: Back Squat 3×5, Front Squat 3×3, RDL 3×5

Thursday: Press 1×3, Bench 1×3, Curlz etc.
Friday: Back Squat 1×3, Deadlift 1×3

A few notes on my program: I’m currently attempting to increase both Press and Bench each week. This is an experiment of mine and is not really something Justin recommends for everyone. I also added Front Squats on Monday because I have a theory that I’m quad weak.

I’m really enjoying the Split template. It allows me to get in and out of the gym in an hour to an hour and a half (coupled with the decrease in volume) vs the old routine. The volume is the most time intensive part of the Texas Method and splitting this up between days really decreases the amount of gym time required.

Another aspect of the split routine is that it allows for more accessory work. After volume work is completed on monday and tuesday there’s room for several more exercises which I’ve filled with Front Squats, Pendlay Rows, and RDLs. The Accessory day in the old Template was setup to accommodate these kinds of exercises. The problem I had with it was that I was less motivated to drag my ass into the gym on Tuesdays since I wasn’t directly contributing to progress on the big lifts. Now everyday is either Volume/Intensity for a lift so I have no issues getting in to work.

The only disadvantage I can see to running this template is that you have less wiggle room as far as recovery is concerned. On the old template you had 3 days to recover from Volume day (includes the light day). Now on the Split template you only have 2. So if you have one night of really bad sleep/day of crappy eating it can have a bigger effect on the week’s progress vs when you might have had one extra day to fix things (See the update below for a clarification).

To review:

Pros:

– Less time spent at the gym
– More time for accessory work
– More motivating since every day contributes to a lift’s progress

Cons:

– Less time to recover (if you train on Friday instead of Saturday)

I’ll be staying on the split template for the foreseeable future.

Update:

Regarding the only disadvantage being recovery time, Justin chimed in,

Hey dude,

Note that Chris/Mike routinely do their Intensity Squat/DL day on Saturday. so they train Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. This gives them the extra day of rest (and the same as the old template).

–Justin

I personally can’t train on Saturday’s since I lift at work and getting a membership at a second gym on Saturday’s would be too expensive. But if you can, absolutely do this.