Help Me Pick My Strength Program for a Cut

arditarose
arditarose Posts: 15,573 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I'm giving up on my recomp. I've been running PHUL in maintenance. For those of you who are not familiar, it is an upper/lower-power/hypertrophy 4 day split. I tried to do this on a deficit a month or so ago and it was just not sustainable.

Starting tomorrow I want to cut back from 4 days to 3 days a week so I can add a little cardio and shed a few more pounds, and ultimately run a bulk cycle. I've always lifted 4 days per week so this will be a bit new to me but will hopefully make this cut a little less painful.

I'm familiar enough with all of these programs but am wondering about the thoughts of others-mainly, your own experiences and whether there is a benefit in running a 5x5 like SL or ICF, or instead a 3x5 like Starting Strength. I don't really plan on running the new program for a very long time. My main goal is to make this cut a little bit easier by sticking to compound lifts and knocking off a day/some unneeded accessory work.

Anyway I'm considering all of these:
SL 5x5-I'm afraid it may be a bit boring though
ICF-I like the extra accessory work but suppose it's not needed in a deficit
Starting Strength-Love the simplicity of this
5/3/1 with a 3 Day Split-I've done this on a 4 day split already so I'm not really new to this

Thoughts? Ideally I'd like to start this tomorrow. Every time I think I made up my mind I change it again.

Replies

  • DopeItUp
    DopeItUp Posts: 18,771 Member
    Why not just pick what you want to do/what you like and adapt it for your calorie intake? You can do 4 day 5/3/1 if you want, I'd just back way off on the accessories/overall volume.

    Hell, even if you did something like PHUL but dropped the hypertrophy day to keep volume down?

    In my opinion, as long as the intensity is there you can maintain your strength/mass during a cut. Just scale back volume and/or frequency to accommodate the deficit and you'll be fine.

    As a side note, a lot of this is individual and preference based. So trial and error is probably going to be your best shot in the long term.
  • arditarose
    arditarose Posts: 15,573 Member
    DopeItUp wrote: »
    Why not just pick what you want to do/what you like and adapt it for your calorie intake? You can do 4 day 5/3/1 if you want, I'd just back way off on the accessories/overall volume.

    Hell, even if you did something like PHUL but dropped the hypertrophy day to keep volume down?

    In my opinion, as long as the intensity is there you can maintain your strength/mass during a cut. Just scale back volume and/or frequency to accommodate the deficit and you'll be fine.

    As a side note, a lot of this is individual and preference based. So trial and error is probably going to be your best shot in the long term.

    Yeah, I get what you're saying. PHUL crams all power lifting in two days and two days hypertrophy so it's not really ideal, and I thought it might be fun to try something besides Wendlers since I've done it before. I'd be interested in trying a 3 day split because I've never tried it--I actually think I settled on Madcow.

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