How do you break down your weight lifting?

Many people here like Starting Strenght, stronglifts 5x5, or else new rules of lifting for women. Mehdi (who runs stronglifts website) has a simple program of compound exercises that you do 3 times a week, as well as a simple plan on when/how to increase the weights, and what to do when you stall. You don't HAVE to signup for anything, if you do get his email he will ask for you to join his payed service, but you don't have to. I find his emails somewhat interesting, so I don't mind geting them.
I just started a program called ALL PRO Beginners after doing stronglifts for a while and stalling out. , and I like it. so far.

Video explanation:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bMJ__EwOlDo

The original bodybuilding.com forum post:

http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=4195843&page=1

A Simple beginner's Routine
You will do 3 work outs per week on non consecutive days. The first work out is your heavy work out. The second work out is your medium work out, use 10% less weight for your work sets. The final work out for the week is your lite work out, use 20% less weight.

Do a lite warm up with 1/4 of your work sets weight. Do a medium warm up with 1/2 of your work sets weight. Do 2 work sets with the same weight. Choose a starting weight and start light.

These are the seven exercises you will be starting with.

Squats
Bench Presses
Bent-Over Rows
Overhead Barbell Presses
Stiff-Legged Deadlifts
Barbell Curls
Calf Raises

You will be running this program on a five week cycle as follows:
The first week do all 4 sets for 8 reps.
The second week do all 4 sets for 9 reps.
The third week do all 4 sets for 10 reps.
The fourth week do all 4 sets for 11 reps.
The fifth week do all 4 sets for 12 reps.
If you got all of the required reps on the fifth week then increase the weight by 10% and

repeat the cycle. If you didn't get all of the reps on the fifth week then repeat the cycle with the same weight. You shouldn't need more than one minute rest between the warm up sets and you shouldn't need more than one minute thirty seconds between the work sets.
Do some cardio and abs work on non weight training days.

There is a spreadsheet to d/l to figure figure out how to progress, and later in the forum he talks about how to figure out what weight to start at. There is also a JeFit program for the routine.

Mike

I tend to stick to two muscles per day for example:

Monday- Quads/Hamstrings/Glutes

Wednesday - Chest and Delts

Thursday - Biceps and Triceps

Friday - Core

Sunday - Traps/Lats/Rhomboids

I add in cardio each day as well as doing various classes, but I stick to the same muscles for each day

As a beginner, I'd recommend one of the full body routines like 5x5, Stronglifts, etc. Spend time (a year or more) building up your base strength, form, and technique on the lifts. Once you have a good solid base, then you can branch out and do a bodypart split where you might target 1-2 body parts a day, or a routine based around the lifts themselves vs bodyparts- squat and assistance for squat one day, bench and assistance for bench another day, deadlift and assistance for deadlift another day, press and assistance for press another day.

I start with 30 min of cardio and then I do one muscle group per day and alternate abs and legs. I do 3 sets and strive for 10 reps but typically since I am lifting heavy it's more 10/8/6. Sometimes I'll drop the weight down so I can bang out the last reps to make it 10.

But as far as my workout goes for example this week was:

M: Chest/Legs
T: Back/Abs
W: Shoulders/Legs
Th: Tri's/Abs
Fr: Bi's/Legs

Monday will start with chest/abs etc. Leg and ab day I do different exercises: squats, lunges, DL, leg extensions, cable ab/adductor & back kicks etc. crunches, captains chair, decline crunches, weighted twists . . . I also just created 3 weeks worth of weight training programs that I intend to cycle so next week it will be a new program with different exercises to keep it from getting boring.

How do you measure progress with such a varied routine? Or do you not care if your lifts go up? (not trying to be snarky with that comment, I'm curious- I'm probably the opposite and will stick with a routine for a long time if I continue to make progress on it).

I start with 30 min of cardio and then I do one muscle group per day and alternate abs and legs. I do 3 sets and strive for 10 reps but typically since I am lifting heavy it's more 10/8/6. Sometimes I'll drop the weight down so I can bang out the last reps to make it 10.

But as far as my workout goes for example this week was:

M: Chest/Legs
T: Back/Abs
W: Shoulders/Legs
Th: Tri's/Abs
Fr: Bi's/Legs

Monday will start with chest/abs etc. Leg and ab day I do different exercises: squats, lunges, DL, leg extensions, cable ab/adductor & back kicks etc. crunches, captains chair, decline crunches, weighted twists . . . I also just created 3 weeks worth of weight training programs that I intend to cycle so next week it will be a new program with different exercises to keep it from getting boring.

How do you measure progress with such a varied routine? Or do you not care if your lifts go up? (not trying to be snarky with that comment, I'm curious- I'm probably the opposite and will stick with a routine for a long time if I continue to make progress on it).

I don't understand the question? By "varied" do you mean because I have 3 different weight workouts that I am going to be doing or the split? With the three different workouts I am using different equipment - free weights, cables etc. - and targeting different muscle fibers. I measure my progress by how heavy I lift each time. I WAS doing the same routine for a really long time -- like a couple of years -- and I stagnated (even though I was lifting heavy) and was getting bored to the point where I didn't even want to go to the gym any more because it was the same thing.

I mean, how do you measure your progress? Are you constantly adding weight to each lift, or do you use the same weight and rotate the routines?

I constantly add weight to each lift and each set. By the third set I am pretty maxed out and struggling at the end.