Power Hypertrophy Upper Lower (P.H.U.L.) Workout Guide

It's quite easy for folks to hit a lull during their workouts and stop seeing progress for a bit once your body gets acclimated to certain routines. Fortunately, there are time-tested ways around such roadblocks. 

Power hypertrophy, as its known in the industry, is the original concept for bodybuilding and can be defined as the enlargement of an organ or tissue from the increase in size of its cells. The PHUL program develops more strength in heavy compound movements (both upper and lower body), like the squat, bench press, overhead press, bent over row(seen below) and the deadlift. Many other big-time exercises that work multiple muscle groups are utilized as well.

The PHUL program is for serious lifters and those that want to narrow the focus of their workouts to select muscle groups that build strength, power, and increases in gains. 

You'll need to increase the volume and have shorter rest periods. For best results, 8 to 15 reps of each exercise are recommended for more time "under tension". Muscle and Strength.com goes into quite a bit of detail about how the program should be structured.

Frequency: Studies have shown muscle protein synthesis (MPS) to be elevated for up to 48 hours after training. That would make it ideal for you to hit each muscle more frequently than a typical once per week split. The PHUL program is designed to hit each muscle group twice within a week.

Compounds: The PHUL program focuses on the big compound movements for optimal progression. The main goal is to increase performance on the main lifts, as well as pack on pounds of muscle.

Power: This program uses 2 of it's 4 working days to focus on pure strength training. The key to getting stronger and bigger is to utilize progressive overload and time under tension. These 2 days will allow you to control more weight on your hypertrophy days.

Hypertrophy: In addition to 2 power days, your other 2 days on the PHUL program will focus on hypertrophy for strength and size increases.

By intensely sticking to this routine, your body will transform very quickly with the help of lean bulking exercises. The PHUL program can also be used for athletes that want to go up a weight class (in sports like boxing and wrestling), or with athletes such as football linemen and shotputters, who will benefit from an increase in bulk. 

Lastly, considering the amount of energy expended by the body while undergoing this type of training, adding more calories is going to be mandatory. Don't be afraid to stuff your face like an animal, multiple times a day, while maintaining a decent macro-nutrient ratio of fats-proteins-carbs.

Now, go hammer away on that damn iron.