Dorian Yates’ Olympia Winning Workout

The following workout comes from the wonderful A Portrait of Dorian Yates: The Ultimate Bodybuilding Guide from the Ultimate Bodybuilder by the late Peter McGough. For those who don’t know, Peter was one of bodybuilding’s most authoritative journalists for several decades. He was intimately linked with Dorian and it was Peter who bestowed Dorian with the iconic nickname, The Shadow.

Dorian was a six time Mr. Olympia champion and, as I argued elsewhere, helped to change bodybuilding. He used a unique training system, inspired by Arthur Jones and Mike Mentzer. Check out a snippet below and, if you can, buy the book. It challenges a LOT of assumptions we hold on training.

TRAINING SPLIT

Day one: Delts, traps, triceps, abs Day two: Back, rear delts
Day three: Rest
Day four: Chest, biceps, abs

Day five: Rest
Day six: Quads, hams, calves Day seven: Rest

WORKOUT ONE

Warm-up: Ten minutes on stationary bike, followed by gentle stretching of all muscle groups to be trained.

* Warm-up Sets

Bodypart Exercise Sets Reps Poundage
Delts

 

Smith Machine Presses 1* 15 120
    1* 12 240
    1 8-10 340
  Seated Laterals 1* 12 2 x50
    1 8-10 2 x 70
  One-arm Cable Laterals 1* 20 35
 

 

  1 8-10 70
Traps Dumbbell Shrugs 1* 12 2 x 140
    1 10-12 2 x 185
Triceps Triceps Pushdowns 1* 15 80
    1* 12 130
    1 8-10 180
  Lying Barbell Extensions (EZ Bar) 1* 12 100
    1 8-10 140
  One-arm Pushdowns

 

Or

 

One-arm 1Nautilus Extensions

1 8-10 70

 

Or

 

Full Stack

Abs Forward Crunches 3 20-25  
  Reverse Crunches 3 12-25  

 

 

 

 

 

 

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