Want to build as much muscle as possible?
Of course you do!
And who better to ask than Ronnie Coleman?
The eight-time Mr Olympia champion recently appeared in an Instagram video with fitness educator Jeremy Ethier, who put exactly that question to him: if he were trying to build as much muscle as possible, what would his go-to workout split be?
Coleman’s answer was the same routine that helped him build one of bodybuilding’s most famous physiques: six days of training, followed by one day off.
‘Always six days on, one day off,’ Coleman says.
‘Always rest day on Sunday.’
Here’s how his old-school split was structured.
Ronnie Coleman’s Workout Split
Monday: Back + Biceps
Tuesday: Chest + Triceps
Wednesday: Legs
Thursday: Shoulders
Friday: Back + Biceps
Saturday: Chest + Triceps
Sunday: Rest
That means Coleman’s back and biceps, and chest and triceps, each get trained twice per week, while legs and shoulders get their own dedicated day.
Then the whole thing starts again on Monday.
‘That’s how you win eight Olympias,’ Coleman adds.
Why Did Coleman Train 6 Days a Week?
The appeal of Coleman’s split is obvious: you’re giving each major muscle group plenty of attention while allowing a little more time between sessions for the same body part.
But there’s an important distinction between the split and the amount of work Coleman actually did within each session.
Coleman was a professional bodybuilder training specifically to maximise muscle growth. His legendary workouts involved huge amounts of volume and, famously, very heavy weights.
You don’t need to copy the workload of an eight-time Mr Olympia to benefit from training each muscle group more than once a week.
For a recreational lifter, the useful takeaway is the basic structure: training frequency can be spread across the week rather than trying to cram all your work for a muscle into one enormous session.
Could You Use Coleman’s Split?
You could, but you’d probably want to make it your own.
The six-day schedule is a serious commitment. You’re training six consecutive days, with just Sunday off, which won’t fit neatly around everyone’s work, family and recovery demands.
You’d also need to consider how much total volume you’re doing. Two chest sessions per week can be perfectly manageable; two enormous Ronnie Coleman-style chest sessions are another matter entirely.
If you want to experiment with the structure, keep the split but adjust the workload to suit your experience and recovery:
Monday: Back + biceps
Tuesday: Chest + triceps
Wednesday: Legs
Thursday: Shoulders
Friday: Back + biceps
Saturday: Chest + triceps
Sunday: Rest
Then focus on making those sessions productive rather than trying to recreate Coleman’s legendary volume.
The most useful part of Ronnie’s advice isn’t necessarily that you need to train six days a week. It’s that he had a clear structure, stuck to it and trained consistently for years.
‘Yeah Buddy!’
