Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max is an upper/lower body workout split for building strength and muscle. It’s a five-day variation of Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra in which you do a third upper-body workout each week.
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max has three upper body and two lower body workouts per week. This makes the program higher in volume than Stronglifts 5×5 and even Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra. The program is targeted towards lifters who want to emphasize their upper body and have time to train 5x/week.
Let me show you how Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max works.
Contents
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What is Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max Upper/lower Split?
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra is a five-day upper/lower workout split in which you train your upper and lower body on different days. In workouts A and C you train your lower body with Squats and Deadlifts. In workouts B, D, and E you train your upper body with Bench, Overhead Press, Rows, and Chinups.
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max consists of five workouts A, B, C, D, and E. You do five workouts a week, alternating lower and upper body workouts. You train your lower and upper body on two consecutive days before taking a rest day. You then train them again on three consecutive days.
| Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max: upper/lower split | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Workout A | Workout B | Workout C | Workout D | Workout E |
| Squat 5×5 | Bench Press 5×5 | Deadlift 5×5 | Incline Bench Press 5×5 | Overhead Press 5×5 |
| Deadlift 1×5 | Barbell Row 5×5 | Squat 1×5 | Dips 5×5 | Chinup 5×5 |
| Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work |
5×5 means five sets of five reps with the same weight. 1×5 means one heavy set of five reps after you do your warmup sets. There’s optional assistance work that you can add to each workout if you have time for more and want to do more volume to build extra muscle.
You can log Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max using the Stronglifts app. Tap the program tab at the bottom and then select Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max from the list. You’ll find several templates with different exercises and options for Assistance Work. You can easily replace exercises if you want.
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max vs Stronglifts Ultra
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max is a 5x/week version of Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra. You do one extra upper-body workout per week. That means you train your lower body twice, and upper body three times a week.
The first way to do Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max is to go two days on, one day off, three days on, and one day off. Like this…
With this workout schedule, you’re never training more than three days in a row. However, you have to do one workout on the weekend. If you prefer to keep them free, you could train five days in a row instead. Like this…
The goal of adding a third upper-body workout E is to increase your weekly training volume to build more muscle. Compare the weekly training volume for your upper body when you do Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra 4x/week vs Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max 5x/week with its extra upper-body workout E…
| Weekly sets | SL5×5 Ultra 4×/week | SL5×5 Ultra Max 5×/week |
|---|---|---|
| Chest | 10 | 15 (+50%) |
| Back | 11 | 16 (+45%) |
| Shoulders | 15 | 20 (+33%) |
| Triceps | 15 | 20 (+33%) |
| Biceps | 5 | 10 (+100%) |
| Legs | 12 | 12 |
| Total Upper body | 20 | 30 (+50%) |
| Total Lower body | 12 | 12 |
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max has 50% more volume for the upper body because of its fifth workout E. You can increase the volume further by adding assistance work to the upper-body workouts B, D, and E. Like this…
| Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max: upper/lower split 5×/week | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | B | C | D | E |
| Squat 5×5 | Bench 5×5 | Deadlift 5×5 | OHP 5×5 | Overhead Press 5×5 |
| Deadlift 1×5 | Row 5×5 | Squat 1×5 | Bench 5×5 | Chinup 5×5 |
| DB Bench 3×8 | DB Row 3×8 | BB Curl 3×8 |
||
This would add another three sets per week for your chest, shoulders, triceps, and back… as well as six sets for your biceps. You’re then doing almost 20 sets per week or more for your upper-body muscles.
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max is available in the Stronglifts app. Just tap programs at the bottom and then select Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max. You’ll find several templates with different exercises and options for Assistance Work.
NOTE: I recommend starting with Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra before doing Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max. Progress with less volume first. When you get stuck, then consider adding more volume for your upper body.
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max Spreadsheet
There’s a Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max spreadsheet available.
The spreadsheet is great for getting a big-picture overview of how the program works, and how your weights will progress. But for logging your workouts in the gym, use the Stronglifts app. It’s easier to use, does all the math for you, and has lots of extra features like a built-in rest timer.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why not do Upper, Lower, Upper, Lower, Upper instead?
Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max has two upper-body days in a row – workout D and E. In both workouts you do a push exercise – Incline Bench in workout D and Overhead press in workout E.
Some people have asked why not start the week with workout E instead? This way you don’t have to do two push exercises two days in a row.
In other words, instead of doing this:
| Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max: upper/lower split | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Workout A | Workout B | Workout C | Workout D | Workout E |
| Squat 5×5 | Bench Press 5×5 | Deadlift 5×5 | Incline Bench Press 5×5 | Overhead Press 5×5 |
| Deadlift 1×5 | Barbell Row 5×5 | Squat 1×5 | Dips 5×5 | Chinup 5×5 |
| Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work |
You would be doing this:
| Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max: upper/lower split | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Workout E | Workout A | Workout B | Workout C | Workout D |
| Overhead Press 5×5 | Squat 5×5 | Bench Press 5×5 | Deadlift 5×5 | Incline Bench Press 5×5 |
| Chinup 5×5 | Deadlift 1×5 | Barbell Row 5×5 | Squat 1×5 | Dips 5×5 |
| Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work |
First, this question assumes that training the same muscle or movement two days in a row will hinder progress. However studies comparing back-to-back workouts to resting for 48 hours found no difference (1, 2, 3).
I’ve found the same thing. For years I did 4x/week full body workouts. Each session had Bench Press. Half the time I followed this by a second press movement like the OHP or DB Bench. So I trained chest, shoulders and triceps back-to-back 2x/week.
My strength was at the highest with that workout split, and I never had shoulder issues. This was done while I was coached by Mike Tuchscherer who is considered a programming genius. I’ve used this same workout split with several people I’ve coached and never saw issues. That’s why I put two upper-body workouts back-to-back in Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max. I don’t consider it to be a problem.
It seems like people who are concerned with shoulder fatigue are used to programs with high volume/high intensity “push days”. For example, in my early 20s I trained one muscle a day 5x/week. My chest day had seven exercises where I took every set to absolute failure. The next day my shoulders were always sore, tired and sometimes painful. So I didn’t like training chest and shoulders back-to-back.
But Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max is different. The upper-body days aren’t extreme. Instead of hitting your shoulders with tons of exercises and sets in one workout, you’re spreading that volume over three sessions. Workout D is just 5 sets of Incline Bench followed by 5 sets of Dips. You’re not taking every set to failure since you’re doing top/back-off sets. The next day you Overhead Press only five sets. The weight is the lightest of the whole week. Workout E may only take you 30min. It’s the easiest session. That’s why I put it on the last day.
Some will argue why not put workout E first anyway just to avoid any possible fatigue. Because this creates a new set of problems.
- Workout E has OHP and Chinups. Chinups work your upper-back and lats. If these muscles get sore, then your Squats will be harder to perform the next day. You need your upper-back to keep the bar in position. From my experience, the upper-back gets sore easier than the shoulders. Maybe because it’s not trained as often as the pressing exercises. That’s why I put workout E last.
- You start the week with the easiest and shortest session of the week – workout E. But you just had one day rest and are fresh. So it makes more sense to tackle the more demanding Squats and Deadlifts first. You’re less likely to skip those harder workouts if you do them first, and the rest of the week will feel easier.
If you really don’t like doing push exercises two days in a row, then I would do Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max like this…
| Stronglifts 5×5 Ultra Max: upper/lower split | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Workout A | Workout B | Workout C | Workout D | Workout E |
| Squat 5×5 | Bench Press 5×5 | Deadlift 5×5 | Incline Bench Press 5×5 | Chinup 5×5 |
| Deadlift 1×5 | Overhead Press 5×5 | Squat 1×5 | Dips 5×5 | Barbell Row 5×5 |
| Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work | Assistance work |
Workout E is now all back work. It won’t interfere with your Squats and Deadlifts in workout A. You have a rest day in between.
However you have to Overhead Press right after Bench. This will pre-fatigue your shoulders. You’ll OHP less weight and/or do fewer reps than if you did it first in workout E. So if you’re concerned about shoulder fatigue negatively affecting the OHP, doing Incline Bench in workout D and OHP in workout E is less fatiguing. You have 24h between the two exercises. Here you only have a few minutes.
Personally I like doing OHP after Bench. In fact, I’ve done it like this for years. You do lift less weight and lift fewer reps than if you OHP fresh. But the set up is different. So you can’t compare what you lifted when you did both exercises in separate workouts (like on Stronglifts 5×5). You need to treat it like a separate exercise with its own weight.
This shows that there’s no perfect way to set up a program. Every option has trade-offs. If you try to “fix” what you think is a problem with a program you’ll most likely introduce new problems that you may not be aware of. Worse, many lifters outright reject a program if they have the smallest flaw. This is the nirvana fallacy. It leads to constant program-hopping, frustration and confusion. Instead of making progress, time is wasted searching for a perfect plan that doesn’t exist.
References
1. Yang, Yifan et al. “Effects of Consecutive Versus Non-consecutive Days of Resistance Training on Strength, Body Composition, and Red Blood Cells.” Frontiers in physiology vol. 9 725. 18 Jun. 2018.
2. da Silva Carvalho, Alcino D, and José A Rodrigues Santos. “Nonconsecutive versus consecutive-day resistance training in recreationally trained subjects.” The Journal of sports medicine and physical fitness vol. 58,3 (2018): 233-240.
3. Hunter, Gary R. “Research: Changes in body composition, body build and performance associated with different weight training frequencies in males and females.” National Strength & Conditioning Association Journal, vol. 7, no. 1, 1985, p. 26.
