The Black Panther 2 Challenge: What You Need to Know
If you’re here, chances are, you’ve read about—or have completed—my original Black Panther program that has gained a lot of popularity since I launched it a few years ago.
With the aim of helping you shed those extra body fats, build your strength and increase your muscle gains, that five-week program has been a huge success and it’s considered one of my most popular fitness programs to date.
If you haven’t completed the first Black Panther challenge yet, I suggest that you check it out first, so you’ll have a better understanding of what’s going to happen in Black Panther 2 Challenge.
But if you’re done with the first part of this challenge and you’re ready to step up your game, welcome to the Black Panther 2 challenge where we’ll focus more on building more muscle mass while still increasing your strength in the process.
The two-day training split method
Since this program is patterned from the original Black Panther challenge, you can expect to use the same two-day training split that will allow your entire body to be trained. The first workout will focus on your legs, abs, biceps, triceps and forearms while the second workout will train your chest, back, shoulders, traps and calves.
On a four-workout week, you’ll be training each muscle group twice, but you can expect that each workout is different from the other to make your training more exciting. Your workout schedule will basically look like this:
- Workout 1: legs, abs, biceps, triceps and forearms
- Workout 2: chest, back, shoulders, tarps and calves
- Workout 3: legs, abs, biceps, triceps and forearms
- Workout 4: chest, back, shoulders, traps and calves
This means that you can have three “rest” days every week, which isn’t basically a complete rest day because I recommend that you still stay active during these days by doing some cardio or playing sports to keep your body moving.
You should only take a full day off from training if your body needs to recover. I have some clients who use their “rest” days to do Cross Fit-style workouts at home. You have full choice on when you should take these “rest” days, but most of my clients follow this schedule:
- Monday and Tuesday: Training
- Wednesday: Rest day
- Thursday and Friday: Training
- Saturday and Sunday: Rest days
If this doesn’t fit your lifestyle, you can always create a schedule that works for you, so it’s easier to stay consistent with your workouts.
The three-day training split method
While most of my clients go for the two-day training split for the Black Panther 2 challenge, you also have the option to turning this program into a three-day split, especially if you want to focus on legs and abs in one workout and work on the arms in another. If you do a three-day split, this is how your schedule would look like:
- Workout 1: Legs and abs
- Workout 2: Chest, back, shoulders and traps
- Workout 3: Triceps, biceps, forearms and calves
- Workout 4: Legs and abs
- Workout 5: Chest, back, shoulders and traps
- Workout 6: Triceps, biceps, forearms and calves
This means that you’ll only have a single “rest” day on your preferred day every week. Remember that with this split, you’ll be doing the same workout on the same day of every week.
The changes from the original Black Panther challenge
If you notice, the workout order for the Black Panther 2 challenge is the exact opposite of the original program. I wanted to spice things up a bit by focusing on the legs on the first few days of the week.
However, if you notice that you’re weaker when it comes to the chest, back and shoulder day, you can switch back to the original workout order that begins with the chest, back and shoulder workouts first.
You’ll also notice that the Black Panther 2 challenge has different rep ranges from the original. Week 1 begins with 16-20 reps, Week 2 will increase the weight on all exercises while bringing reps to 12-15 per set, Week 3 will follow the same pattern of increasing weight while decreasing rep ranges to 8-10, and Week 4 will still increase the weight while reducing rep ranges to 8-10.
On Week 5, you can do more weight but still maintain the 8-10 rep ranges. You follow the same pattern for the remaining weeks and finally, you’ll reduce the weight so you can complete 16-20 reps on your final week. Take note that Weeks 5, 6 and 7 all follow the reverse linear periodization model.
In terms of the exercises used, I used wrist rollers, shrugs and hex bar deadlifts on this challenge. If you don’t have the equipment to perform these exercises, you can opt for the standard barbell version of shrugs, deadlifts, wrist curls and reverse twist curls.
You’ll also see that I used pre-exhaust in the last two workouts for each week. Pre-exhaust is a training method where you do isolation exercise before multi-joint exercises. This will help you ensure that your target muscle gets the most muscle growth stimulus while you exercise.
The Black Panther 2 challenge also uses tri-sets for exercises involving the calves and lower legs. This will help you to create better balance on your lower legs and build more muscle in these areas while avoiding the risk for shin splints.
The right weight choice for each exercise
With the Black Panther 2 challenge, you have the option to choose a weight that allows you to hit the target rep ranges for a week. Make sure that you keep the weight for all sets, so you can hit muscle failure. According to studies, this point will allow you to take advantage of more muscle growth during the fitness program.
The different intensity techniques
Finally, you’ll see that the Black Panther 2 challenge follows the same high-intensity technique that the original Black Panther challenge had. You can follow the same routine or keep things as they are.
