End of 2004 I started to weight lift pretty seriously, I was tired of going to the gym for months and months prior, taking advice from other people and not getting results. So I started to do a little of my own research for a mass gaining workout. Worked out 3 days a week, mon, wed, and fri. Mon was chest/triceps/abs, wed was legs/lower back, fri was biceps/ upper back. Tried to keep the workouts under an hour because your body starts to break down muscles for energy for any longer workout. Also I focuses on compound workouts. In a 3 month period I went from 160 lbs to 175lbs, body fat went from 14% to 8%. I did absolutely no cardio. Then of course I crashed on VIR N the following nov in '04, and sprained my back muscles, so I lost everything I gained!
Most of the workouts with weights were 6 sets. First two reps would be a warmup. I'll use the bench presse as my example. I would just start with the barbell to get the blood flowing. After that I would start to add weight.
1st & 2nd sets, no weight warmup. 15 reps
3rd set, add weight, 12 - 15 easy reps.
4th set, add more weight, 8 - 10 reps.
5th set, even more weight, 4 - 6 reps to failure.
6th set, enough weight to do 1 - 2 reps to failure.
In between each rep, I would take a 3 min break. I also focused on the negative repetition, I would take about a second to push up the barbell, but slowly lower it back down to my chest counting slowly to 3. You obviously can't lift as much weight like this, but it's actually the negative rep that really works your muscles.
Immediatly after the 6th set I would switch back to the weight done in the 3rd set and lift till muscular failure. Then switch to dumbell flys just to eek out a little more from the muscles. It really burned every time and I would be sore for a good 4 - 5 days afterwords.
You also gotta be strict with your diet, on workout days, and non workout days you gotta consume a certain amount of protein, carbs, and calories to provide your body with what it needs to rebuild. Don't remember exactly how to calc it out off the top of my head right now. Also rest is a big factor, gotta get 8 hrs of sleep per day.
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