By Eric Troy

Specificity has become one of those buzz-words that, as I'm always complaining about, people give 'lip service' to without any real understanding of the concept.

I think the first problem is that trainers do not understand it IS a concept. The "law" of specificity is no more a law than the cream cheese bagel law. Actually, that's a good guideline for weeding out the BS artists in the industry. Whenever someone goes on about "laws" of resistance training you can bet that their depth of understanding doesn't go much further than a list of bullet points.

Laws are exact. There is nothing exact about specificity and transfer of training. If it were exact then it wouldn't be one of the most extensively studied concepts in training ever.

Where most go wrong with specificity is that it is about mechanical specificity not superficial appearance. This means that an exercise is kinematically and kinetically similar to a certain performance or skill scenario. They may not "look" similar; they are just mechanically similar. So, movement patterns, muscle actions, rate of force development, acceleration, velocity, energy transfer…all or many of these are similar. The more similar all these things are the greater the chance that there will be a transfer from the training exercise to the goal skill.

The concept of specificity is drawn from the “SAID” principle (Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands) which says that the adaptations to physical demands placed on the body are directly related and specific to that particular demand.

Siff and Verkoshansy called this "dynamic correspondence". The misunderstanding between mechanics and appearance is why we have a hard time convincing many sprinters, for instance, that things like squats or pulls can have a big influence on sprinting. Sprinting appears to a horizontal activity. How can vertical resistance movements help one move faster in a horizontal fashion? Well, all that study I was talking about indicates that vertical forces are the limiting factor in sprint performance. Not horizontal forces.

Think sprinting is all horizonatal? Look how far Christine Arron is off the track.
image by Eckhard Pecher via wikimedia

As stated above however specificity goes further than mechanics. Even in metabolic modes specificity is more the rule than generality. This is why a Tour de' France winner is not necessarily ready for a running marathon and why a long distance swimmer shouldn't be expected to perform at the same level in middle distance. But it is mechanics that the average strength trainee is most concerned with. Other manifestations of specificity are taken for granted such as the fact that we tend to use 12 or less reps rather 15 or more. But this too is specificity.

What does this mean to us guys who just want to get strong? Well not as much as you might think. The idea that a hammer press lacks specificity to a bench press, for instance, is just plain silly. What you have to understand is that studies in specificity tend to deal with training transfer to sport. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but nobody much cares how your Romanian deadlifts transfer to your squats. Nobody sporting a lab coat anyway.

Does the Power Clean transfer to the deadlift? Reams and reams of discussion go on about that one. Guess what? Relatively few people care who are in a position to study this in a scientific way. The question about the power clean regarding specificity is more often how it is similar to the vertical jump. Same with the squat.

When your only goal is maximum strength then strength training is pretty darn "specific" isn't it? Going on and on about whether step-ups "transfer" to back squats is a bit beside the point. It's not the question of whether such things transfer but unrealistic expectations about what represents a good "bang for your buck".

There is a popular thread on many of the bodybuilding forums called 'Why Aren't You Growing?' In it one of the writers, "Iron Addict" makes the following statement regarding lifts that have bad carryover:

"I have seen many times, and one I have done myself. The trainee burns out on benching and decides to do Hammer Strength Benches for a change. He makes the switch and is jazzed. His Hammer press is going up every week and he is stoked. After a time he has added 50 lbs to his Hammer bench and decides to go back and hit the bench, only to find it’s up a whole 10 lbs!!!!!"

Personally if all I had to do was add 50 lbs to a Hammer press to see a ten pound increase in my bench press I'd be stoked. The fact is that is a great carryover if your bench training age is advanced. Many trainees cannot expect a ten pound increase even for the same amount of time spent actually bench pressing! And after all if we could continually progress on bench press with just straight bar bench pressing then we wouldn't be seeking out alternatives to get us "unstuck". But if you are doing Hammer press, for a change, then to add fifty pounds would constitute little effort for such a large increase in your bench press. If you were a beginner to bench press, well, the question would have never arose since you would be getting consistent gains just through benching with the straight bar and perhaps with dumbbells.

It may be that complaining about the lack of specificity of a hydraulic machine to its free weight counterpart may be taking specificity too far, depending on the individual. That is we may not always see a difference between someone trained hydraulically and concentric only and someone trained with free weights using eccentric-concentric training. Sometimes it is just too darn similar to expect big differences even though many individual aspects are different between the two modes. No, I am not saying you should just go ahead and use machines. I am saying that it is not always predictable, despite what some would have you believe.

The point is that if you expect to always get a given reward, in some expected ratio, between your cross training exercises and your main target exercise you will likely find that most everything you do has "bad carryover".

Although I may not think that the specific example is generally useful what the Addict was identifying is a cognitive trap that most trainees and trainers alike fall into at one time or another. This trap can be related to the so-called is-ought problem which occurs when we make a leap from factual descriptive statements, statements about what is into statements about what ought to be. Actually I shouldn't call it a leap because it is usually a slow and barely detectable glide. This idea was first hit upon by David Hume in "A Treatise of Human Nature". This particular statements is one of the most hotly debated sections of the work and people still grapple with it. However taken at face value we can see how it works in statements about strength training:

In every system of morality, which I have hitherto met with, I have always remarked, that the author proceeds for some time in the ordinary ways of reasoning, and establishes the being of a God, or makes observations concerning human affairs; when all of a sudden I am surprised to find, that instead of the usual copulations of propositions, is, and is not, I meet with no proposition that is not connected with an ought, or an ought not. This change is imperceptible; but is however, of the last consequence. For as this ought, or ought not, expresses some new relation or affirmation, 'tis necessary that it should be observed and explained; and at the same time that a reason should be given; for what seems altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it.

Hume was writing about moral ethics but in purely scientific terms we see this error all the time and it is a big problem in studies of specificity since we are "observing" what happens and then wondering if it "ought" to result in a certain performance improvement or transfer.

Look at the example of the hydraulic chest press and its transfer to the straight bar bench press. Imagine the following thought sequence:

The chest press is similar to the bench press in some respects and although it is concentric only we often observe equal improvements between eccentric only and concentric-eccentric training.

Therefore progress on chest press should cause a certain improvement in the bench press.

That "certain" improvement may be imagined as an expected ratio between added load, reps, or sets in the chest press and a resulting improvement in the bench press 1RM. Notice that a "should" statement is the same as an "ought" statement. Nothing in the second sentence can logically follow from the "is" statements of the first sentence. If you want to know why I am always saying that what you should have or could have done doesn't matter, now you know one big reason for it! Many times you can see that what we are really thinking is "wouldn't it be good if" such and such were true. In fact many people bring up the "naturalistic fallacy" regarding is-ought problems. The naturalistic fallacy interposes moral ideas on top of factual ideas. However, in our context what is "good" is not meant to be used in a moral sense. So let's change the statement to "wouldn't it be cool if" such and such were true. Regardless of how we change the statement though, what has happened is our values have interceded in our judgment. The next time you miss a weight that you hit as a PR a month ago, remember these paragraphs.¹

Since the effectiveness of most things we do tends to be measured quantitatively the average trainee doing step-ups tends to get discouraged when this doesn't result in a new ten pound PR on his back squat. The first thing you need to know is that there are other benefits to the things we do that can lead to better progress down the road and these things will sometimes be seen as a qualitative improvement. Other aspects of performance may improve rather than the load on the bar but these improvements will have a positive effect on your ability to sustain progressive increases in load on your target exercises. Even so, a step up may be just the thing to see squat increases when the lower body has become a limiting factor.

Oh wait, your guru did a study? Bullshit. The average trainer, coach, or fitness guru is no more qualified to design an effective and legitimate study into specificity (or anything) than I am to recreate a Jackson Pollack. No matter how drunk I get.

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by EricT

By Ashiem Matthn

Strength Training has become the new "in" thing to do. Train like a Powerlifter and eat like a Bodybuilder. This is standard advice given to every beginner wanting to get in shape. The next thing you're likely to read or hear is "Squat 500, Pull 500 and Bench 300 and you won't be complaining about size."

While these statements may have some truth in them - however remote, I do not think that the Big 3 Powerlifts are going to be the only "Holy Trinity" in getting anyone big and strong.

In my opinion, the most elite weightlifting sport is Olympic Lifting because of the sheer employment of technique and power. These guys train multiple times a day from the time they are little more than toddlers to get this strong. That kind of dedication and precision requires a category of its own. Unfortunately, learning the OLY lifts by yourself and progressing without the leadership of a coach can be frustrating and progress is likely to be snail-speed.

To, the next elite sport is Strongman Training. Moving heavy things around again and again basically means you need brute strength and endurance. The only drawback to this sport is your weight. You have to be one of the big guys to ever be on ESPN and you have to be able to Deadlift 600 pounds 10 times at the very least. These guys are not about hitting one rep maxes and calling it a day. They want to move heavy stones, carry heavy bags and even run a race with a full refrigerator strapped onto their backs!

After Strongman Training the next big sport is Powerlifting. While it may be considered a backyard sport by many, it does have its merits in that it focuses around only 3 exercises: the Squat, Bench Press and Deadlift. It's all about hitting that one single rep you need to set a new record. This has become the standard for all training now. Unless you Squat, Bench and Deadlift you aren't a strength trainee. Hell, if you don't do the above 3 lifts, you aren't worth shit because you'll never get strong or big. Forget your individual goals and aspirations..who cares about that? All that matters is your ability to hit a 700 Pull, 600 Squat and 500 Bench. This achievement will make you large, strong and cure cancer. Yeaaaahhh…

So, in short:

What happens to those trainees who don't want to compete and don't want to be labelled as Powerlifters or Weightlifters? What if they just want to get strong? They're Strength Trainees and the lifts they want to focus on aren't the same as the Powerlifts simply because they have no aim to compete. If you aren't going to compete in a meet why restrict yourself to training in one fashion ALONE? You have the freedom to do what you like - basically pick the most optimal tools you need to get you to your goals.

What lifts should someone like that focus on?

In my opinion, people who have no intention of competing professionally and making Powerlifting or Strongman Training a source of their bread and butter do not need to restrict themselves to training the Squat, Bench and Deadlift. They have something most Powerlifters and Weightlifters don't: they have the ability to be flexible in their exercise selection.

Given this degree of freedom, I think most strength trainees should focus on the following three lifts because of their sheer functional benefit:

1. The Front Squat
2. The Strict Overhead Press
3. The Deadlift

The Front Squat

The Front Squat is probably the most functional variation of the squat. Here are some tips I have to get better and stronger at Front Squats:

• Work on Hip mobility Drills to get your hips moving correctly. Ground Up Strength has an entire page dedicated to Hip Mobility Drills which can be found right here: Mobility
• Do not use the cross grip to perform this exercise. It will end up limiting you because it does not provide enough stability. Using a clean grip or a weightlifters' grip is much better because it enables the weight to rest completely on your shoulders (the way it should be) with no potential to roll forwards during the course of your rep.
• There are many different types of progression which you could employ to help you but keep in mind: different set/rep schemes are simply tools. Don't get overly attached to any one of them because that will limit you. Use everything you can to progress and your end goal is to get stronger. It's all about perspective.
• Apart from simple linear progression, you can use a percentage basis as a guidelines. Note: I said you should use it as a guideline. Here's what I mean: every Front Squat workout, perform atleast one single at an intensity greater than 90% of your 1RM. As weeks progress you have the option to either increase the reps or perform more than one single or improve the quality of your single(s). After performing the required single(s) you should dedicate 3-5 sets on working with weights between 80-90% of your 1RM. You either add reps here or you increase density (keeping the same number of sets and the same time frame but improving the reps and or the weight - basically making your workout more "dense" with more work done in the same or lesser time frame). So, you are progressing on a two fold level: improving the ability of your body to handle loads greater than 80% of your max and improving your ability to attempt these weights multiple times.
• When performing the Front Squat, do not worry about "squatting back". You need to focus on squatting DOWN and relate yourself to the bar. Do not think about hips or anything. Everything moves in synchrony.

The Strict Overhead Press

The Strict Overhead Press used to be an Olympic lift until some guys managed to lean so far back they made this into an Incline Press. However, if this lift is done correctly, I believe it can be very helpful.

• The Press outranks the Bench Press because firstly you aren't lying on your back. I dunno about you but I don't think workouts should involve me lying on my back. Thats not a workout or a worthwhile exercise.
• The Press keeps your shoulders safe and injury proof. Doing this exercise the right way helps improve the stability of your shoulder girdle. Coupled with pull-ups and rows, you got one strong upper body.
• It is more functionally efficient than its counterpart: the Bench Press.
• Regarding Progression, the Strict Overhead Press is a slower lift to progress at because of the level of difficulty. One simple way to progress is to improve the number of sets and reps you can do with 90% or more of your 1RM. This boils down to you taking 90 lbs (assuming your 1RM is 100 lbs) and performing more sets or more reps or higher weights over time. So, Week 1 can involve you doing: 90 lbs x 2 reps x 3 sets. Week 2 can be 90 lbs x 3 reps x 3 sets. Week 4: 90 lbs x 3 reps, 95 lbs x 3 reps, 100 lbs x 2 reps. Boom. Since this lift is slow to progress on, you should give yourself some breathing room to progress on.
• Regarding form, try to keep your shoulder blades pinched together. Elbows should be ahead of the bar and to avoid strain your lower back, before you press the weight, make sure your glutes are also pinched together. Hold that pinch for the entire duration of the lift.

The Deadlift

If the Snatch and the Clean & Jerk are considered the Gods, the Deadlift will surely be the King!

• Eric Troy has written numerous must-read articles on the Deadlift. A quick look at his blog and the articles in the Training and Exercise sections will enable you to nail your form down correctly.
• With regards to Progression, firstly: don't think that the mutually beneficial nature of Deadlifts and Front Squats is a one way street. If the Deadlift improves; so will the Front Squat and vice versa.
• Next, try doing the Singles Scene for your Deadlift every 4-5 months once you have gathered sufficient momentum with the heavy weights.
• Work on being able to perform quality reps with 90% or more of your Max week in and week out. A lot of trainees train with sub par weights and expect to shatter their previous Absolute Maxes. This only works for a handful of people. Most of the time, you got to Deadlift big and Deadlift often to get serious results. Bob Gaynor is one of the classic examples of this. He's 63 years old with a 672 pound Deadlift.
• Eric has guided me through several types of progression schemes but I want to touch upon two in particular. The first is called Poliquin's Modified 5-1 Progression. Here's what you do: take a reasonable heavy weight and perform 1 rep. Take 10 lbs off and then do 5 reps. Then add 5 lbs to the weight used for the first set and do 1 rep. Take 10 lbs of this current weight and perform 5 reps. Rinse and repeat. An Example:

• The second protocol I'd like to discuss is Quality Volume Training (QVT). This can be applied to any lift you like including curls. The purpose of this system is to improve the quality of your reps. So, you start at roughly 85% of your max and you perform 1-3 reps making sure you are perfect in your technique. You make small increments with each set (5-10 lbs) and you keep the reps between 1 and 3. Sometimes you can perform 2 sets of 2 reps (for example) or repeat a single if you choose to do so. This is about you gauging your ability execute the rep with perfect technique. A hypothetical numerical example is listed below:

• I have had great success with both these protocols (among others) and I highly recommend someone to try them out.
• When most people get back into lifting after a lay off or when they aren't having a particularly good day, they become frustrated at not being able to either hit their old maxes or missing target weights expected of them. Most of these people usually get angry and then give up. They end up carrying their frustration around with them. Instead of getting so down on yourself, the next time this happens to you - when you're having an unsatisfying day or you're getting back into lifting after some time off, use the Quality Volume Training approach because it will help you to gauge yourself, hit heavier weights and give you an overall sense of satisfaction as well.

Conclusion

I know my selection of lifts is odd compared to the publicized and highly promoted "Big 3" Powerlifts, however, I believe the Front Squat, Strict Overhead Press and Deadlift have merits which are unique to them. In terms of functional benefit - which is something I believe most Strength Trainees who don't have any desire to compete professionally; should focus on, they are second only to the highly technical Olympic Lifts.

Here is something else to consider: since I've made it clear that limiting oneself to training just the powerlifts when one doesn't have any intention of making weightlifting into a profession is not optimal, I'd like to say that firstly, there is no need to limit the functional lifts to three in number either. These three are just those big movers which I have in my training. I love pull-ups, rows, overhead squats, incline presses, etc etc… Secondly, one does not need to do any variation of the Squat, Deadlift or the Press to be considered a strength trainee. It all depends on your goals and intentions. If you want to improve your 1RM on Barbell curls, you don't need to Squat to achieve that goal. This is just something I want to add because I certainly am not limiting myself to any three lifts ONLY and I am most certainly not claiming any one lift to be the end all and be all in the pursuit of strength.

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by Ashiem_Matthn

By Eric Troy, Ground Up Strength

A great deal has been written about the general warm up for strength training. Mobility drills and soft tissue work are big news and most trainees would do well to pay the general warm up some attention. However, the specific exercise warm up is often a source of confusion and a good specific warm up can be an art form in itself.

So many trainees not only fail on how to properly build up to their big squats and deadlifts but also fail to realize how important a proper build up is. Yes, it's important for injury prevention. But the simple fact is a good specific warm up can be the difference between success and failure.

Most information on the web about weight training warm ups are written from the point of view of bodybuilding. The typical percentage range of bodybuilding does not require the warm up know how that strength training does, especially when near maximal loads are on the schedule.

It is impossible to cover every possible strength training scenario and give recommendations for each so the best approach is to assume that near maximal loads are to be attempted which are loads of at least ninety percent of maximal or more. After you understand the basic technique for constructing the specific warm up for these heavy load warm ups for the lighter loads and higher rep ranges will be straight forward by comparison. Given that, we will provide some tips based on common scenarios as well.

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Joe Weir and I explained a proper warm up well in the Singles Scene under warm up and acclimation. That explanation was given in regards to a session of single rep training which means that the build up may be slower and the acclimation sets can end up being much closer to the maximum weight for that day. So use that only as one example.

A specific exercise warm up consists of two parts, the warm up and the acclimation.

Start with the Empty Bar

You should know approximately what your working weight will be before you begin your warm up. For moderate percentage loads you will usually know exactly what weight you plan to use or at least within 5 to 10 pounds of it. For near-maximal training such as singles or doubles you only need to make a guess since you will be able to judge your working weight by the warm up and acclimation process itself.

Always begin with an empty bar. Even advanced trainees should start with the bar empty which usually means 45 pounds for Olympic barbells although some cheaper bars may weigh around 40 pounds. Starting with an empty bar serves a number of purposes.

Depending on how complicated and long your general warm up routine is you may need more or less time to "get in the groove" of your squats, deadlifts, or other heavy lift. For those with complex needs who not only need good mobility warm up routines but also specific stretches for problem areas more time with very little weight to re-coordinate yourself with the lift is useful.

Although a variety of movement, as is the case of mobility training, serves to facilitate motor learning in the long run it may tend to "scatter us" in the short term. Warrior lunges and spidermans are great but the best way to get ready for a squat is to squat.

Mobility routines used as a general warm up emphasize continual movement. But that does not mean that static components do not exist. You should avoid holding static positions during mobility drills for more than a second except in the case of static stretches held for specific overactive or problem muscles. However, if you have many problem areas such as this you will need more time with the empty bar.

Likewise those that are unfamiliar with the mobility exercises will need to take more time with them and will tend to hold positions longer. This will temporarily decrease coordination even though it is a necessary part of learning the movements. The empty bar will serve as a recovery time without having to wait around for the effects to wear off, meaning the warm "wears off".

Perhaps the most important reason to begin with the empty bar is that it allows you to evaluate for the presence of potential tweaks. Those of us who are veterans of strength training know how easy it is to have a problem sneak up on us that we may have felt if only we had took some time with an empty bar to check ourselves over.

Begin with one to three sets of no more than eight reps with the empty bar. Take your time and do the reps slowly (not superslow) and with control. Pay attention to technique.

The Warm Up Phase

After your initial sets with the empty bar you are ready for you warm up sets. Again use no more than eight reps to avoid the accumulation of excess lactic acid. Although a bit of lactic acid production can be favorable too much will degrade force production. We want more force production after the warm up, not less! The warm up should not fatigue you. It should be easy and comfortable. It is better to do several sets with 4 to 6 reps than sets with more reps if more reps mean you will be more fatigued.

To calculate how much weight to put on the bar for the warm up phase take your projected working weight and calculate 50 and 75% of that. These numbers will be used as benchmarks around which the sets will be planned.

Here is an example of a basic warm up based on a proposed target weight of 150 pounds.

Empty Bar X 6
Empty Bar X 5
75 X 5
110 X 4

So the first two set represent 50 and 75% respectively. As you can see only moderate reps are used. Most sources advice many more reps than are needed for the warmup. As you become more advanced your warm ups (and acclimation) will consist of more sets not more reps.

As stated however, the percentages are just benchmarks. Weights up to 80% may still be considered part of the warm up for some trainees depending on individual needs and training status. Loads heavier than 80% percent are best considered acclimation.

Acclimation

Although after the above sets you might be thoroughly warmed up if you were to jump right to the working weight of 150 it could come as a shock. That's a jump of 30 pounds.

If the working sets represent a moderate load and are to involve moderate reps then it is permissible to go right from the warm up to the work sets. Even so, at least one or two acclimation sets can produce higher quality and better performance. If the working load is a maximal load then the acclimation sets are absolutely required.

After the above warm up a short period of acclimation might look like this:

120 X 1
125 X 1
135 X 1
Target Weight

135 pounds is 90% of our projected weight. How close to approach the working weight is an important question to ask. Some, myself included, avoid coming closer to 80 or 85% of our projected load while others do better with acclimation sets that go a bit heavier. You will have to experiment and learn what suits you best. Keep in mind that what suits you may change over time. Perhaps the biggest mistake trainees make is failing to realize that their needs change as their training status progresses (or regresses as the case may be).

As mentioned, the number of warm up and acclimation sets you need may go up as you become more advanced. Everybody is a little different though and individual tolerances to lifting will determine whether shorter or longer sessions are used. What is warming up and acclimating to a more advanced trainee may well be overwhelming to a beginning trainee. So here is an example warm up and acclimation using a target weight of 300 pounds:

Empty Bar X 6 X 2 (6 reps, 2 sets)
90 x 5 x 1
120 x 4
150 x 3
175 x 3
225 x 2
235 x 1
250 x 1
260 x 1
275 x 1
Target Weight 300

This is where the 50 and 75% numbers being "benchmarks" comes into play. For a target weight of 300 our benchmarks are 150 and 225 pounds. The warm up sets are planned around these. So for the above session I used 120, 150, 175, and 225 before beginning the acclimation sets. The 90 pound set was thrown in to represent a trainee who needs additional work with very light loads. Notice, however that we didn't mess around with 50, 60, 70, 100, etc. Those would be needlessly light loads and would only serve to accumulate more work than we needed to build up to our lift. So the benchmarks simply tell us the range to begin with. That does not mean you, as an individual, cannot go lighter if you need it. These benchmarks are good ballpark for the average trainee.

Rest Periods

Rest as long as you need between sets of warm up and acclimation. The initial warm up sets will tend to require little rest and one to two minutes may be enough. If you are out of breath rest longer and even at the beginning it may be proper to rest as long as three minutes when needed. As the build up sets get heavier longer rest periods will be required and for acclimation sets rest periods of five minutes or even longer are sometimes needed. In general allow three to five minutes between acclimation sets. Much will depend on the nature of the training session to follow and there are no rules except not to race through a warm up.

No, you do not need to worry about your warm up "wearing off" or your muscles going cold because you rest too long between sets. This is not bodybuilding so don't wear a bodybuilder's hat to the gym. The purpose of the specific warm up and acclimation is to facilitate high force development and high quality. Curtailed inter-set rest periods are not conducive to this.

Time management is of course a factor and no one wants to spend half an hour on the warm up. But remember that the first lift in your session is your priority lift. If you need to sacrifice for time then shave time off the end of the workout never the beginning. Accessories can be supersetted, for instance, which will save a great deal of time at the end of the workout.

Warm Ups for Secondary Exercises

The second most common question about exercise warm ups is whether or not you need to warm up for each and every exercise you do. The answer is it depends and not exactly.

Let's say your first exercise is deadlift and your second exercise is step-ups. Once you've finished your deadlifts your entire body has done work and it is safe to say that your lower body is thoroughly warmed up. But that is not the same a being "prepared".

The obvious difference between the deadlift and step-up is that the deadlift is a hip dominant exercise and the step-up is a knee dominant. Some may understand that as "posterior chain dominant" and "quad dominant". But the deadlifts do work your quads just like step-ups for sure work the posterior chain to some extent. The less obvious difference is amplitude of movement, the step-up having more. The ROM of the step-up is greater than deadlifts.

So you may still need a few lighter sets to get ready for the step-ups. But no you do not need a full-fledged warm up and acclimation. If fact you should rarely need any acclimation at all for a secondary movement and at most a couple of sets of 4 to 5 at say 50 to 70 percent of the working load. Play it by ear and learn what works best for you.

What if your second exercise is upper body and your primary one is lower body? Well this changes things. You will need to consider whether the second exercise is near maximal or submaximal work. Also consider injury history. The shoulders need more love and care than almost any joint in the body. Don't think you are ready to launch into some heavy military presses just because you've deadlifted and after all, the deadlifts do work your shoulders a bit.

You will never need the same long warm up process for any secondary exercise but always hold out the need for some warm up. For exercises after the first few there is rarely any need for further warm up. You will be working the same area of the body with movements of a similar class and the weights will be lighter.

To wrap this up, strength training is not a race.

Stepped Sets

The question of stepped sets is bound to come up. Stepped sets are when the weights used during successive sets of a resistance exercise are increased in steady increments. Only the final set is the maximum working load so the initial sets, depending on the size of the increments, may well be considered a "warm up".

So, in general stepped set will require much less warm up since you are still warming up as you begin the initial sets. How much warm up is needed before the "working sets" depends on how heavy the initial set is or in other words, how tight the increments are.

Usually stepped sets are planned by taking the final working set and planning each set downward from there based on a certain percentage.

Lets say you plan to do 200 X 6 for you final set and want to do 4 stepped sets. If you use only five percent increments your sets will be

170 X 6
180 X 6
190 X 6
200 X 6

A couple sets with the empty bar, followed by some moderate rep sets of around 100 and 135 should suffice before beginning the stepped sets.

If higher increments are used even less warm up would be needed.

Stepped sets are often confused with "pyramiding" by the way. These are two different methods. Pyramid sets involve working up to a maximum set and then back down again. So the pyramid has "two sides". Stepped sets only work up.

Submaximal Set Across

Warm ups for submaximal sets across like the typical 5x5 or 4x6 fall under the discussion above for warm ups for non-maximal training. Little acclimation will be needed but it is still necessary to have some warm up and even some acclimation.

A typical complaint from many trainees during these sessions is that the the third set is easier than the first few sets and then the fourth set is hard again. This does not make sense to the trainee since it seems logical that it the first sets should be the easiest and then each set should simply get successively more difficult as they fatigue. What is happening is the result of lack of warm up and acclimation. The first sets, lacking warm up, are difficult and sloppy and are serving in place of a warm up albeit an improper one. Then comes a sweet spot where it feels easier. After that fatigue is building up and the last set tends to be a gut buster.

This may seem fine to many. After all you've got the work done. You accomplished what you set out to accomplish. However, with a proper warm up and acclimation as needed you will be able to perform your reps with much higher quality in general and be able to judge your performance much better. Your ability to correct faults will improve with a good warm up. Amplitude across the session will be better in general. Basically everything about your performance should improve. Meaning that over time the bulk of your work is of higher quality which helps prevent compensations and injury mechanisms taking hold over time. Just another way that the warm up helps us.

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by EricT

By Eric Troy

Did your mom ever tell you that when you have a disagreement with a friend you have to learn to compromise? Not to disrespect your mom but the idea that we always must reach a compromise is nonsense and is a common fallacy of thought.

The problem is that people overgeneralize the appropriateness of compromise. Compromise is about what people want and what they get. So when we have a list of wants that differs from what another individual we are involved with wants each of us must be willing to give a little to get a little. This way we don't get everything we want but we come up with a mutually beneficial and fair solution. This is compromise.

On the other hand if your buddy wants to throw a rock through your neighbor's window and you do not, you are not required to reach a compromise whereby you agree to only soap the windows instead. Your buddy is wrong and you need to have the backbone to tell him so and walk away. Don't let him bully you.

Strength training is a similar transaction. Many people who misunderstand the nature of compromise teach trainees that they must make false compromises. This allows one's training to "bully" him and usually this means that a particular lift runs roughshod over the trainee.

There is no better example than the back squat. Known widely as "the king of lifts" the back squat has become the proverbial playground bully.

Part of strength training is to prioritize certain lifts at certain times. This means that other lifts may have to be set on maintenance which involves cutting down the volume and frequency of those lifts so that maximal ability can be maintained within a certain range. It is actually not that complicated and most trainees overestimate the amount of training needed to maintain maximal ability.

However, lifts such as the back squat are viewed as essential at all times. In fact the purported properties of the lift are downright magical. Many gurus teach that the squat actually helps your deadlift but not vice versa, for instance. With this sort of nonsense at play, strength training becomes squat training.

There IS no essential strength training lift. None. There is no exercise that we cannot do without. It should be easy to see, then, that there is no exercise that cannot be put on the back burner because we choose to focus on another.

You will never make better progress on your deadlift, for instance, than when you back off on the back squatting. You may find that the reputation of the deadlift being so murderous on the lower back has as much to do with it being viewed through a back squat lens. Why wouldn't the deadlift seem to be tough on your lower back when it's surrounded by heavy back squatting at a ratio of six to one or more as is the case with the beloved 5x5 routines?

If you want to make appropriate compromises in your training then you will not allow any lift to 'be in charge'. Setting any one or two lifts as superior to all others basically means that you must always make a false compromise. A false compromise means that not only do you not get what you want, not even that oh-so-important lift does! Remember our friend the would-be window breaker? He didn't get to break any windows, did he? You see, setting lifts like the back squat as superior ultimately means that not even the back squat gets trained appropriately because it is constantly over-trained and then detrained. Like the bully, it is either on the playground bullying or sitting in detention.

This may sound like we should always seek a middle ground with a lift. Not at all! That's another mistake in itself. Although good training tends toward the middle of two extremes this does not mean that it actually settles in the middle.

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by EricT

Travis Ortmayer, top international strongman and owner of Athletic Nation gives a tutorial on the snatch lift in this video.

See more Travis Ortmayer videos here at Ground Up Strength.

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by EricT

By Eric Troy

All strength athletes, at certain times, must consolidate their gains and they will do this instinctively by adding reps to their present limit. As a matter of fact this is an "old-school" way of training and it is still prevalent. There is not a NEW way that is better by virtue of science or Russian periodization. The ways that work haven't changed…our attitudes and expectations have.¹

Most trainees today have been indoctrinated into thinking they can't think. Or that they are not allowed to think, react, gauge, and otherwise adapt to their own internal progress. They expect rote systems. And it's a shame because some of the best training is done by the individual with self-knowledge rather than by group consensus.

Realizing that people cannot change their thinking all at once, I am willing to try to define what I mean by strength consolidation and to give you one example of a system. This is not a simple endeavor so I will ask something in return from you. I ask that you meet me half-way and be willing to think on your feet a little bit while using this system. Call it practice.

What is strength consolidation?

First of all, strength consolidation is not something I invented. I may be one of the first or few people to use the term in regards to training for strength but the concept has always been around albeit not always in a conscious, spelled-out way.

The definition of the word "consolidate" is "to make firm or secure". So consolidation is a process of firming or securing our strength gains.

As defined by Michael Fakete:

Consolidation being a separate "stage" of training in which no other advantage is gained other than to firm up the gains from the previous "progression" stage is consistent with most sources' definitions. So, consolidation is the same as "maintenance" and "recovery". Such definitions are inadequate. Maintenance implies NO PROGRESS and NO CONNECTION to PROGRESS. At best it implies recovery from the high demands of the previous training stages but to maintain is simply to stop gaining. There is nothing in the word maintenance that implies consolidation.

Since most sources severely overestimate the amount of training needed to maintain maximal strength levels they would therefore underestimate the amount of training needed to consolidate. This makes sense because most so-called strength training sources are simply not concerned with maximal strength in and of itself but speak of the more nebulous concept of "fitness".

Consolidation is not "something other than" progression. They are connected and one cannot exist without the other. Take that statement as far as you would like. Ultimately, it means that there is no right or wrong time to consolidate your gains.

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Why consolidate?

We have a long and very informative discussion on consolidation in the comments to Anuj's post The Importance of Progression.

I tend to think that I am at my best when commenting informally or spontaneously so I invite you to read that discussion before continuing this article. It may seem a little rambling but sometimes a good ramble is just the thing and I sometimes think that the difference between rambling and writing (for me) is simply a matter of editing! You can read it complete with typos so that you know this was not contrived.

The system

1. The first thing I must firmly establish is that this "system" is not a training program and is meant to be used for one or two exercises at a time. If doing two exercises then one should be lower body and one upper body. NEVER try to do two upper body movements or two lower body movements in the same training period. This method is EXTREMELY AGGRESSIVE. If you thought I was about to describe a way of "backing off" from training, then think again. This isn't a deload. There is no way of gauging the effect of this for every individual. This is one or two exercises a week each done ONE DAY a week.

2. For hybrid or "full-body" movements this should be used for only one exercise. So, also for Olympic lifts, for which caution should be used and the numbers given should be reduced.

3. For deadlifts and squats, consider making this a deadlift only or squat only day. You stand the best chance of success this way. At the most, throw in some static core work or some single joint exercise. But it would be best to get in and out. So, in this way, we are "backing off" our total volume for that day.

4. This one is not so much a rule as a guideline. Read through the The Singles Scene. Before using this method of consolidation it would be beneficial to have some experience using singles. It is NOT required but using this method assumes that you have some experience with maximal training and specifically, experience using singles. If you've never systematically used singles training, most of the numbers I suggest will probably have to be greatly reduced, perhaps by as much as half. However, I have great confidence that after you read "The Singles Scene" you will be excited and will WANT to use singles in your training, at which time you will experience great gains in your strength. Meaning this method can be saved for a rainy day. But all the basics are included here.

5. NOT FOR BEGINNERS! The intensities used in this method are inappropriate for beginners. That includes those just now switching from bodybuilding training to strength training, unless that training included dedicated strength training as part of it's philosophy. If you are not sure, ASK! I cannot, and will not attempt to give a universal definition of beginner, intermediate, or advanced, trainees. All you really need is a reasonable mastery of the lift(s) and experience doing those lifts at intensities of at least 85 percent or higher with at least some emphasis on intensities greater than ninety percent.

Before describing it, I once again have to give props to Anthony Ditillo. I did not realize (or remember) until reading back through "The Development of Physical Strength" that he described something very similar to this just after the quote I used above. Undoubtedly when I developed this I must have been influenced by that. I read so much that I don't always know where everything comes from but at least part of this comes from Ditillo.

However, in terms of intensity, I am a bit more aggressive in my training philosophies than Ditillo, although that is because of our differing definitions of the word. I am going to spell out this method step by step. Single, Double, and possibly triple progression will be used at the end and, again, I owe much to Anthony Ditillo for that. But again, my ideas are an "adding on" and take many other concepts into consideration. Ditillo is big on the idea of "intensity cycling" (although he doesn't call it this) and this is a concept that I personally despise:

From "The Singles Scene" by Joe Weir and Eric Troy:

"This type of buildup may be necessary for the extremely advanced or elite lifter, but that constitutes so few of us it is practically worthless for our discussion. This is nothing more than “intensity cycling” or intensity deload. Most trainees will have very little need to cycle back intensity but rather will need to cycle volume. For these trainees it is much more efficient to stay as close to their maximal intensity as possible during near-maximal lifting activities. If they spend an appreciable amount of time away from this maximal intensity they will simply be detraining maximal strength and a percentage based program becomes nothing more than playing catch-up. In strength training, never lift lighter when you can lift heavier safely."

A few points:

• We are not "setting back the weight" and working back up by adding reps and sets in single, or double progression. We are using a near-maximal weight and adding reps to that (single progression).

• We are not basing our starting weight on a "limit" weight or a one rep maximum. Basing this type of training off a maximum established a few weeks ago or even last week would have us use a weight that was much too low or much too high. This type of thing is what is sometimes called a "raw" max and it is a silly and ill-defined concept. Instead we will use a "relative max".

• What to do with the rest of your training is not a topic that can be covered in this article. A good choice, if in doubt, would be to deload all your training except for this. However, if you want in-depth advice simply ask an in-depth questions by posting a comment after this article.

Relative max is a term I use to describe a trainee's best single for any given day. This best single may or not be a personal record. So the max is relative to your ability on that day.

The Plan

The initial period of this plan is 4 weeks. So call that "phase one" if you like. This phase will be establishing a baseline from which to proceed, using the single, double, and triple (if possible or desirable) as mentioned above.

I'll describe it using deadlifts as the exercise but it can be any compound lift, especially the slow lifts. The word "DAY" is the same as WEEK. So "DAY ONE" is also "WEEK ONE".

Day one:

Begin by following the same procedure for doing a singles workout as described in "The Singles Scene". Find your relative max for the day (your best quality single).

Here is the procedure (with example) for finding your max taken from the article:

You should have enough experience to make a pretty good guess as to your maximum lift. If you have no idea what to shoot for, then you are not ready at all for this. As you go about the warm-up and acclimation you should be getting an even better feel for how much you can lift that day. You should also try to avoid making large ‘jumps’ in weight when it comes down to your working sets.

To begin, make an educated guess for your max. Let’s say you think you can hit about 150 (on whatever exercise). After your foam rolling (should) and dynamic mobility warm-up (should again) you will perform warm-up sets for your chosen lift….

Using squats as an example and projecting a max of 150, it may look something like this:

Bar X 6-8
75 X 3
95 X 3
100 X2
125 X 2
125 X 1
135 X 1
145 X1 (MAX)…

By the time you get to 135 you should have a pretty good idea of how it is going to go. Again, do not make huge jumps.

Unlike a regular singles workout, ALL the singles will be at the SAME WEIGHT.

So using the above max of 145 pounds, we have:

145x1
130x1
130x1
130x1
130x1
130x1
130x1
130x1

Notes:

• Don't worry if you can't get eight to ten singles. Don't push yourself if that means sacrificing quality a great deal. If you can only do, for instance, five singles, then your next workout will be adjusted accordingly.

• If using a weight that is ninety percent of your max seems too heavy and you are sure that you cannot get the singles in then by all means reduce the weight. The intensity is simply a guideline to get you in the ballpark.

That is it for day one.

Day Two:

Follow pretty much the same warmup as for the first day (depending on your needs of course) and repeat the same relative max you did on the first day….this can be a few pounds lighter if you want.

The reason you are repeating the same max is basically for a staged effect…potentiation.

Then…after the max warmup and max from day one take the same weight as you did the 8 to 10 singles (counting the max) with on day one and attempt 6 to 8 doubles.

Note that this is a HUGE jump in workload but no jump in intensity.

Adding reps to the singles is an example of "single progression".

That is it for day two.

Day Three:

Same procedures…same weights…

Except try for 5 to 7 triples.

That's it for day 3.

Day Four:

Take the same ~90% weight you used for all the singles and perform two to three sets for reps to near failure. You should feel like you have at least one good rep left in you. On the last set you can go to failure, meaning that this is the last rep you feel that you can do with reasonably good form (in other words, even if you could do another rep it would be a 'forced rep' or a 'cheat rep', which is unacceptable).

For example, using the 130 pounds given in the example above:

1.Do a set of 130 pounds to NEAR failure…that maybe about 2 good reps left, or one good rep left, or 1.5 good reps left..that depends on how it works for you. Doesn't matter how many reps. Even if it's only 3 that's fine. Or 4 or 5. Whatever happens happens.

2. After a GOOD rest..and I mean as long as you want or need up to 5 or 6 minutes, do another set, same as first. This time TRY to repeat the same number of reps because that will just make it easier to progress off…don't bother doing more reps than the first set unless it is just ridiculously easy..which is doubtful.

Take your time between reps so that you can be thinking whether this set will be it. The best way to no that is if this second set is more to failure than the last. In other words if the second set feels much like the first set then you can probably move on. If the last rep is the LAST rep, you're done. If you do not understand what I am getting at here then you probably lack the experience to be doing this in the first place!

3. Only after you gauge the toughness of the second set should you try to go on to a third. There is no need to push it. Two sets is fine. If you do go on to a third set don't worry about what happened on the first two. If you only have two reps in you then just do two. If all you have is one rep in you…then you probably shouldn't have bothered moving on to the third.

Lets suppose that on triples day with our 130 pounds we performed 5 triples. For day four we may do something like this:

130x5x1
130x5x1
130x3x1

Now we have established a base from which we will work and this concludes day four, also concluding the formal phase of the method. The remainder consists of taking the baseline we establish and progressing using single, double, or triple, progression.

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by EricT

by Eric Troy

This article is about basic strength traning progression. If you are looking for information on using single rep training you should read The Singles Scene

The only other person, besides myself, that I've known to speak in-depth about single, double, and triple progression is Anthony Ditillo. However, to be frank, most of what he said about it makes no sense to me and he seems to have been applying the terms to established styles of training as an alternative to what others had named their training methods, such as "the pyramid system".

When Ditillo spoke of single and double progression he seems to have meant simply allowing yourself to use more than one way to progress. Or in other words to manipulate more than one parameter. This should be fairly obvious since it is an intuitive means of progression for most trainees and if not told most will simply add to what they've done before in some way, be it weight, reps or sets of exercise.

Consider that there are basically three ways to progress (there are MANY ways to progress but we are only considering three direct ways). You can add weight the the bar. You can add reps to existing sets with a given weight. Or, you can add sets to an already established number of sets with a given weight.

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To me, therefore, it's just a name and I appreciate Ditillo's efforts at calling our attention to the fact that there are many ways to progress, I don't think that one can rightly call his ideas examples of "double progression" or "triple progression" in any way other than CHOOSING to name his ideas that.

My biggest problem with it is that even though you may only be progressing by one parameter in any given workout, if you use more than one parameter in any given training period people think this is "triple progression". Without even knowing what that means it simply SOUNDS like "too much"!

Tell a beginner that he can also add reps and sets rather than just weight and you will likely have armchair trainers shouting, NO! Beginners can't use triple progression! When, in fact, single, double, and triple progression is tailor made for the beginner. And a trainee CAN progress by MORE THAN ONE MEANS in a workout. He or she can use only single, or use double or triple and with a minimum of reactive based training this can naturally flow with the trainees state of preparedness.

The great thing about being free to use all three is it can allow you to vary the stimulus so that you don’t get burned out. It can also allow you to slowly build on the volume and then back down to a base volume while increasing intensity…built in natural peaks. With all that said, it is required to get out of the mindset of a certain number of reps being the be all and end all, and just knowing that adding reps has a benefit up to a point just as adding sets does.

So, after establishing that we are talking about load (weight on the bar), reps, and sets, Ditillo and I part ways. But I'd like to be clear that I have the greatest respect for Anthony Dittilo's teachings and his book, "The Development of Physical Strength" has had a great influence on me as well as many of his articles. He helped form my ideas about strength consolidation which basically entails increasing work tolerance at a given range - and Ditillo was a big proponent of this type of thing.

Before I begin this explanation of single, double and triple progression for strength training I need to state some very important things up front.

The first thing you will notice is that these concepts are about numbers. And I'm sure most of you reading this will be quite familiar with numbers in strength training. Most training rationales have an increase in numbers as their primary means of progression.

This may be increased weight. Increased reps. Increased sets…but it's always about numbers. So I want to be clear that there are MANY different ways to progress and many different things that REPRESENT progression. Strength training is NOT JUST ABOUT NUMBERS. There are many things you can improve that have nothing to do with numbers and that improvement represents progression…and that can lead to higher numbers down the road.

What is SDT?

The remainder of this article will sometimes refer to single, double, and triple progression as SDT for short.

SDT uses three main ways to progress and these concepts can be used at any time in ones strength training career but it should never be considered the be all and end all. There comes a point where everyone has to focus on that one "ingredient" in order to see changes in absolute strength. Individuals who are new to strength training, and to resistance training in general, will find this the most useful as a primary means of training. More advanced trainees may want to use it more as an adjunct for secondary lifts or as a way to gather volume. Although even those individuals will have need for it, as, for example, my use of it in the 'strength consolidation' routine.

The first thing you should notice, which should be clear from the beginning of this article, is that there is nothing new or innovative in the basic PARAMETERS of progression. It's so simple you may think this is just plain belaboring the obvious. However, even though most people are aware of these basic parameters of progression, most never really use them in the way I will outline in this article.

Rest Periods

We will assume that rest periods will remain fairly constant for simplicity. Keep in mind, however, that depending on your needs and goals, more or less rest between sets can be used. For example, rest periods can be gradually decreased for strength endurance.

Using single, double, and single progression the way I will explain is somewhat a "reactive" based way of training and progressing. The fact is I've been teaching people how to use this for years..long before "reactive" training was a 'brand name'. But reaction is only part of it. Like any good training we make a plan but we allow ourselves to think on our feet and adapt to our changing needs.

Using SDT

To reiterate, the three way to progress:

1. Add weight to an existing number of sets and reps.

2. Add reps to an existing number of sets (call this increasing density/volume. Adding any number of reps to any or all sets is progression. Adding any number of reps to any or all sets is progression.

3. Add set(s). Adding a set alone is single progression even if that added set isn't the same number of reps as the previous sets. Now, you have to use logic here. If you were doing 3x5 and you added one more set of two, that would be less progression than adding two reps to the first set of five. You see? Becasue of the rest and recovery involved. This should give you the idea that, up to a point, one should first attempt to add reps to existing sets before attempting to add sets.

Such an idea would be absolutely correct as long as one keeps in mind that it is only correct, as stated 'up to a point'.

So, during any one workout, we can use single, double, or triple progression and at any time we can add weight to the base volume. When we add weight to the base volume we start again from there or we establish a new base to work from depending on our goals.

Sometimes it's useful to simply count the reps and then look at any added reps as a percentage of the starting reps. This helps keep us reasonable because in fact many times we are making very big additions in volume without even realizing it. It doesn't seem much just looking at it but in pure mathematical terms it is in fact very large. Adding another set of five to an existing 3x5 sets is a thirty percent increase in total volume.

An example of something that may happen in the gym:

Can you spot the weeks that are single progression and the weeks that are double progression?

In week two, we add 5 pounds to the bar and do the same number of sets and reps. So single progression. In week three we add 5 pounds to the bar and do the same number of sets and reps plus we add one more set of 4. Double progression: we have added load AND volume. In week three, we add two reps to our last set of 4 from the previous week. Single progression. In week 4 we add weight but drop the volume and density back a bit, but not that much. So we consider this single progression.

This may be somewhat an extreme example when looking at week three. It's not that such thing is impossible only that if one were able to add 5 pounds to the bar AND add a four rep set it begs the question of whether more weight should have been utilized at the outset.

But such an example serves to illustrate how using single and double progression gives us a natural way to gauge our training.

So here is the example again labeled:

Note that since the total number of reps in week four is the same as in week one. But the density has decreased as it took us three sets instead of two to to it. But we have increased the load fifteen pounds from the previous workout and 25 pounds since week one. So, given such a big jump in poundage and a relatively short time we consider week 4 to be single progression FROM week one, made possible and/or manifested by weeks three and four.

So, by the same token, if it took twelve weeks to get to that 175 pounds then we could not compare it reasonably to week one but instead would have to gauge our progress by the weeks leading up. To avoid the possible confusion that long and drawn out periods of progression present, I separate the progressions into four to six week phases.

Therefore, as in the above example, we have a four week phase. A new baseline is established in the fourth week with three sets of four with 175 pounds. So our new phase can start with that but keeping in mind our original starting point. In week one of this new phase we might repeat the last workout of the old phase, our starting point for this one. But in the example below we will continue to progress:

Note that in week six we add weight but drop the volume back down to the original two sets of six. Even though we have added ten more pound we have cut the volume by more than half. So we have progressed forty pounds from our starting point and deloaded a bit from the aggressive volume we had built up.

This is example may be pushing it to the edge of what is possible except for novice trainees. But of course this way of progressing is particularly suited for novice trainees. However, all such examples are ONLY examples. They are not to be taken as a recipe for progression. Although there is nothing wroing with having a loose plan in place for how you wish to progress, SDT allows you to simply progress by whatever means your are able to do at the time. Or, whatever you feel like doing at the time.

Unlike rote linear/single progression schemes you will always be able to progress in some way and will not have to ever REMOVE weight from the bar. Personally, I cannot think of a more psychologically damaging concept for a trainee than to continually have to remove weight from the bar in order to build back up and continue progressing in the same mundane way you were doing it before. And I certainly wouldn't call such a process "efficient". So SDT represents a simple and natural way to progress. It is not contrived and stilted and that is exactly what makes it elegant.

How about an example using pullups?

That should serve for now as a general introduction to the concept. This is not to be taken as a program but simply as a set of guidelines to be used as needed. My use of the abbreviation SDT was only so I didn't have to write out the words single, double, triple thoughout. Please don't take this a "stamp" such as with HIT or HST. Take it as my attempt to remind you what you may have forgotten or simply had beaten from you by all the programs out there.

Don't Confuse SDT with "Double Progressive" Training

There is a way of structuring a resistance training workout that is sometimes called the "double progressive system." This system has nothing to do with what this article explains. Here we are talking about progressing from workout to workout for a certain period of time, such as weeks to months. On the other hand, the "progressive" in "double progressive system" refers to how the trainee progresses from one set to the next within one training session.

This system starts with a certain number of reps and then increases the number of reps, from set to set, until meeting the prearranged target reps. Then the weight on the bar is increased from set to set while the reps are decreased. The same number of sets are are done, while increasing the load each time, until the reaching the initial number of reps the trainee started with. As you can see, this is similar to "pyramid training". By and large, this type of training has no value. Don't bother with it.

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by EricT

By Eric Troy

Ok, you are at your favorite forum or you are talking to one of the trainers in the gym and you want to know about rest periods.

"How long should I rest between sets?" you ask.

Here is the typical first response you will get from the forum:

"What's your stats?"

Now you'd get that response from the forum whether you asked about rest periods or whether most people prefer chocolate chip over macaroons. "What's your stats" is bro-lingo 101 so we have to get that out of the way.

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More Articles Concerning Rest Periods

Then they will pretend like they are doing some quick and dirty calculations based on your body weight, bench press, squat, and deadlift. Afterwards, they might ask you what your goals are and what your training is like, which is likely the first thing the trainer would have asked you. Then they'll give you the same answer they give everybody else!

Something like:

"Ninety Seconds and your muscles have recovered all they are going to."

OK, so I'm exaggerating a little. But not that much. Out of one hundred possible responses I'll bet a good 70 percent will be ninety seconds to two minutes rest between sets across the board. And that is really ridiculous.

A more honest and/or accurate answer would be: "I don't know. It depends."

The fact is I have never talked to a person whose rest periods are too LONG. But I've seen countless trainees that use the same ninety second rest periods for their circa-maximal deadlifts (say singles and doubles) as for their 5x5 program as for their bicep pumping session. That's right. What's more, tell them that is stupid and they will fight you tooth and nail. Yet again, belief perseverance at work and I could write an entire post on how it is a confirmation bias etc…

The length of your rest periods has a huge influence on your response to an exercise session. In a large way, it is what makes the workout what it is. Rest periods influence the metabolic response, the cardiprespiratory response, the hormonal response, the fatigue response, the strength response…

Is that enough?

Maximal strength gains have consistently been shown to be greater with longer rest periods. Simply, the longer rest periods allow you to lift MORE at a certain high intensity while maintaining quality. You lift a heavy weight more times while minimizing fatigue to maximize quality and you get stronger faster.

Is there a limit to this, or, in other words, a point of diminishing returns? Of course! But depending on the individual, a good rest period can be so much longer than the average trainee has been taught you may feel you are "cheating". Periods up to ten minutes are sometimes used with very heavy single repetitions. That's right TEN MINUTES.

The first simple guideline of rest periods for resistance training is the heavier the load, in terms of intensity, and the larger the amount of muscle used, the longer the rest periods needed between sets. So even though your goal is strength, you will always use longer rest periods for deadlifts than you will for tricep extensions. Pretty simple but many trainees don't have guidelines for rest periods, they have one concrete rule: always rest ninety seconds or two minutes, depending on which bodybuilding magazine they read. Some of the more enlightened trainees always rest exactly three minute between sets.

I've even had people tell me they only rest a minute and sometimes they rest ninety second to two minutes if they "need it". Did you know, there has never been shown to be much difference between one minute and two minute rest periods? Nope.

Take a bunch of comparable trainees and put them on the same protocol. Give half one minute rest periods and the other half two minutes. The difference in their results is insignificant. This is because the amount of time it takes to affect a certain amount of recovery is not exact. It's variable and can depend on many other factors.

Put another way, take two groups of trainees and put one group on one minute rest periods and the other half on three minute rest periods and there will be a significant increase in reps performed for each set for the three minute group. Now, put one half on one minute rest and the other on two and the difference in reps performed will be insignificant.

Makes one wonder how they came up with the ninety second rule.

Most people's ideas about rest periods are way off base. Your rest periods depend on your goals and what you are doing. Only ever resting up to 90 minutes because of some rule….very very bad idea. If you only rest that long…intensity will be SACRIFICED. Volume will be sacrificed. Progress in general will be sacrificed.

That is a "bodybuilding" prescription and even then it is only one detail to be manipulated. Anybody who's only ever rested that long between sets…start resting as long as you need to get the job done and watch your progress skyrocket. But those type of short rest periods are based on hormone response and I think mostly acute growth hormone response rather than "recovery" although I'm sure a bunch of people have made the "complete recovery" claim to back up their one size fits all recommendations. The basic claim goes something like this: "In 90 seconds to two minutes your muscles have recovered all they are going to." Complete and utter ignorance.

Even if one focuses on the hormone response angle I have a big problem with focusing on acute chemical response rather than what really matters: CHRONIC RESPONSE and ADAPTATION.

You don't need any of that. Just stop following rules nobody can prove to you and let experience be your guide. Anybody that thinks they can lift some maximal weights only ever resting 90 seconds….ain't ever lifted maximal weights (relatively speaking). Let the intensity and volume be your guide.

Absolutely must have some rules based on that? Sometimes rest periods are correlated with intensity or rep maximums sort of like the chart below, and I think you can see the pattern:

Some people will say that certain individuals train themselves to use much shorter rest periods being "highly advanced" athletes and that they can increase their strength without increasing rest periods. It's trying to get water from a stone. Something has to give and you are not going to ever get full performance from a system that may require up to 5 minutes to fully rev up with a rest period of 1 or 2 minutes. ANYBODY would be able to lift more with more rest in that case.

In general for strength you want 3 to 5 minutes for optimal recovery. Reducing rest periods can be a goal in itself for some short term strength gains and enhanced recovery. This is especially useful for body weight movements where the intensity cannot be changed and you need to add reps before you can add weight or otherwise increase the difficulty. But this myth about short rest periods has got to go. It is nowhere near the truth.

Unless you are using a protocol that is calling for specific rest periods or manipulation thereof…rest as long as you need to get the job done.

Ninety seconds as a blanket rule is simply not enough for recovery when it comes to strength training. To say that it is always enough for "mass" would be missing the boat as well. Certainly, with so many people doing 5x5's, I hope they're not all just resting 90 seconds between sets. Good lord that ain't the way to get the most out of it. And in case you are wondering why I brought up 5x5's in a paragraph about mass, that is because I consider that sort of training to be a generalized mass/strength way of training.

Even if you are a guy that "doesn't care about strength" to say that one specific rest period is always what anyone needs for mass would be like saying one specific volume is all that is needed. There are too many factors involved to make a rule like that. You need what you need.

However, for bodybuilding goals shorter rest period of around one minute to two minutes are thought to increase acute hormonal responses such as growth hormone in the blood which may be significant for hypertrophy. Even so, this is not the "proof of the pudding" for hypertrophy.

The point of this rant, though, is not to discuss all the possible affects shorter or longer rest periods (aren't you glad) but to make the point that most strength trainees don't rest long enough at all.

So, it takes around 3 minutes, give or take, for replenishment of intramuscular adenosine triphospate and phosophocreatine levels (to the extent they can be recovered). This is the first important factor in optimal recovery for maximal strength training goals. There is only enough ATP stored in the body to fuel the first few seconds of exercise.

It is at this point we consider "metabolic recovery" to be nearly complete. Generally, metabolic recovery is a catchall for all the machinery other than neural components, which is the next important factor.

And neural recovery takes anywhere from three to ten minutes. I should note that the term "neural recovery" should not be taken as a precise term. What is actually going on in these later stages as the trainee recovers the ability to exert full or next to full force is not exactly known and it could be related to activity in the CNS or the neuromuscular level. I use it here to describe recovery that takes place beyond metabolic recovery and make no claims of it tuning out to be a precise and usable term.

Please note: None of the charts given in this post represent YOU as an individual. How much rest a person needs, as I hinted above, can be fluid for an individual at any given period in his or her training. And training age itself has everything to do with it. A novice trainee will recover faster from a set of 10 squats than a more advanced one.

A major problem with short rest periods is that they can be psychologically daunting. When you feel fatigued or pressure to keep your rest periods down to some predetermined period, anxiety is increased.

If you compare a barbell complex or a demanding circuit to heavy maximal strength training it is easy to see how significant this psychological duress can be. The metabolic demands of a fast paced circuit may translate into "dread". It is entirely appropriate to use rest periods of thiry seconds to a minute but you know it is going to kick your butt and you may wish you could just lift some heavy weights.

You dread it but you don't fear it. The weights are light. If you get too tired and you feel like form is sacrificed too much you can always cut it short. Rest a little longer..what have you.

But if you couple the daunting nature of short rest periods with much heavier weights, failure doesn't just mean not getting all your reps. Failure means FAILURE. Shortchanging yourself on rest affects your readiness to lift and that will affect your success at the lift. Not to mention the combination of fatigue, anxiety and worry can be a combination that causes bad mistakes and bad injuries.

The kind of heavy I am talking about is at least 85% of 1RM or heavier and intensities of greater than 90% are sought for near-maximal efforts. But even when our strength training is not so heavy, but are based on volume and linear progression, short rest periods can be even worse.

At least with a maximal weight you recognize the seriousness of the situation. After all, as I just mentiond, your short rest periods have added to your anxiety about the effort. So, yes, resting longer can give you a psychological and recovery boost but the fact is, you are less likely to get hurt doing maximal training than you are doing sub-maximal training. In general I mean.

Many so called called strength programs such as 5x5 programs which use set reps and sets and linear progression, when combined with these very short rest periods, are injuries waiting to happen. The overall intensity may be a bit lower but the repeated effort and the pressure to "get your reps" in cause a huge deterioration in form as the session goes on. Throw in improper recovery from short rest periods and it's not longer so many trainees see injuries during these programs.

If, under these circumstances, your goal is to use a short rest period then that becomes a goal in itself. You start with a longer rest period…as long as you need to maintain quality…and you gradually reduce that each workout.

But very few strength trainees have shorter rest periods as a goal; they have them as a rule.

Break it.

If you are new to strength training and are unsure how long you should rest between sets, I'll make it simple. Rest as long as you feel you need and then just a bit longer. Let results be your guide. If you are progressing and getting stronger then don't fix what ain't broken.

Assuming, that is, your only goal is to increase maximal strength. I do not care how long I rest between maximal deadlifts attempt as compared to how long I rested 10 years ago. Despite all the PC propoganda about the big lifts, I don't deadlift for my health! Not that it isn't a great lift for many aspects of "health", I just didn't work my butt off for years bringing up the lift because I wanted to tack another half a year onto my life or even to increase my functional years. I did it because I like to challenge myself and lift heavy things off the floor. So, my only goal is to increase the total amount of weight I can lift regardless of how long I need to rest before I do it again.

Despite that, many highly seasoned lifters act like, due to their advanced status and their advancing age, instead of needing an average of five to ten minutes between circa-maximal lifts they now need book a long, relaxing cruise between lifts where they spend a couple of weeks playing shuffle-board. To which I say, if one big lift completely disables you, you have bigger fish to fry than rest periods between sets. You don't need to compromise your strength training with shorter rest periods; you need to get in shape! This is why the powers invented conditioning and periodization.

Yes, you can have a great deal of maximal strength on a few lifts and still be out of shape. Why do you think all the old powerlifters are dragging sleds around and then saying their deadlifts are increasing? Because sled dragging 'works the hammies'…right…

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by EricT

By Joe Weir

As a follow up to my last blog post, and to satisfy my obsession with crushing grip strength, I'm going to lay out a guide for torsion spring grippers. I'll make it as comprehensive as I can and it will contain information for people with and without experience with grippers.

First things first, below are a few torsion spring grippers. They are used to develop crushing grip strength but can also be used for supporting grip by using static holds or using strap pinches. From left to right, we have a CoC gripper, an ergonomic gripper and a straight gripper.

Below is a list of the Iron Mind Captain's of Crush grippers and their resistances. Now, not everything has to be done with a CoC gripper, but these numbers are a good way to describe your 'level' of grip strength and will be especially helpful when I refer to what resistances you should be looking at getting.

After reading this table you may be saying the same thing as I did when I first saw these, holy crap it takes 365lbs to close the No. 4! While the No. 4 takes legendary strength to close, the ratings on grippers are really nothing more than an indication of how tough they will be. Since there is no standard method for evaluating a grippers resistance it should be taken as nothing more than an idea of how challenging it will be. The main thing is that you train with a consistent set of grippers, as progress is really all that matters.

Beginner's

If you're brand new or relatively new to the world of grippers then this section is for you!

I'm sure most of you have seen grippers sold in sporting good stores or even Wal-Mart. Typical department or sporting good store grippers are usually around 30lbs resistance and even if you buy a package of 2 identical ones, they can vary by a few lbs.

You don't necessarily have to go with the CoC grippers and a good alternative is the Iron Woody Bonecrusher. They're about half the price, start as low as 100lbs and go as high as 400 and 500lbs of resistance! (Remember what I said about those numbers though)

I'm not suggesting you go out and buy a whole whack of grippers but I will suggest that you get one of those weaker grippers from Wal-Mart (or wherever). A weaker gripper will help you learn to set a gripper and can also be used as part of your warmup. You want to avoid the ergonomic style grippers however, and go with a straight handled gripper. Ergo grippers are not good for learning to set a gripper and some of them can be awkward to use and even painful, depending on how well they fit your hand.

From what I have read and from my own personal experiences with myself and others, an average person can close a 'trainer' level (100lbs) gripper for a few reps. I would suggest purchasing one of those as well. You will also want another gripper that you can do for only a single (or even barely) or a couple reps so that you have something to work towards. I would recommend something in the No. 1 range of 140lbs.

Having a variety of challenging grippers will not only keep you interested in grip training but will also give you some realistic goals to set.

Just because it is grip training does not mean that you don't need to perform a proper warmup and it doesn't mean you need to be able to close the gripper 8000 times. We will be doing a proper warmup. Typically I will close a weaker gripper for a couple sets of 10, move onto the next level gripper for 2-3 sets of 2-3, intermediate gripper for a 2-3 1 rep sets and then perform some maximal work with my heaviest gripper. A warmup should get you ready and acclimated but not fatigue grip strength so that it impacts the session. And we will be doing sets of 1 or 2 reps with the heaviest gripper, maybe not even a full rep at the start.

If you find that you can close all of your grippers easily for 10 full reps then it is probably time for the next resistance level. If you cannot close your highest resistance gripper, its ok, try and close it as much as you can and take note (or even measure) of the gap you need to close. On the next session you can measure the gap again and measure your progress by seeing how much you are able to decrease that gap. Partial reps are also a good tool as well. Closing a tough gripper for three 1/2 reps is still better than not trying to close it. You're still working your grip afterall.

This training is the same as barbell and dumbbell strength training. We want quality reps and low volume, with good ROM and technique. This should always be kept in mind when doing grip training, especially when you start to move into the higher level grippers. Its just like anything else, because you deadlifted a heavy weight does not mean you are a good deadlifter, form and technique count especially if you want to do this for the long haul.

The absolute worst thing to do is sit there and do hundreds of reps with a weak gripper. At the very least you will wear out the gripper prematurely and have a sore hand. We also want to work the hand extensors, using some sort of a band(s) or other means of resistance. There are some exercise ideas for this in my previous post.

WARNING: This can get very addictive so keep this in mind and try to minimize the impact that this has on your normal training.

Intermediate

I won't go much into this stuff because I'm not terribly advanced myself, but I will share some tips and tricks that make progression easier for those higher number grippers.

By this stage you should be working on the No. 2 level gripper, maybe you can close if for a few reps or more. The jump from the No. 2 (200lbs) to the No. 3 (280lbs) is pretty huge and very difficult. You can always buy an intermediate gripper (around 240lbs) but that can be an expensive stepping stone.

Here is a list of things that have helped me or others.

Strap Grips
For this one you're going to take a wrist strap or something similar, it doesn't matter much so long as it is flat, and attach it to a weight plate. Bring one end of the strap through the plate and then through the loop. Now take a gripper that you can close, set it, and place the free end of the strap in between the handles and close the gripper, suspending the weighted strap.

Here is a video to illustrate this.

Banded Grips
Similar to the strap grip but with a twist. Instead of a weighted strap you're going to use a band. Anchor one end of the band, you'll want to do this so that the band reaches the height of the closing hand with a bit of slack, you're going to set the gripper again, place the band in between the handles and close the gripper. Once the gripper is closed, lift your hand up (as if you're doing a bicep curl) until you put tension into the band. You'll want enough tension so that it will almost begin to slip out of the handles but not so much that it does come out.

I would recommend doing this with an old band as the handles may damage the rubber or you can use another medium to wrap around the band to protect it.

Monitor the Gap!
Similar to what I said in the beginner section, it doesn't matter that you can't close the gripper, it only matters that you're getting closer and closer to closing it. Sometimes the most frustrating thing is missing that last 1/8th or 1/16th of an inch. When you get very close to closing a gripper but not quite there, you can get an official gap measuring tool from Ironmind but I have a few cheaper alternatives. You can always use a ruler or a tap measure, but that can be difficult while you're trying to sustain a partially open hand. You can use a spark plug gapper for those really really close closes or you can use my personal favourite, silly putty!

Yep, that's right. Because it doesn't dry out or tear easily and can be repeatedly molded to any shape it is perfect for this. What I do is take a piece of silly putty that is appropriate in thickness, when compared to the gap I have left, and I make a small strip at the bottom of the handle in your hand and facing the other handle. When I close the gripper the silly putty conforms to the shape of the handle and what you get is the exact impression of both handles in their closest position. You get the smallest gap created during that attempt as if it were a still picture. You can then take that and measure it with a ruler or caliper and not have to worry about measuring and squeezing. You can also save the piece from previous sessions, since you use so little, for a direct comparison.

Wrap it up
Take a gripper that can be closed with some effort and wrap some cloth or tape around the handles. Increasing the handle diameter will force your hand into a more open position, but it will also decrease the gap a little bit making it less of a closing distance.To get around this you can use tape ONLY on the sides where your hand is contacting the gripper handle. Obviously you will need to either use quite a bit of tape or tape something to that part of the handle, the result is more important than the method but so long as it is not extremely soft, to the point where your hand sinks into the 'padding' it is fine. This method is also good for supporting grip, especially if you don't have any thick barbells.

My last piece of advice is for beginners and experienced 'grippers'. Chalk can be a great asset for anyone, beginner or otherwise. Nothing will put a stop to your grip training faster than a painful blister or skin irritation. I've had some real good ones trying to do some max effort closes with a slightly sweaty hand, the friction will eat your hand alive. Chalk will save you the pain and downtime and can be easily removed from the gripper with a bristled brush. If you don't have chalk, you might want to look into getting a few ounces.

With this information you are all set to explore the world of grippers. Grip training can be extremely fun and it is very flexible so I encourage everyone to experiment and find what is effective for you.

I'm currently writing up another article related to setting a gripper, where I'll go into deep sets, credit card sets, the dog leg, etc. In the meantime feel free to drop me a line if you have any exercise suggestions, gripper reviews, or even a question!

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by JoeWeir

By Joe Weir

I came across the title of this post while I was looking around youtube (I feel compelled to watch weightlifting vids or strongman events sometimes) and not only is it a classic line but it also reminded me of something I've never really sat down and talked about: Grip Strength! Just like the title says if you can't hang onto the bar or the handles then you can't perform that exercise. You COULD use wrist straps, but where's the fun in that.

Grip strength is possibly one of the most overlooked and under appreciated aspect of any sort of training. This past Christmas I bought myself some Captain's of Crush Grippers, and I love them. Sure a one legged squat or an absurdly heavy pull-up is impressive, but I'd say being able to close a #3 gripper or squeeze and crush a full, unopened, can of coke/beer is just as impressive if not more (the coke can is a very long term goal of mine as well ;).

I'm more obsessed with the crushing aspect but there is more than one type of grip strength. There is pinching, supporting (holding things for extended periods ie farmer's walk), and crushing (grippers, handshakes, etc.). And as with any sort of training we want to have a balance between protagonist and antagonist, so we can do exercises that work on opening strength (ie extensions).

Most think grip training is wrist curls or simply doing some deadlifts but it is so much more and truth be told grip training can be a hell of a lot of fun. Just the other day I decided to do some farmer's walks with some dumbbells. This has always been a favourite strongman event of mine but I have never done them consistently because there is never a clear piece of real estate at the gym. I would almost guarantee that I would smash into someone, while carrying a payload of a couple hundred pounds. Now that I workout in the early morning, its not so much of a problem but there is always the occasional person doing some sort of curl or fly right where I have put my 'course. The other reason, now, is that when I did them I was using 125lb dumbbells and the heaviest dumbbell is 135lbs. I have a couple friends around the 160lb mark and I was thinking of asking them if I could use them as 'dbs' once I had progressed that far. I doubt they will agree but nonetheless, fingers crossed, otherwise I'll have to find a longer laneway.

I also enjoy grip training because the results you get are very satisfying. You pull a very heavy deadlift with an over-over grip and all of a sudden the deadlift isn't nearly as impressive as the fact you did it with that grip. Same with pullups. Strapping on a few odd pounds and being able to do a pullup is a very good feeling, but so is doing it without feeling any strain in your forearms and hands.

I mentioned the CoC grippers, they're top of the line but they are a bit pricey. Well, there are plenty of cheap ways to get some good grip training gear. You can train pinching grip by using a hub made out of a hockey puck, some chain and a couple of eyebolts. A favourite of mine is a pinch deadlift. I like taking a pair of dumbbells for this. Simply pinch the bells together and deadlift it, the beauty is that the heavier it gets the thicker the bell is, instant double progression! Supporting grip is easy, just grab something heavy and hold it, irregular objects like a sand bag or a larger rock work wonders. Crushing grip is a bit trickier but it can be done, support your palm on a racked barbell, tie a soft roped to some plates or a db and make a loop on the other end. Put the loop around your fingers and squeeze. It may be barbaric but it costs a lot less than grippers. For opening strength you can plunge your hand (with finger tips touching tip of the thumb) into a bucket of rice and simply open and close your hand. Or for an even cheaper alternative, take one of those big elastic bands that comes with broccoli and again, with finger tips touching thumb, put the elastic at the end of your fingers and thumb and open and close your fingers. When one elastic isn't enough, use two or three.

These are just the tip of the iceberg. You can turn just about anything into a grip training implement.

You never want to let your grip hold you back so its always a good idea to throw in some grip training even if you think you don't need it. You can even make it fun, it doesn't have to be spring loaded handles and static dumbbell holds!

Before I leave and go do some unscheduled grip training, I'll give you a video of a lovely little exercise called…Rolling Thunder! Enjoy.

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by JoeWeir

By Eric Troy

Learning a lift is not the same thing as receiving instruction on a lift and demonstrating a basic grasp of the technique. Learning is a more complex and ongoing process.

Let's examine two different hypothetical training situations, both novice lifters beginning their first real strength training program, to see how they learn the lifts.

The first trainee: You

So let's say you want to start strength training and OF COURSE one of the lifts you choose is the bench press. We could be talking about overhead press, squat, deadlift, rows…you name it.

The first thing you do is have someone show you the basic technique. Or if you don't have anyone you watch videos and read instructions to prepare. Well..some people don't even do that. It looks so simple they just get under a bar and start pushing it up and down. But let's assume that you at least TRY to learn something about the technique.

So typically you use an empty bar and spend a couple to ten minutes getting the basics down with that. Then you put a bunch of plates on the bar and do 4x6, 3x5, 6x4 or whatever reps and sets you have been told are best for beginners.

And your off to the races! This, we'll say you did 4x6. Either to failure on the last set or a little short of failure, again, depending on what you've been told is the best. Then next workout you put 5 or so pounds on the bar and do the same thing again. And again and again.

This scenario, of course, is repeated with the other lifts in the program. And it works. Or so you think. You're able to add weight to the bar for a while. If not every workout then at least most workouts or once a week. You're getting stronger fast!

No, you're adding weight to the bar fast. While your busy counting reps and sets what little technique you managed to pickup is quickly going out the window. You cannot a proper scapular position. The bar starts and ends in different places. You lift your ass in the air and arch your back in a tremendous effort to get in those last, all important, one or two reps. You're compromising your shoulders and even hurting your back. Setting yourself up for all sorts of heartache down the road.

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In fact, I've heard it said that this is an instinctual way to train. Given the chance, we will simply go in and try to put weight on the bar each workout and progress in a linear fashion. And it's true. Putting weight on the bar is instinct. But I don't think "4x6" reps has anything to do with it!

The first trainee: My way

A good bit of time has been set aside for this initial session with the bench press (and one other "lower body" lift). Good learning takes time. You can't do it in 45 minutes or less.

The first few times he trains the lifts and perhaps as many as 4 to 5 sessions depending on his comfort level he concentrates only on honing the technique and getting quality time with the lifts. He doesn't worry about reps and sets. He doesn't worry about failure or lack of it. He doesn't worry about incurring fatigue. In fact he avoids fatigue.

To an observer, it would appear as if he is training more like an advanced lifter than a typical beginner. Except he is not trying to train with near maximal intensity.

Beginning with the empty bar he concentrates only on the setup. He gets into the proper position on the bench. He receives the bar from a hand-off (best case..if not he does the best he can to unrack the bar and maintain good positioning) and he does a few reps trying to get comfortable with the TECHNIQUE of performing a rep. He actually does it slow. Going through the motions, so to speak.

He does no more than three reps at a time depending on how tough it feels. He is trying to avoid getting fatigued. He rests liberally in between. Liberal in this case doesn't mean a lot of rest, but he takes as much as he needs or wants.

And he does this quite a few times. Get in position. Receive the bar. Go through the motions. Rest. Do it again.

Then when he feels comfortable with technique some weight goes on the bar. The amount of weight depends on the trainee, of course.

Now, he is lifting, not just going through the motions. But the emphasis is on QUALITY. Again no more than three reps at a time. Plenty of rest. He does three or so sets like this. He is not straining. It is easy and fluid. If it feels difficult no more weight is added to the bar. If not, he puts some more on and repeats.

Between each set, he is recovering almost completely. There is no aim to be exhausted at the end of this training session. Or to get a muscle pump. The only aim is to learn the lifts and get a reasonable amount of quality volume in while loading the bar only as much as that quality can be maintained. When the weight on the bar negates this the session ends. If this happens too soon due to too aggressive loading of the bar then the weight can be backed off and some more practice can be done with lower weight.

Pretty simple. And he does the same thing for the next workout. Only without all the time with the empty bar. A good starting point is about 10 to 15 percent less than the greatest weight used on the preceding session.

It seems to conservative. But only subjectively. In fact, he actually ends up lifting a greater overall volume than the first trainee AND puts more weight on the bar. And he doesn't compromise technique. The second session he will be much more comfortable than the first trainee.

But will he be stronger? Don't you need a certain amount "stimulus" or reps and sets?

You need stimulus. You need repeated exposure. For this trainee the 'stimulus' IS the practice. The repeated exposure. And the added benefit of doing this practice with MORE weight on the bar. More weight on the bar is NOT the aim..but it is entirely possible and likely. That is because recovery is being allowed to take place between sets. The typical scenario has you resting for a predetermined period and doing a predetermined amount of reps and sets. Meaning there is only so much weight you can handle to get the job done..and you STILL will not get the job done as well.

This second trainee recovers more completely before the next session. In fact recovery has already begun during the firs session. He's practiced the lift a GREATER number of times, used more weight in the end, AND recovered more.

If, after repeating a few more practice sessions he were go on the SAME program as trainee one, he would probably start the program with more weight on the bar. Even if he were to stop progressing at the after the same time period as the first trainee he would still be in much better shape. He has more weight on the bar AND he is able to maintain proper technique.

Except that he wouldn't do the same program. That program is too restrictive.

But that's it for the honeymoon period. That's the general gist of it, anyway. It's not a program it's learning the lifts.

If you've ever spent long period of time engaged in a monotonous, repetitive task, you know what is at work here. Those that have worked on assembly lines or loading trucks or anything like that know what this feels like. The first few times you may even find yourself daydreaming about doing that task. As if your mind is obsessed with it. Even when you're not consciously aware of it, you're mind IS somewhat obsessed with it.

Say you ARE on an assembly line. You are getting payed by the piece. The only thing on your mind is keeping up and going as fast as possible. The first time it's a disaster. Your fingers fumble and you ruin as many pieces as your complete. You wonder how the workers around you got SO fast and SO good. Impossible, your end the day worse than you began.

You lie in bed that night with the assembly line running through your head, your fingers blistered and aching. The second day your improvement is miraculous. You are still slow but your don't ruin so many pieces. By the fourth day it's old news. You know you can hang now and pretty soon you'll be the fastest and best assembler in the room.

You didn't THINK about what you were doing. You were too desperate trying to do it. You got better DESPITE the worst possible learning environment. It happened naturally without any conscious involvement from you. You were doing this eight hours a day! You get better or it's the unemployment line.

Imagine if your first week you were expected to only work of one hour and to get as many pieces done in that hour as possible. Then after the first week you were thrown to the wolves, so to speak, and you were expected to make quota.

You wouldn't. You'd be in trouble.

Yet this is exactly how most beginner programs work. You are expected to go right into the program with minimal exposure and MAKE QUOTA.

Well…I don't want to end up with the products that person assembles and I don't want to be the guy to have to fix that trainee. We can't spend eight hours a day fuddling with the lifts but what we have with the honeymoon period is much more time than is typically spent on QUALITY rather than just quantity. Which makes the time spend much more efficient.

So that's it.

If you need help with any particulars, including individual exercise form, please let us know. You can comment right here on this page or ask via a thread in the forum.

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by EricT

You know I love how the words 'teach' and 'learn' get mixed up. Provided you are concentrating on just a particular exercise rather than a general technique overview, you can teach a person a basic slow lift in 10 to 20 minutes.

Meaning, you can INSTRUCT them on it it that time frame and have them go through the motions, correct the mistakes, etc. That doesn't mean they have LEARNED the lift. That means they have received instruction on the lift and gone through an initial training session with it.

Perhaps part of the problem with all this is that we DO concentrate on individual exercises and not on GENERAL movement and technique. Most beginners that I have dealt with are coming to strength training later in life and lack a foundation. They don't have a conditioning base. They don't have many fundamentals in place at all. There are certain fundamental movement patterns that are at play in most of the basic lifts.

For instance: hip extension.

Many beginners will have trouble differentiating between hip and lumbar extension. Even if they were high school athletes they likely never specifically trained hip extension. Matter of fact..all their training was likely quad focused. Take this likely individual and try to teach them a lift and they are going to use what they have. They've already 'learned' certain movement patterns that are not conducive to their strength training. So, instead of learning they need a period of unlearning and rebuilding. Which requires different things.

In high school, besides lifting I did two primary athletic activites. Martial Arts and track. And track was the only thing through school. In track, besides training the events we trained two parts of our body. Our quads and hamstrings. We used a combo leg extension/curl gizmo that ran on hydraulics. We might have jumped in the squat rack from time to time when our coach wasn't looking. None of this trained hip extension. And my running did not use hip extension..which is why I was slow.

Sure I was the fastest in my neighborhood. But certainly not on the track. I was no sprinter. In retrospect, even the fastest runners on our team were 'bouncers' or 'shufflers' who used a relatively short and bouncy stride to propel themselves down the track. They relied on very strong quads instead of hip extension. There were a couple of guys who I thought were phenomenally quick. And they won some races. But they probably got by on the fact that the other high school programs were as crappy as ours was! Hindsight is twenty-twenty and I know that these guys who I was in awe of would have gotten flattened by any well-trained runners utilizing a proper hip extension instead of a bouncy quad dominated thing done of the balls of their feet. I know nothing much about running, but I know that.

The football players? Same scenario.

This is probably still typical. This is the person who is entering a strength training program. This is the person who is told to 'pick a program' and start cracking.

The reality is that that is exactly what a beginner wants to hear. They want gratification, in the form of weight on the bar, as soon as possible. And there are plenty of one-size-fits-all programs out there that aim to give it to them.

Programs are designed to "sell" themselves. How do you sell? Give people what they want. But first you have to make them want it. So like any good marketer you use the right words in the right combinations. And use extremes. We live in a society of extremes and extreme sells.

So make it ultra-complicated and talk about advanced Russian fancy-ass periodization. You want to see this in action go to any of the "really-smart" strength training forums and you will get treated to pages and pages of discussion about anything Russian. With some Supertraining thrown in for good measure. All this stuff is ultra-complex and more academic than real world. But it sells to the uninitiated. Here is a hint: If someone is giving you beginner advice and they preface it with 3 or 4 study abstracts…

Or, you go the other extreme and rant and rave against anything that requires a modicum of cerebral involvement and OVER-simplify everything. The key attribute of this method is it claims to operate under the K.I.S.S. principle (keep it simple stupid) but what it really uses is K.I.R.S (keep it restrictive [and be] stupid).

First things first. Beginners do not need even a simple short linear periodized model let alone a fancy undulated one. They also do not need to be thrown into an aggressive loading situation where they are too busy counting reps and sets to get comfortable with the lifts.

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They need what I call a honeymoon period. Where the emphasis is on quality time with the lifts. We are told that pretty much anything a beginner does will make them stronger. They call it 'general adaptation'.

The problem is, the same people who tell us that then proceed to tell us they have figured out the BEST way to do it that makes no COMPROMISES.

The faulty assumption in that is that taking a honeymoon period with the lifts results in a compromise. It DOES not. This is short term thinking. People are told to train as if they are getting ready for a competition in a month. The same kind of thinking is everywhere in the 'fitness' world. Want to get in shape? Enter a marathon. Here is an 'efficient' program to get you ready.

Short term? It's motivating and appears to get results. Long term? Results in slower and less efficient progression owing to the bad habits and compensations that are built up in the beginning. You WILL spend more time UNLEARNING bad things later on than you will to LEARN good things now.

Assuming that, speaking to a general audience, I am not going to get anyone to spend a couple of weeks doing self-assessments and working on general movement, mobility, and stability, I would like to suggest a very simple way to spend some quality time with each new lift you learn. And then how to continue progressing in a natural way. Not a fancy plan but a plan that allows you to progress naturally and is NOT-RESTRICTIVE. One of the most frustrating things I have had to deal with is people asking for help on their form while they are in the midst of an aggressive program. Anybody can train aggressively. Not everyone can train smart.

One of the worst offenders in this regard is the "Starting Strength" program by Mark Rippetoe. In my experience, that program has thrown more trainees under a bus than any other. It is based on a great many unfounded assumptions and expectations and it ignores some very important fundamentals about learning.

It actually bugs the heck out of me that so many prominent figures recommend the book for the explanations of the basic lifts but seem to forget that MOST people will skip over that and go for the PROGRAM. These same people recommending the book I'll bet never used the program themselves or prescribed it for a trainee. There are people right now on forums and blogs recommending it that have been lifting for years and never used it. They recommend it because that is the trend not because they themselves have any personal experience with it. Not cool.

I don't want to launch into a series of articles aiming to derail SS. Frankly, I think that would be a waste of my time. And I don't want to diminish the good it has done. Getting beginners off high-volume split routines and onto a full-body, moderate volume routine is a good thing. It's a BIG thing and I don't think so many beginners would be using full-body routines without the surge in popularity of Starting Strength over the past 5 or so years.

The beginner should be aware that initial performance during the early stages of training, even while they appear to be better while concentrating on one movement of a general motor program, is not a good indication of future and long-term performance.

On the other hand it would be useful counter the assumptions in that program with what I say. In the end it's not up to me to tell you what's better. Only to honestly express myself and let you decide for yourself. Sol what I want to instead is to introduce some very simple things that a novice lifter can do to have the initial strength training period be both productive in terms of weight on the bar but also in terms of honing in the lifts. Just the straight information. If it seems valuable to you, than take heed. If not, throw yourself under a bus and we'll still be here later when you come to your senses!

To that end the first piece is:

The Honeymoon Period

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by EricT

In my last post about strength training misconceptions I made a statement that needs to be expanded on, cleared up, qualified, etc. because you could read into it and maybe think I am saying something I'm not.

QUALIFIED.

That is a very important word. A reason I avoid using terse, oversimplified statements, which I refer to as aphorisms, is because for them to be useful they usually need to be qualified. That is, a set of conditions and explanation have to be put in place so that they fit a general audience. So that they are not taken too far.

A good example of a much used and abused aphorism in the strength training and bodybuilding world is "NO PAIN; NO GAIN".

This statement is so fraught with consequences it eventually found it's way into the trash bin of fitness advice. The problem with such an aphorism is that it can be interpreted in various different ways and each individual using it can mean something different.

Some people, when they said, no pain, no gain, REALLY actually meant that you should seek out PHYSICAL PAIN in your training. Others meant that training will sometimes be uncomfortable, or various other alternative meanings.

A statement like that is just too over-simplified to be useful. It causes more confusion than it is worth. Even if sometimes it can be shown to be a useful aphorism by qualification it ends up being the page full of explanation that is useful rather than the aphorism itself.

So in the last post I stated that people want to be given simple straight-forward progression models. I said that linear progression will not continue to work forever. That is, if you are looking to continue to increase absolute strength or even power. So, in effect, continued progression is more complicated than that.

But that makes it sound like I am over-complicating strength training. Nothing of the sort.

It would be difficult to make you see this, but I am actually simplifying things. Only, I am not simplifying things in the short term by giving you pat and watered-down or "one-size-fits-all" advice. Instead I am attempting to help you avoid complications in the long-term.

The big picture or the long-term is what the general, watered-down, run-o-the-mill, fitness information is not concerned with. And that's how it fails you. Getting strong is the result of many, many workouts over many, many cycles. If you want to get strong, then you have to be able to continue training for years without unnecessary injury and set-backs.

Many people DO over-complicate things. I could point you to some websites and resources where you will encounter guys that have more in common with the guys in lab coats than they do with strength trainers or coaches. Along with those people come the over-simplified watered-down crap that is the majority.

That causes guys like me a big problem. We have to spend a lot of time on complicated seeming explanation for the sole purpose of eventually showing you how simple it is. IF you can get it right. It seems like a contradiction in terms but it is always harder to help people unlearn things than to learn them.

Here are some common characteristics of strength training advice purporting to be simple but actually resulting in setbacks and complications:

1. Such training tends to be monotonous and mundane.

Usually there are only a handful of exercises you are allowed to do. There is only one parameter for progression. Every workout tends to look and feel a lot like the one before.

Many trainers do not realize that mundane training can be a source of frustration and even over-training effects.

2. Such training tends to involve setting your poundages BACK over and over again.

If you remember the stair model from the post before this is basically like saying the only way to get to the top of the stairs is to walk up three stairs and then jump back down two. That may happen in the real world but you don't SEEK it! You seek the path of least resistance. That path may not always be a straight line but going forward is usually better than doubling back.

If you needed to walk down a steep incline you might go down it in "switch-back" or zig-zag pattern. This reduces the grade that you have to walk on. It might be slower than climbing down the sheer rock face without a rope but the chance of "failure" isn't nearly as drastic. It is certainly better than walking for miles and miles trying to find a way around. Well, can you imagine actually climbing a quarter of the way down the sheer rock wall, zipping back to the top, and then climbing a third of the way down, etc. and so on? People strength training this way! That is replacing a bad option, taking the shortest route possible regardless of safety, with a ridiculous one. Getting to your goal without backtracking over familiar territory is always better.

3. Such training tends to be inflexible.

In an old issue of MILO, sometime in the late 90's, I think (I don't remember exactly), Jim Schmitz¹ had an article in which he stated that he did not like 'instinctive training'. This is when you train based on how you feel on a particular day. In essence, you do "what you feel like" doing. He pointed out that this was OK for some very advanced lifters but that while training should be flexible, it should be based on time-proven techniques.

Someone who trains "by feel" is the extreme opposite of what I am talking about. And these oversimplified, one-size-fits-all training models are the other extreme. It's All program an NO flexibility. There is a new thing floating around called 'reactive training'. Good strength training has ALWAYS been somewhat reactive. It's not a new concept, but you must have a plan AND be flexible. A middle ground approach to thinking about training is usually best. Taking a middle-ground approach TO training, however, is another post (and I'm getting to it).

4. Such training tends to be based on a Larry the Cable Guy operative

Basically, "get-r-done" is the slogan. Go to the gym and get the job done. How do you get the job done? Get your reps in, usually after you have loaded the bar again, that is. Just getting it done, is NOT good enough. Just getting it done is a recipe for failure at best; injury at worst. If not in the short term then in the long term.

Get-r-done, Samson!

I saw an old guy this year before the weather turned warm. It was about 7 AM and it was freezing rain. And here was this man who looked to be around 90 years old by my reckoning. Frail and weak looking, he was barely able to move. And there he was, out in the freezing rain, running. Or something like running or jogging. He seemed to be unable to actually move his hips and knees very much. He seemed barely able to move at all. A stride involved a big hitch in the torso and then one foot would sort of shuffle/slide forward..over and over..as fast as he could. Which was not very fast and looked to be extremely painful.

What in the world was this old guy doing? Why, he was getting it done! He was going out there, rain or shine, and getting in the mileage. I cringed and wanted to stop him. It was as if I could feel the impact of each shuffling step. He wasn't going to get better. He was going to get worse. But he was getting it done.

Do I need to say more?

Next time, it will be time to get specific. I will give a fairly in-depth look at just the sort of training I'm talking about, the assumptions it operates under, and how it complicates, rather than simplifies, your training.

To conclude, I'd like to explain the title of this post. You see, when I talk about strength in this context, I am assuming that my audience is made up of people who are primarily interested in getting stronger and continuing to get stronger.

A lot of "fitness trainers" or even fatloss experts will tell you that resistance training is very simple and you only need simple programs. You MUST keep in mind that for many of these people and their clients strength is a secondary goal. They are looking to use strength training as a tool pursuant to other goals. If your primary goal is fatloss then getting your diet in check is going to probably be more complicated than your strength training.

This same thing can be true of bodybuilding trainers. While bodybuilders are once again becoming aware of the importance of a strength base their primary goal is still mass. So again, even if they engage in training stamped 'strength' instead of 'mass' it is still a tool and not a means to it's own end.

Far from criticizing these trainers, I am simply pointing out that they are speaking to a certain audience. So always consider who that audience is when you consider someone's statements.

Many very successful trainers have never come close to reaching their own strength potential because they have NEVER ACTUALLY TRIED. And they have never trained anyone with strength as a primary goal. Yet, this will not stop fitness writers from offering watered-down one-size fits all advice on strength, fat loss, and 'fitness' (which is a term I've grown more and more to despise).

Real strength training, you may come to realize, is simple, but simple is not EASY. Simple and easy are NOT THE SAME THING. To show just what I'm talking about (and then I promise I'm done) I'll tell you why I LOVE overhead squats.

I love the overhead squat because it is a very non-technical exercise. I.E. it is simple. But it is HARD, man! A simple but demanding exercise is a sure-fire way to make me happy in the gym.

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Related Posts

The Training to Fail Series

by EricT

Footnotes

1. Jim Schmitz served as the 1980 & 1988 Head US Olympic Team Weightlifting Coach and Assistant Coach for the 1992 Olympic Team, USAW President from 1988–1996, IWF Executive Board Member, and Chairman of the IWF Scientific and Research Committee from 1992-1996.

By Eric Troy

Part 1 of a 2 (or more) part post.
Go to Part 2

This page is a blog page. That means that I am not going to provide a bunch of scholarly references at the end. I am not going to do a week of research to prepare. I might have done a little cross checking but these pages are meant to be informal reactions, opinions..me drawing on my experience, etc. And HOPEFULLY, to stimulate discussion of ANY kind.

That is my idea for this particular blog post. Many others use blogs with many different models.

It's all about tone. You do not need any particular expertise. You do not need to continue to educate yourself. You do not need to have trained anyone. You do not need any of that to make an authoritative sounding blog post. One that will have the air of 'truth' or 'fact'. In fact, you can get most of your 'facts' wrong and still convince/impress those who don't know the words you know or have just a little less exposure to the lingo.

You can bring your misconceptions with you to your blog, then make those misconceptions a REFERENCE for others who are looking for answers.

As a matter of fact, a few key bullet points and making it all sound "so simple" will probably win you more fans than ten true experts (whatever your definition).

And you know who will be some of your biggest fans? Those whose beliefs you reinforce! If your misconceptions are common misconceptions, then what you need is a modicum of marketing skills and some web page design savvy to be hyuuuuge. The fans…they were already in your camp before they read what you wrote.

Here is a number of BIG misconceptions around that will help you build a successful blog. Just pick a few and get to the blogging and the adoring fans are bound to come.

Fatloss is the BIGGEST source of misconceptions. Here is a common one:

1. Strength training is the KEY to fatloss.

This is GREAT marketing. You can get droves of people to your blog by telling them what the KEY to fatloss is. So definitely use this one. But yes, sorry, strength training is NOT the KEY to fatloss. You can strength train your butt off for years, becoming incredibly "strong" and still have your gut proceed you into every room. Anyone who has been both strength training for a while and who has problems with body fat will tell you that strength training will not magically melt pounds off your body because of all the "fat burning muscle".

Yet, people are still hearing things like:

"A pound of muscle burns thirty calories a day!"

Not true. A pound of muscle burns maybe 6 calories just by virtue of its existence.

"Strength training stokes up your metabolism and turns it into a roaring furnace!"

BS. This is probably based on the EPOC effect which is part of the process of recovering from high intensity exercise like strength training in which oxygen is consumed at a greater rate for a certain time after exercise while the system returns to homeostasis, meaning a greater percentage of fat burned during this period. It's true and it's the claim to fame for HIIT (high intensity interval training) versus steady state cardio. But it is easily overestimated and overindulged by "fatloss experts" who want to re-invent the exercise wheel because they are too lazy or simply unqualified to do what needs to be done FIRST: Help people get their diet in line and change their eating (lifesyle) habits. Movement is a BIG part of that and a big part of health. But EPOC won't make up for a bad diet. Or for sitting around 23 hours a day.

The biggest factor that exercise brings, and especially strength training, is the preservation of lean muscle mass. Preserving lean mass while losing fat is of profound importance. Another very important factor that exercise seems to play a key role in is controlling visceral fat.

The different kinds of fat in our body are basically named by where they are located. So visceral fat refers to the fat surrounding our organs. Even very thin people can have a problem with visceral fat and lack of exercise does seem to be a primary factor. You can have very low subcutaneous fat and still risk your cardiovascular health because of visceral fat. To be clear, however, this problem has been somewhat misrepresented in various reports. While thin people can have an accumulation of viseral or "intra-abdomnal" fat obese individuals will tend to have more of it, especially men. Unless their activity levels are very unusual for an obese person, such as a sumo wrestlers, who have been found to have a remarkable lack of visceral fat, probably due to their training (although dietary practices could play into this as their diets are fairly unusual for athletes, although very high in calories).

In general, you cannot work off a bad diet. The way you eat, or don't eat is the KEY to fatloss and the key to keeping off the fat. Exercise is a factor in that. All strenuous physical activity is a factor. A big one. But not the KEY. The person telling you that strength training will make you thin…has probably never been fat.

But shhh…don't tell anyone.

2. Body-weight and martial arts training makes you "lean and toned" while strength training with weights makes you big and bulky.

Hmmmm…I'll tackle the strength training one first. Strength trainees come in all shapes and sizes. Now I'll tackle the martial arts one. Martial Artists come in all shapes and sizes. Including over-weight.

Body-weight trainees, if they weren't on the light side, would not tend to stick exclusively to body-weight training for very long and, logically, the most successful, and thus the most enthusiastic 'body-weight officianados' are not fat people.

This is similar to the misconception that all gymnasts are very muscular and ripped.

False. Just the elite ones you've been exposed to through the Olympics and other high-profile events tend to be very muscular and ripped. This is confusing cause with correlation. Gymnasts who are able to develop a great deal of body strength while maintaining a low body-fat percentage, tend to be the more successful ones and thus the ones we associate with representing gymnasts as a whole. But that does not mean that doing gymnastics type training will make you look like your favorite Olympic gymnast. This is simply selection bias at work.

Bryan Chung has a great name for this. Or, actually, a couple of great names. He calls it the "sport causality bias" or "the elite athlete selection bias"¹

However, if you are into body-weight training and since body-weight training comprises gymnastics type training, you darn sure better tell people they will look like a gymnast!

Check out the following video about the legendary DEATH TOUCH of martial arts. I remember seeing this on television when it aired. And I laughed my ass off.

Here is a very good example for martial arts. It can serve two purposes. The first is to show how people will believe almost anything if you present it right..even the 'death touch'. That is the mythical martial arts skill that allows you to knock people down, knock them out, or even kill them from across the room! Apparently Stephan Bonner was one of the ones to be immune to the death touch. That is because Stephan did not play along. The instructor actually provides this explanation for the large percentage of people who are IMMUNE to the death touch: "they don't believe". Ummmm..I think you just discredited yourself.

This is a good example of people WANTING to believe things. So keep telling them what they want to believe and they'll go for it.

The other purpose of this video is to illustrate what I said about martial artists coming in all shapes and sizes. The resolution is not good but look at the students..all shapes and sizes in just ONE room.

3. You always progress in a linear fashion.

There are many ways of looking at linear progression but a huge misunderstanding in strength is that your training will continue to be a simple journey from point A to point B and there will always be a straight line between those points.

So, imagine that point A is at the bottom of a long flight of stairs and point B is at the top. EVEN if you go up two stairs and regress down one, up one, and down two, and so on and so forth until you eventually reach the top your PROGRESSION from the foot of the stairs to the top is still LINEAR.

This is exactly the model you want to assure people will always work if you want to be a really successful strength writer. You may not be such a successful strength TRAINER but that is not required. Lucky! A straight line is always more inviting than a curvy one full of detours and side-roads.

Detours and side-roads, are, of course, the reality. So-called linear progression…straight up the stairs… works for a certain period of time when you first begin but the more advanced you get the more creative your training must become. The more thought it takes. I didn't say complex. Complex is not always required. But simple-minded may not continue to work.

So, the first thing you want to do is get up a nice piece about Milos of Kroton and his bull. I know you've heard that story. It is required on every strength related website and most books. So, Milos got himself a bull calf and he carried it up a hill, or a mountain, depending on the version. He repeated this every day. As the bull got bigger he got stronger until, eventually he was carrying a full grown bull up a hill, or a MOUNTAIN! WOW!

Most people know that this is a fable. But most people believe it to be a true model of strength training. They believe that if you increase the load in very small, minute, increments, over a long period of time you won't ever "feel" the difference but eventually these very small increments (even one-half pound a day) will add up to hundreds upon hundreds of pounds.

You definitely want to use this story. It inspires people. If that is all there is to it, I can do it, they think. They can envision themselves lifting herculean weights without too much effort at all!

You and I both know that Milos would have failed miserably to continue to carry the bull up the hill. At some point this straight "linear progression" would have failed to continue. Remember, LOAD is the ONLY parameter that changes here. The distance he carries the bull does not change and the story is implying that the time involved does not change. He doesn't carry the bull any faster or slower each time. After all, he doesn't even 'notice' the changing weight.

Linear progression WORKS when it WORKS. We must except that the same thing will not continue to work forever. We are constantly changing. We are not static. We are dynamic.

When I use the term linear progression in this way, I am borrowing the term the way it is generally meant. The idea that there is a way to progress that is "non-linear" is ridiculous. Don't get "periodization" which regards training, mixed up with progression.

But we'll keep that between ourselves.

4. Skills are always developed in a sequence.

This is related to number two.

Each exercise or strength related thing that you do is an individual skill. They, in and of themselves are not "strength" but are a display of skill which shows specific strength. You put a bunch of these diverse skills together and you have something that can be called overall strength.

But each of these skills are made up of a sub-group of other skills. Movements or positions that are themselves fairly complex.

Let's say you want to do a handstand. The way most people would do this is to simply try a handstand. They would put their hands on the floor, throw their feet in the air, remain there for a second in a kind of handstand, and fall. Some of the more creative types might use a wall to put their feel against, thus providing some stability, and then try to wean themselves from the wall.

Either way this would be an example of linear skill acquisition. Ok, I don't even know if that is a real term, I just made it up but I think you get the point. The linear part is an increase in time as you continue to try to do a handstand. Each time you add just a little bit of time. It may be a microsecond. But eventually the microseconds add up and you are standing on your hands long enough for you to consider it a 'handstand'.

This can actually work. For some of the people some of the time. Depending on their base of conditioning and their boredom threshold.

A more efficient way of doing it would be to break the handstand down into a number of different components. Each of these skill components would be developed separately. You would, in effect, attack it from both ends, and as you try to move into the main skill a 'cross-training' effect occurs as each of these 'sub-routines' find their way into the complete skill. So a hand stand with your feet against the wall, since the wall is balancing you, might be endurance. Then attempts at free handstands might be balance. Many people might try to break it down into irreducible parts.

An extreme version of this is at work when people use body-part training to 'get strong'. Only they go too far and break the body down into a bunch of different parts instead of training 'functional-units'. The answer is to simply realize that you are TRAINING SKILLS OR MOVEMENTS not body parts or even body segments.

The most important thing to realize is that finding the most efficient way to learn a skill does NOT mean finding the most convoluted and complicated way. But it does involve finding an efficient and sustainable way. The kind of knowledge it takes to learn and perform new movements more and more effortlessly involves a process of elimination rather than accumulation! This is something about learning that most people do not realize. That is, a great deal of it is getting rid of the excess bits that have cluttered the program. We want to whittle down what we do to that which is absolutely necessary. Everything else is just excess weight to carry around with you…pun intended.

But when you write up your step by step plan for handstands, stick to the first method! If you can't tell people what they want to hear you're never going to make it.

5. Strength train stalls or Plateaus are 'inevitable'

The standard definition of a stall is a temporary stop in progression. When most people talk about a stall or plateau they are talking about failure to progress on one or two exercises.

That is an exercise plateau. Not a 'strength training' plateau.

The problem is that cessations in progression in particular exercises have gotten all mixed up with stagnation or even overtraining.

Complete failure to progress in strength training would indicate a much bigger problem than a "stall". Failure to progress on just one workout, however, or even a regression in one workout, does not always represent an actual regression in fitness. It is more likely a fluctuation.

But it gives rise to many silly ideas. Such as if you fail to add five pounds to your squat one day you should take a week off. Ridiculous.

When most GOOD strength trainers tell you how to break a plateau they are telling you how to break a plateau on a PARTICULAR exercise. Exercise plateaus are not even themselves inevitable, they are just very difficult to avoid. But even while exercise plateaus occur there is always another way to get strong. Pick up a new skill. Cross-train. Be creative.

Only people who are training to compete in just a few lifts should be obsessing over a handful of movements and even they must use variety in their training.

This is a tricky one in terms of winning over the crowds. You would think that telling people that strength training stalls are not inevitable would be a popular message. But don't be fooled. People want to feel better about their own failure to progress instead of being told HOW to progress. So, for sure, you want to stick with the "plateaus are inevitable" message.

6. That's five examples

Notice at the beginning I didn't tell you 'here is 5 misconceptions' Indeed, I didn't make the title of this post "5 Training Misconceptions".

That is because I didn't know what I was going to write about until I did it. Like I said, this is an informal blog.

Big mistake. Never let people think you don't have a plan. And I definitely should have named this post "5 Training Misconceptions". People love lists!

And what's even better is this last one is a bonus. Off-subject though it is.

Hopefully you don't take the cynical and facetious nature of this post too seriously. I am not, by nature a negative person. The facetiousness was meant to make a point and hopefully, somewhere along the way, that point was made.

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Related Posts: The Failure Series

Training to Fail

by EricT

In my opinion, Progression is the key to strength training. There is no point in hammering away at an exercise without progressing on it. But this is not new knowledge. This is simply an observation – an observation made by many strength specialists and this has recently gained a lot of momentum with online mention. But, I want to highlight how each exercise you have adopted into your training should be treated – or can be treated, differently in terms of progression.

So, this article is NOT about a one-size-fits-all progression chart. What it IS: is a reflection of how I have progressed on three lifts on unique and different levels. Are these three schemes the end all and be all of progression? No. There are probably a million other ways to progress. All I am doing here is reflecting my experiences on three different types of progression over three different exercises.

So lets get cracking.

It’s been a year and a half since I have returned to Deadlifts after my lower back injury. Prior to that I was never a fan of Deadlifts and I only managed to do 315 for a double or so while I could squat 300 plus with good depth – I say “good” because I needed to work on hip mobility and stability which only came later.

I am not built do Deadlift. It’s hard for me. I am not one of those lucky guys who can walk into the gym and Deadlift 400 with no warm-up or anything. We’ve all seen these guys. Powerlifting is full of them – so is the football team. So are a lot of other people whom you would assume couldn’t do half as much by the looks of them.

But, as luck had it, 135 lbs for me was a struggle. I have gone from Deadlifting 135 lbs to 425 lbs over the last year and a half. This is how I did it.

I choose a range and I make sure I settle in it before progressing. So, for 4 weeks I settled in between 135 and 185 lbs and I got good at it – so good that I could do 185 (which was very difficult for me at the time) any day of the week. Then, I moved up to 225 to 255 lbs. I spent a good deal of time on that. Then, I moved up to 275-295 lbs. Then came 315-335 lbs. After that 365 to 385. And now I am at 405-425. What does it mean to “settle” in these ranges?

When I say that I am between 405 and 425, it means that my work sets during my workout involve weights between 405 and 425. My “max” may be a bit more but for right now, this is where I am working. My favorite exercises for improving my Deadlift are Banded Deadlifts (I use APT’s White, Red and Blue bands all double looped), Deficit Deadlifts and Deadlift Singles (you guys absolutely must check out The Singles Scene by Eric Troy and Joe Weir).

The take home message for this exercise is that I used ranges to get quality in before adding weight. The benefit of doing this is that you become more resistant to injuries and your body adapts to the weights making them “light” before you move on to the next range. Just to throw it out there: I Deadlift weekly. I would also like to point out that at a certain point, one would not be able to do their relative max on any day of the week. When you’re working with weights in the 300s and probably a bit in the 400s it is easy to be able to do them weekly, but once you hit 500 or so then it is hard to maintain that kind of intensity – particularly because if you want to work with weights close to your “max” you must distribute fatigue correctly.

A Pistol Squat is a one legged or single legged squat done with your free foot extended outwards. It is one of the hardest exercises in the world to master - particularly because it requires knee and ankle mobility.
The purpose of doing this exercise is to work on hip stability.

When Eric told me that it was time I put my nose to the grindstone and get used to Pistol Squats, I had no idea it was going to be this hard.

I started doing Pistol Squats back in February this year (2009). When I got into it, I was advised to start with a box. But, I didn’t like this. It threw me off and doing Pistol Squats off a box is hard – it doesn’t allow you to move in your range of motion, which you would have once you do them without the box. So, after a frustrating month, I dumped the box. Something told me I’d be able to do them if I had enough ankle elevation. So I placed a 10 lbs thick plate below my ankle and through March I got good at doing Pistol Squats with a high ankle elevation. But this doesn’t make me good at doing a Pistol Squat. Truth by told, I was dependent on that ankle elevation. You take that out and can I do a Pistol Squat? No. So I had to get rid of the ankle elevation. So, in April I dumped the 10 lbs plate and replaced it with a thinner 5 lbs plate. It felt much more difficult. Because my left leg is weaker than my right, I always start with my left leg first. I don’t go to failure with these: I do singles and doubles till I get a total of however many reps which satisfies me – or rather which I am able to do before my legs collapse.
I am meandering now.

Back to topic: so in April I got good at doing Pistol Squats with a 5 lbs plate under my heel. But this wasn’t it. When I am doing this exercise, I am not able to lockout my other leg. So I practiced static holds with each leg, holding it out and trying to lock it out the best I could. It’s hard because while I have decent hip mobility, I don’t have good muscle flexibility. I am in fact, still working on this.

In May I made it my goal to be able to do a Pistol Squat with no heel elevation. And I have managed to do it.

One question, which I expect you guys to have, is how did I know when to lose the heel elevation? Truth is, I like to stick to a preset rep total. So, lets say it’s May.

Roughly, in my mind, I have decided that my weekly progression on Pistol Squats is going to be:
Week 1: 7 reps because the exercise is a new challenge for me
Week 2: 10 reps because I should be better used to the exercise now
Week 3: 12-15 reps because I should be sort of getting the hang of it now
Week 4: 15 reps with atleast one “set” in which I do 3 reps per leg

If I manage to get such good quality by the fourth week, then I know it is safe to move onto the next challenge. Why does this make any difference? Because I know by week 4 whether I am totally dependent on the heel elevation or am I just on crutches.

The take home message with Pistol Squats is that minor changes on the set-up in and of itself can be a way to progress. It is June now and my goal is to try and perfect my form. At the end of the day quality is always more important than quantity: I’d rather be able to knock out two or three textbook perfect Pistol Squats over ten to twelve reps with me all over the place.

Pull-ups rank second in my list of favorite exercises in the world. Recently, I’ve gotten good at doing higher volume pull-ups. I can manage to do a total of 50-75 reps per session without taking anything to failure and doing a large majority of the work with weights added.

I tend to stick to a fixed number of reps on this exercise per session and this is sometimes not ideal because like I mentioned: quality over quantity. If I can do 15 reps total with a lot of weight added, why should I settle for 50 reps with lesser weight? The goal is to get stronger. Strength means intensity. Intensity is a percentage of my relative max. So the way to get stronger is to lift heavier weight.

So, lets say I choose to do an aggregate of 50 reps in Week 1. I’d distribute them like this:
BW x 5 reps x 2 sets
BW + 20 lbs x 3 reps x 10 sets
BW + 30 lbs x 2 reps x 5 sets

That’s it. Then, next week I might want to set a time limit. I make it my goal to do the 10 sets of 3 reps with 20 lbs added to me in 13 minutes. That means at the top of every minute I need to crank out 3 reps and this leaves me with some breathing room. I can do something similar with the third wave of 30 lbs added to me for 5 sets of 2 reps by setting a time limit of 6 minutes.

Or, the next week I could crank up the intensity even more:
BW x 5 reps
BW + 20 lbs x 2 reps x 5 sets
BW + 30 lbs x 3 reps x 5 sets
BW + 40 lbs x 1 rep x 5 sets
BW + 30 lbs x 2 reps x 5 sets
BW + 20 lbs x 5 reps

I have done 50 reps and used much more weight than before. Progression indeed.

One other trick I like to do is a ladder technique where I use very small increments and go all the way up, then down or I just leave it up. In the sense, I will start by doing 2 reps with just my BW. Then, I will acclimate by adding only 5 lbs at a time. So, set 2 will involve me doing 2 reps with 5 lbs added, set 3 will have me doing 2 reps with 10 lbs, set 4 with 15 lbs, set 5 with 20 lbs, etc. I will do this till I can no longer 2 reps. Then, I work back down to just my BW. Or I might just leave it at the highest weight. There aren’t really any specific rules. It just depends. I could do the ladder technique by going up in the first week and then I progress by going down the following week. Every once in a while I’ll try to max out for a heavy triple or double.

This type of training is not specific. It is you who makes up the rules as you go along. This means that your rules can either set you free or limit you. It is completely up to you. At the end, you must either get better at pull-ups in terms of quality of reps, you should be able to do more reps with a weight or you should be able to pull yourself up with more weight added to you. This is how you measure progress.

Conclusion

I hope these reflections help some of you the way this type of training has helped me get stronger. This is not about copy pasting a one size fits all progression chart and adding it into your training. This is about customizing ways of progression to the lifts you do. The possibilities of progression are endless. These are just three, which I have been using.

Good luck!

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by Ashiem_Matthn

By Joe Weir

A big problem with strength training is that it has been introduced in places (read: forums) where the general membership doesn't have adequate exposure or adequate knowledge. And like alot of internet sources and sites, the ideas and principles have been twisted and convuluted into something that it really isn't. With the large proponents of the distortion coming from the uneducated 'experts'.

The truth is that strength training revolves around INTENSITY. If someone is talking about 'strength training' and mentions the terms 'volume intensity', '5x5', or 'I don't want to burn out after a couple weeks' then that person really doesn't have a clue about actual strength training.

Volume intensity really doesn't make much sense because volume and intensity are inversely proportional, as intensity increases volume must decrease and vice versa.

Its quite possible to sustain maximal strength training for long periods of time without the risk of 'burning out', you just need to be smart about it and know how to manipulate volume and accumulated fatigue. Which surprisingly is not a difficult task but seems to be a difficult concept.

I don't even want to touch the 5x5… for now.

Acclimation is a very important aspect of strength training. It can single handedly make or break an attempt yet many people still opt for the traditional "bodybuilding" style warmups (1 plate 10 reps, 2 plates 5 reps, 3 plates 3 reps, you get the idea) which are not only inefficient but also prevent you from properly acclimating. A proper acclimation will have you performing single reps at a high intensity leading up to (what I refer to as) your working sets and we can justify these high intensities because the volume is kept extremely low (1 rep). Just as it sounds, acclimation is your body adapting to the environment it is exposed to and in this case the environment is very high intensity lifting.

The beauty of this is that it takes place the entire time you're lifting. As you progressively lift heavier weights, all preceeding sets inadvertently act as acclimation.

You can also use it as a means to complete a failed attempt. You may find that performing a couple of sets at a slightly lesser weight and returning to that failed weight may result in a succesful lift. This also brings us into postactivation potentiation effects, an acute effect with some very lovely attributes.

An especially frustrating topic is percentages and percentage based training. Yeah, they're easy to use to relate things but they really don't mean a whole hell of a lot. The core principle of strength training is you lift a heavy weight, the heaviest weight that you can at that time, and you keep lifting a weight that is close to that weight. Who cares if its 96%, 98% or 92%. 96 today might be 98, 94, or even 90 tomorrow and with many of these percentage schemes having PR or Max weeks built into them, it helps to muddy the waters a bit more and turn maximal training into a glorified PR hunt. Which is a complete mis-interpretation of strength training.

The next time you're looking at your workout log you should ask yourself "Is my 'strength training' actually strength training?"

In part 2 I'll be talking about some not so obvious components that are essential to comprehensive strength training.

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by JoeWeir

Any of you that have been following my Journal here (Strength Journal) will know that I recently included the infamous 4 squat workout into my routine. This delightful little routine consists of 4 exercises, each with 4 sets (5,4,3, and 2 reps respectively).

For the 4 squat variants I chose Overhead Squats, Anderson Front Squats, Back Squats (to parallel) and what I've coined the Anderson Half Squat. For anyone unfamiliar with an Anderson squat its not much different from a regular squat or so it may appear. The glaring difference is that an Anderson involves a deloaded bar in between eccentric and concentric portions of the movement. Basically you finish the eccentric movement, you're setting the bar on some pins, grabbing a breath maybe, and then completing the movement by driving up against the bar.

Sounds easy but its not quite.

Moving back to the idea of the Anderson Half Squat. If I posted a video on any number of forums I would most likely get the "nice 1/4 squat" or "go A2G" and if this were my main movement of the workout I might agree. Yes, it is a 1/4 squat, if you call full depth dropping your ass to the ground, but I coined it half because all of my "full" squats in the workout were brought to parallel. The point is that this movement is being used to supplement everything else so depth is really not the goal at all. The goal is to get a heavy bar on your back and work on your ability to accelerate it at a mechanical disadvantage as well as provide the other necessary criteria to do it safely and effectively.

Anytime you deload a bar you lose the elastic energy stored in the muscles that controlled the eccentric movement. Furthermore you lose your abdominal pressure, core engagement, and pretty much anything else involved in keeping yourself from folding like an accordian. In using this movement you really have to be confident in the fact that you can properly engage everything, push against that bar and accelerate it from a dead stop to full lockout. Oh yeah I forgot to mention, chalk on another 50% of the weight you can do for a back squat at that rep range.

This is the part I like most, the results. From using this exercise I've noticed a few very good side effects:

1) Feel of the bar. Since I haven't been back squatting in a while, my regular back squats felt very very heavy. Mainly from the fact that I haven't quite got my front squat to surpass my back squat, yet. After including the half squats the weight of the barbell used for back squats feels virtually weightless, a good boost to self-confidence at least.

2) Hip and glute activation and strength has increased. Since the bar is deloaded on some pins it takes a whole lot of hip to get the bar accelerating and since its such a heavy weight a whole lot of glute is involved to lock it out.

3) Core activation and stabilization has increased. Again because of the deloading you've got to get your core activated in an extremely fast manner. Driving up against the bar requires some explosive core activation and some very good stabilization. Without that your either not making it off the pins or your going to start folding over under the weight.

Those 3 side-effects carryover to anything that involves core activation and hip/glute strength, which, by the way, is ALOT of exercises and movements. I encourage anyone reading this to give it a shot but you'll have to answer one question after you do: Do you still think half or quarter squats are easy?

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by JoeWeir

By Eric Troy

You may have noticed this site is about strength training. I have a confession to make. I don't know how to give fitness advice. Because I cannot clearly conceptualize fitness. I can understand exercise for health. I cannot understand exercise for fitness unless "fitness" is another word for health. But it is not.

While I certainly care about the concept of "fitness" I don't believe that fitness is a defined goal in itself. Apparently many trainers do as I see all sorts of hybridized strength/cardio concepts supposedly designed to optimize your pursuit of "fitness".

Strength training and aerobic endurance are not like peanut butter and chocolate, after all. Spiking the heart rate during your strength training IS a good thing and there are many occasions in a typical strength training career where this will happen. But if your goal is absolute strength and NOT strength endurance do not let others sway you with generic ideas about fitness. You can have your cake and eat it too.

What kind of fitness advice do I mean?

The sort of advice I am talking about is something like this:

"Replace your strength training with supersets or circuits to keep the heart rate up. Or cut down the rest periods in your strength training."

Well there comes a point where you have to question what you are training for. If you water down your strength training you will get watered down results.

What is fitness anyway?

You've heard of the concept of Survival of the Fittest. And you've also heard fitness writers using this phrase many, many times in writing about fitness. You know, I'm not sure that Darwin really meant that those animals who did their "cardio" and "strength training" a certain way were more apt to survive. When we talk about being fit we mean fit FOR SOMETHING.

If you are fit to survive it means you have the traits that optimize survival in your niche. If just being healthy fit is the goal then all the complicated crap that fitness writers get up to is simply mental masturbation.

Most people have specific goals when they begin training. That doesn't mean they have to train like an athlete but it does mean that some abstract concept like 'fitness' is not likely to keep one motivated for very long.

But here is the good news. Most training goals, when approached with moderation and common sense, lead to you being more fit. The problem with the idea of hybridized training is that it always approaches the middle. And middle ground training means you simply will not be getting stronger after a certain point.

I am not sure how many "fitness" trainers (whatever they may be) who write about strength training really recognize the value of developing ones absolute muscular strength, in and of itself, regardless of other factors.

Why Don't I like Fitness as a Goal?

Because the term "fit" is based on a purely subjective value system. For instance: "I am thin therefore I am fit." Being thin is no more a measure of overall fitness than looking like Wolverine is. So, does that mean being able to run a couple of miles makes you fit? It means you are fit to run a couple of miles.

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From an objective standpoint I could point out a myriad of ways in which the typical early morning plodder is "unfit". Movement mechanics, mobility, body composition…

I could likewise find a reason for calling the typical powerlifter unfit. All one has to do is put any individual in a hypothetical situation. In this situation that individual will be called on to display certain traits or "skills". Lacking those traits; they are deemed unfit.

What I'm getting at is that the word FIT is NOT a general term. It has been turned into a general term by marketing and media.

Those that are stuck on the term fitness seem to have a hard time defining it without making personal value judgements. So, "fit" means one is able to "run a marathon" for instance. Again, that is SPECIFIC. I've even heard comments such as "one should be able to compete in a triathlon". Such statements make it clear that many "fitness" trainers really have no clue about event training! A triathlon is built on a very specific set of skills. Certainly a triathlete could be viewed as more fit than a most non-athletes but to say that a triathlete suits the definition of fitness more than say, a strongman, is a value judgment.

We don't have to be that specific. Some trainers insist that a person must be able to run a certain distance, like so two miles. Well, again, this specific. Being fit to run two miles does not make you fit to handle a hard days work laying brick! The idea is that in order to live the way we want to live our fitness pursuit must be specific to our life-style.

This does not mean that we shouldn't seek to optimize our fitness. What it does mean is that we have a better chance of doing that if we can optimize the traits of fitness. We must prioritize. This is where specific goals come in.

Resistance Training Versus Strength Training

To be honest I am a bit sick of fitness trainers talking about strength training as if it were the same thing as 'resistance training'. Strength training is resistance training but resistance training is not always strength training. Bodybuilding training is resistance training. Circuit training is resistance training (or can be). Yet they are three different things with three different end goals.

Yes, these types of training will bring about general improvements in strength for beginning trainees up to a certain point. But training becomes more specific over time not more general!

As a matter of fact that is probably a misconception that you have never heard mentioned before. That strength training is SYNONOMOUS with resistance training. But while some strength enhancing effects can be a side-effect of all resistance training; resistance training itself is simply a category.

Like fitness is a category.

The Fitness Wad

Perhaps this trend toward hybridized training has come about because of two universal desires that have been meshed into a "fitness wad".

1. The desire to improve one's quality of life. Or, in other words, to be able to enjoy life because you are more able to work well and play well, therefore reaping the benefits of a life well lived.

2.The simple desire to live longer.

If this is so then I'll make a simple suggestion:

FOCUS ON NUMBER ONE.

Think about what your needs are. What fitness goals would enable YOU to live a higher quality life. What would enable you to enjoy the kind of things YOU enjoy? What would serve to ameliorate stress? What would enable you to stay healthy and functional in your occupation until you retire or move on?

Perhaps you can come up with your own questions that need answering. After all, it's YOUR life so you should be the one in charge of setting your goals.

But why do I suggest focusing on number one? Well think about it. You don't just want to live longer you want to live better for longer. AND if you live a better, more active and functional life, I think (call it intuition) that will give you the greatest chance of living longer.

So in order to achieve the general goal of living YOUR life better your training must be based on achieving specific, rather than general goals. And working toward these goals will be MORE ENJOYABLE and REWARDING than some vague "fitness" training so it will be a part of your overall goal which is to LIVE BETTER.

You do not have to "train like an athlete" or dedicate youself in passionate pursuit of some physical goal. Your exercise, workout, or training - whatever you wish to call it - does not need to own you. On the contrary, you must be in charge and own your training. In order to do that you MUST have well-defined goals: long term, medium term, short term…even ultra short term (daily) goals. Because a vague and loosely defined goals such as fitness is not likely to keep you in it for the long haul.

Make sense?

- Eric Troy

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by EricT

They are used for rehabilitating ankle injuries. The idea behind it is to retrain the proprioceptive mechanisms that can be damaged when a joint is injured. Basically, your body has sensory organs called proprioceptors which relay information about the body's position to the brain. In the case of the actual joints, information about a joints angle relative to the rest of the body is monitored this way. Without this you'd be in big trouble. If your ankle, for instance is turning under that needs to be quickly and automatically corrected. When the ankle is injured this proprioceptive sense can be damaged and this is one thing that leads to repeated ankle sprains.

Wobble boards can help to retrain this proprioceptive sense. And it works. It's a good thing and is perfectly suitable to a rehabilitative setting. But that is where it ends.

However, many trainers have taken it out of the rehabilitation setting and applied it to general training. You see people doing all sorts of things on unstable surfaces. Like barbell squats on wobble boards, bosu balls. As if doing weighted exercises with these isn't enough we now have people doing barbell back squats standing on top of Swiss balls like in the image below right.

It should be needless to say, but this is a dangerous and ill-conceived practice and, if you don't get injured, it is more likely to worsen your performance than improve it. Basically this is mistaking balance for stability. They think that if you are standing on a bosu ball or wobble board you are training stability but in fact you are simply learning how to balance on a bosu ball or wobble board. If, when you are standing on solid ground you have no problem with a squat, for instance, meaning that you have the stability to squat a loaded barbell then putting you and the barbell on top of a bosu ball does not suddenly prove you unstable. It means that your foundation is unstable and you will have a harder time resisting changes to your precarious equilibrium. Perching yourself on a bosu ball is good if you are training to be a ninja. Not so good if you are training the squat.

Balance is your ability to control your equilibrium. If you are standing up then you are in equilibrium, for example. Stability is your ability to resist changes in equilibrium. If I come and push you your ability to remain upright is an example of stability.

Figure 1: Wobble Board

Balance is a specific skill. That means is is specific to the surface it is developed on. The way a tightrope walker learns to balance on a tightrope is to walk on a tightrope. Having mastered the tightrope will not make him better able to be a linebacker.

Now, Louie Simmons and even the Diesel Crew are touting similar practices. Except it's using a foam pad. You are supposed to walk on a foam pad or do bulgarian split squats, or step-ups off one.

To be fair Jim Smith, author of Combat Core and a very innovative strength coach, intends the foam use for rehabilitative and activation purposes. However, I would want to know exactly what injuries and who it was intended for before I engaged in such practices. And that would entail an actual injury analysis by a qualified therapist.

Perhaps the current trend toward bridging the world of therapy with the world of strength and conditioning coaching has gone a bit too far. When strength coaches start "minding" therapist, who typically know very little about strength training and therapists start to portray themselves as the future of strength and conditioning, things are getting strange. Whatever the case, slapping a rehab label on something intended for a general audience is not something I can agree with.

Unstable surface training was meant for rehabilitative purposes and as such was employed in a specific way toward specific injuries.

I could be wrong but I just don't see a difference between doing things on a wobble board and on a piece of foam. Besides the obvious difference of course. I see them both as unstable. I don't expect that having a foot planted on a piece of foam or walking on foam will actually impact performance on a hard piece of ground. And I would expect many people to turn an ankle stepping down to one doing step ups. Or trying to balance on one doing split squats.

Another supposed benefit is inhibiting the "push-off" during step-ups. Well, there is no push-off in step-ups. If you are pushing off then you have not gotten step-ups down. There is one working leg. Side-stepping things and using a piece of foam to inhibit the push-off will just keep you from learning how to control the movement and use the working leg's strength and your own stability to master the movement and get stronger. I do step-ups with a loaded barbell on my back. I don't pushoff. I control the descent. I do not allow my back leg to crash down to the floor and only come down to the ball of my foot. This is how I do it and this is how I teach trainees to do it. If they push-off they get a lecture.

As a matter of fact I have noticed that many people have just as much trouble getting stable doing a bulgarian split squat as they do just moving it up and down. They need to start with a static split squat just on the ground and even that is a challenge. If there is any place for the foam..it is a advanced place. If you can't balance enough to do a split squat I doubt very much that doing it on foam will train that balance faster.

Most people that I have trained lack stability in a stable environment. The last thing they should be doing is training in an unstable one. It violates specificity. To me, unstable is unstable. People used to think that doing wind sprints on the beach would make you run faster. More likely it will screw up your running mechanics.

Of course I've heard the time honored pseudo-scientific argument about humans having 'evolved' to run on sand and grass. The point is, however, that the surface you are moving on makes all the difference. Sprinters, for instance, can sometimes encounter serious difficulties between one running surface and another even though both surfaces could be considered hard surfaces. Indoor volleyball players would certainly take some time getting used to beach volleyball. How would beach volleyball players do if they suddenly had to switch to a hard surface? Likely it would at least "feel weird". But heck, even the balls are different, the approach distances are different…everything is different reflecting the two different realities. All the things that you have to change to be successful on the sand are not going to make you better on the court because in many ways they are just too different. I would think this is a fundamental truth that can be generalized to some extent.

Figure 3: Bosu Ball Jumps? Wouldn't have my son do this.

Vibrational training is the new big thing set to overshadow wobble boards and stant blades. This is where training takes place on some type of vibrating platform. All sorts of science going on by men in lab coats concerning that. I see this as well as being just another unstable surface, as do many others. As they say the jury is out and I have a feeling they will be out for quite a while. You can read Cardinale and Bosco's review of the literature here in this Pdf. And here where vibrations seems to have improved counter-movement jump performance in women but worsened it in men. In any case the supposed improvement seem to be temporary in nature.

I'm no expert though, so I'd suggest you dive deeper into the research.

Since this article has been up Jim Smith expressed his concern that I am misrepresenting his views. He points out that the idea of the exercises on foam rolls is rehabilitation and activation, and I included a paragraph above to that effect. This is outlined in his article. I personally don't see it and I don't feel that I put any words in Mr. Smith's mouth in this article but in fairness I wanted to include Jim's explanation for this. For example, doing Bulgarian split squats with the foot on foam is for glute activation and knee stability, among others.

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by EricT

By Eric Troy

What is this thing with hip position in deadlifting? Why is it so hard for people to figure out where their hips should be without a qualified coach laying on hands and forcing them into the best position?

Prodigious effort has been made by so many to demystify this very simple concept. Notably by Mark Rippetoe in Starting Strength, whom despite my not being a big fan of his training methods, has done a great job of teaching basic technique in his writings (if not his videos).

Yet every time I turn around some guy is talking about trying to get his butt lower or being told that his butt is too low and his back should be parallel to the floor. I think it was Jim Schmitz who said the butt (i.e. hips) should be higher than the knees and lower than than the shoulders. That sums it up. Where your hips end up is somewhat unique to you.

So I started looking around at instructional deadlift pieces and I found some good instruction..up to a point..then I found out the writer is not really getting it either as they begin to give some type of formula for hip position based on parallel or "straight back" or other cue.

They get that the shins should be damned close to the bar so that the bar is about midfoot over the feet. Good. They get that the shoulders should be forward of the bar so that the bar and the scapula are in a vertical line..in other words the bar is underneath the shoulder blades. Good. They get that the shoulder should be up and the back set in a tight natural arch..

But they still can't produce the proper position. So I studied images from people who seem to "get it" but still don't get it and I found one factor being the biggest culprit. More often then not the hips are TOO FAR FROM THE BAR. I take it that this is due to the cue "bring the hips back" (meaning to bring the butt back and use hip flexion rather than lumbar flexion). This is translating into the butt ending up a thousand miles form the bar. It won't work. Try it. Reproduce all the factors discussed above except mentally cue yourself to "bring your hips back". If it feels like a hamstring stretch rather than a deadlift you'll get what I'm talking about.

Sure it's okay to approach the bar by bringing the hips back, and this may be necessary as many lifters try to pull themselves down to the bar or think that they must squat down. But bringing your hips back is only part of the setup.

What happens is that people approach the bar correctly. If the shoulders and feet are in the right place and the shoulders are up and locked back the hips should be in place. But then they tend to allow the hips to drift back upon initiating the lift. This is a habit that reinforces weak hip drive thus locking in this faulty technique. So when I say to get the hips as close to the bar as possible that is a technique reinforcement to get you to plant the hips and pull UP on the bar rather than back.

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When I say mental cues I mean stuff like "my butt should be just lower than my parallel squat". Instead focus on benchmarks. In this case the bar is the best benchmark. You find your position relative to the bar not relative to some mental picture of another movement such as the squat. If you notice in the above example all the positions of every part of the body were found relative to the bar but then when it came to the hips suddenly this tried and true formula was abandoned for mental cueing. Always stick to something you can see, feel, and touch.

In this way we use a "frame of reference". Using your hips as a frame of reference is more complicated since they are moving RELATIVE to the bar. Using the BAR as a frame of reference is simpler. The bar is stationary on the floor.

Miscues in the Setup

The typical instruction on how to setup for a deadlift tells a trainee to simply bring the hips back and let the knees bend naturally while keeping the lower back in its natural arch. The idea here is that you slowly move down in this fashion until your hands are able to grab onto the bar, and bang, you are in the "perfect" position for the deadlift. There is one problem with this method. Nobody does it. That is, lots of people teach it but hardly anybody practices it in real training.

The problem is that this method does not produce the same efficient position for everyone. It is in itself a mobility test. Depending on your mobility, you may or may not reach the bar while maintaining the lumbar in neutral. You may have to set the bar higher and then slowly move it closer to the floor until you develop the mobility to initiate the lift this way. Once you do that, you will likely find that you need to unlearn some of the positional habits that you learned along the way.

What were are told then, is that this method is the "basic" position and then you should raise or lower the hips according to what part of the body you want to emphasize or what "kind" of deadlift you want to do! See the problem? Here again, nobody seems to know where is the right place to put the hips. Those so-called strength coaches who do not know how to deadlift or how to teach a deadlift, then invent alternate deadlift methods based on silly bodybuilder or other concepts, simply to disguise the fact that they themselves do not know a deadlift from a hole in the head.

There is ONE optimal position for YOU to place your hips in when you deadlift. Once you dial in that position and progress to very heavy weights, I guarantee nobody will be able to convince you to adopt a butt down position to emphasize the quadriceps, or to do a "clean style deadlift" to keep yourself safe. There are a lot easier ways to build up your quadriceps and glutes than inventing new deadlift versions. On the other hand, lifting the heaviest weight possible from the floor to waist height, that is jut plain fun, not to imagine a lot more immediately satisfying. Meanwhile, you can't build a heavy deadlift, in any position, without building a lot of muscle that, should you keep your diet in check, will look good at the beach.

Miscues in the Deadlift

1. Butt up or butt down. One of the most frequent cues you hear in deadlifting is to "get your butt higher" or "get your butt lower". To me, this one of the WORST ways to cue a deadlift. For purposes of discussion we will assume that hips and butt is the same thing. When someone tells you to simply move your butt up and down they are having you focus on a MOBILE benchmark and then telling you to move it around! You'll have to have someone tell you where to put your hips about a thousand times before it finally sinks in. So we want to start with something that is not moving and maintain our setup relative to THAT.

2. Drive the feet into the floor. Another big miscue, in my opinion is focusing on the feet or the floor for closed chain movements like this. What you hear are things like "drive your heels into the floor" and "try to push down on the floor". It seems like a good idea but the problem is that focusing on the feet and the floor makes your body want to move down. You are NOT pushing down the floor. You are pulling UP the bar. Although it will require a lot of pushing into the floor to move the bar the action that really results in the bar being pulled up is a very powerful hip extension.

Hip Dominant Instead of Knee Dominant

Deadlifts are a "hip dominant" movement not a "knee dominant" movement. To illustrate this to yourself there is a very simple but very powerful test which is similar to doing a jump. Do this right now as you are reading this.

1. Stand up and get yourself into a sort of deadlifting position. Bring your hips back and place your weight onto your heels.

2. Now VERY SLIGHTLY "push" your heels into the floor. Your weight should be on your heels and your hips should be flexed so that your torso is slightly inclined. Basically you should be able to jump forward from this position. So push your heels into the ground just enough so that you feel your glutes and hamstrings engage. You may actually feel as if you can "tense" these muscles a whole lot without actually extending your knees or hips at all.

3. NOW, do something different. Get into the same position as step two. Weight on the heels. But do not push your heels into the floor. Instead concentrate on driving your hips and butt forward very slightly and easily. In other words just try to slightly extend (straighten) your hips.

4. If you do this correctly you should notice a very marvelous thing. In step two, you will probably be able to generate a lot of muscular tension in your legs and really feel as if you are pushing that floor but without actually generating any movement. Yet, in step three you should find it pretty much impossible to try to extend the hips and not end up standing straight up! If your degree of effort is pretty much the same for both things that should tell you something about the relative efficiency of both movements!

The reality is that both efforts SHOULD result in the same thing. But the first method is able to generate a whole lot of muscle tension with no movement whereas the second method results in powerful and fluid movement without a lot of static muscle tension.

With that being said, there MAY be something to say for first driving the heels and then performing a violent hip extension…which is what most people do. Because you generate that tension in the extensors and then you "let it rip". However, I have never personally found it to be more efficient.

Yes, with a heavy deadlift you generate a lot of muscular tension. But that does not mean that "high tension techniques" are more efficient. If I could guess as to why this is so I'd say that generating the excessive and unneeded tension limits efficient joint movement. In that vane you may notice that step two, if you allow movement, causes a more herky jerky movement, whereas step three, as I said before, causes a fluid movement, and what's more you can hardly avoid this movement occurring with only the slightest application of effort. I explained the problems with excess muscle tension a bit more in-depth in the Zone series.

Pulling Too Much: Lifting with the Shoulders

The other mistake that people make is to take the word "pulling" to literally. This is another reason why focusing on hip drive is so important. What people do is they simply attempt to "pull" the bar off the floor with their shoulders. So it is as they are doing the movement from the top down. In extreme cases, this results in the "scared cat deadlift" that we see SO often. Top down pulling is of course not the only thing that causes the scared cat deadlift but it is one thing that can lead to it.

Your Guidelines for a Proper Deadlift Setup

1. Stand with your shins about an inch from the bar with about a hip width stance or slightly wider depending on what works best for you.

2. Look down at the barbell and imagine that there is a vertical line coming up through it so that the line of the barbell is part of an imaginary plane. The barbell and this imaginary line is your reference point or benchmark. You will use this to orient your body to. Remember this if for visualization purposes only.

3. After you grab the bar you will bring your shoulders in front of the bar so that the imaginary line intersects your scapula. In other words, the bar is in line with your scapula. Keeping your shoulders forward of the bar in this position, bring your chest up and shoulders back and locked. Scapula retracted.

4. Hips/Butt: Now that your feet are in the right place and your shoulders are in the right place the trick is to get your hips as close to this imaginary LINE as possible while maintaining your shoulder position. You are NOT bringing your hips down toward the bar…you are bringing them forward toward the line coming up through the bar. WITHOUT moving your shoulders back.

All the while the chest must stay OUT and the shoulders back. The lower back must remain in it's tightly set natural arch.

Really, once you hit step three and you are maintaining a good deadlifting position with your lumbar set you are pretty much there. Step 4 is a very subtle adjustment. If you move your hips down the shoulders drift behind the bar. If you move your hips too far up the shoulder sink. So "just right" is in between. Correct, as has been said before, means your butt is below your shoulders but above your knees. This may seem simplistic and smarmy but but since we see people try to deadlift with their butt below their knees in the "deadlift as squat" position or with their butt pretty much level with their shoulders…it needs to be said, apparently.

-Eric Troy

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by EricT