I’m gonna be honest with you, i only normally get into these threads while i’m waiting for IT to start working. If my company upgraded to IT systems from this century, I’d probably never stray far out of the Training Logs section.
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Oh my goodness yes. Remember how the stereotype was that big strong jocks were dumb?
Well yeah, they still are.
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I read these threads when I find classes boring
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This is the entire reason I ever come to the Darden forum – its entertainment value.
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Fortitude Training rules. It’s fun to do and I busted through a big plateau using it. If it’s fun and makes you big, I can’t think of anything better. I recommend it to anybody I can that has an interest in Bodybuilding style training.
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I think it provides access to every major pathway to muscle gain; whether fast twitch, slow twitch, or even distribution of the two - Fortitude will work both in combination with loaded stretching (which is often overlooked in most training regimens).
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How long do the workouts take? Was just reading online about it and apparently the workouts take 90 minutes?
I like the principles and it reminds me of meadows stuff (in some ways).
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I would say tier I and II takes about 45-60 mins when adding stretches after a muscle group. This by keeping the rest to about 60-90 secs between sets (not counting pump supersets).
Tier III may approach 90 mins in the load-pump routine, but I have done my own tier 2,5 at most which took about 70 mins.
I agree with @davemccright who introduced me to FT - probably the most varied bodybuilding program there is right now. It never gets boring. The muscle round cluster sets are the best way to enter heavier weights - and you get training volume without even thinking about it. That being said you need to be a bit careful on the 5th or 6th set when you are getting exhausted. I almost overdid my legpresses last time - risk for potential injury. But I think Dr Stevenson also adresses this.
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After seeing you guys mentioning Fortitude Training again , I finally decided to find out exactly what it was . Turns out I’ve been doing something real similar it for a while without knowing had a formal name.
I’ve been doing 5 reps before the ten second rest (5 deep breaths) , only do 4 clusters or mini sets and use a drop in weight for each cluster. I use a weight stack machine and performance pins for the drop so no time is lost. I’ll have to give the 6 sets a try with the same weight as he lays it out. I always loved breakdowns and I just referred to what I was doing as ‘cluster breakdowns’ in my log. Loved this as each ‘mini set’ is tough and makes all 20 reps ( if I completed all 20 ) difficult.
I never did a whole workout this way, I’d would usually use it for a compound and follow up with a single joint in straight reps, Zones or my newest favorite way to do reps - two slow followed by two normal - for 8 reps which I learned from Christian.
Can’t wait for tomorrows back and bicep workout to give the ‘Official FT’ a try. Glad you guys brought it up again.
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When I did volume Tier III, some of the workouts took that long. Usually you schedule your training Blast to taper up in volume to about the max you can handle for a week or two then drop it back down for a week or two for your cruise then taper back up. Volume Tier I sessions only take about 30-45 minutes though. So it really depends on where you are in your training cycle and there’s a lot of room for variability.
It does closely resemble Mountain Dog, and that’s probably because Stevenson and Meadows were good friends and often collaborated including on John’s book, “The Brutality of Mountain Dog Training”. Which is an awesome read by the way.
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I will say most of my workouts on Fortitude are about 90 minutes, but this includes ~10mins warmup and standard warmup sets. I’m running Tier 2, which is effectively 2 sets on your ‘loading’ exercises compared to Tier 1’s one set per loading exercise.
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90 minutes … that’s my weekly training time !
I do a three way split which totals around 14 -16 sets and am usually done in 30 - 35 minutes depending on how many plate loaded pieces I’m using. How many exercises / sets are you guys doing ?
Even if I’m not doing the FT type stuff with the ten second rests , I usually take no more than 20-30 seconds between sets.
What am I missing that you guys are doing ?
If i were to take a guess, not doing warmup sets and not doing extremely heavy weights (not an insult, just guessing on a likeliness scale).
Most days are 10-15 working sets, this does not include warmup sets. There is also a 60-90second loaded/extreme stretch following most exercises.
Yes, warmup sets. I also spend too much time on the free weight section, that is moving weights on/off the barbell.
Yeah, has to the warm up sets as I do only few and that’s only for the first exercise of the day and it’s much at all . On the upper body days I will always spend ten minutes or so stretching and loosening ups shoulders with resistance band stuff , but I don’t count that in what I call my workout time. My workouts usually are ten to twelve minutes a muscle group with three muscle groups in a workout.
If I go over 35 minutes it’s due to the yoga pants 
which is why I try to remember to leave my glasses in the truck to avoid such horrible distractions .
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I’m not understanding how this aligns with Fortitude, unless you are not running FT - which then makes sense.
I’ve always had my workouts range from 60-90 minutes, or sometimes longer (haven’t done this for years). But I also used to be a total volume junkie, which I still am - kind of, so this adds a good bit of time to the training session.
I believe he was just saying he runs a system like Fortitude’s Muscle Rounds. If he is only working three muscle groups per session rather than the whole body, it also makes sense as to why his routine takes less time.
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Curious, do you like the muscle rounds or Rest-Pause more?
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That’s actually a really tough question… I think muscle rounds are more “fun” but I think rest pause is basically the ultimate bang for your buck set type. It’s very versatile and lends itself to any type of equipment from Barbell and Dumbbell to selectorized Machine, whereas muscle rounds work best with a large rack of dumbbells or selectorized machines due to the pre-planned weight drop. Rest pause sets generally also take less time. In terms of hypertrophy, I think they are on a very similar playing field
I think muscle rounds are the most fun style of training I’ve ever done but if I could only choose one, I’d have to pick rest pause. Especially being that I’m currently working out in a garage gym, the parameters of DC style rest pause better suits what I have access to. If I were working out in a fully equipped gym with tons of machines and pre set dumbbells, I’d be picking muscle rounds all day.
I appreciate the question, because it’s a topic I think about a lot.
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100 % agree,
real and complex answer points about AJ