Sunday 10/22
Front Squat
5x135
5x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
Back Squat
2x285
2x315
2x345
1 Like
Monday 10/23
Back Squat
5x135
5x165
5x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x345
2x345
2x345
Tuesday 10/24
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x345
1x375
1x375
KB Press
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1 Like
Wednesday 10/25
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x345
1x375
2 Likes
Great stuff as always man. I have three questions for you:
- Do you ever do more than 5-6 reps?
- How do you know when to push it and went to keep it lighter? How do you progress on this program you do? Meaning when do you know to add weight?
- I’ve always heard low reps doesn’t build thick muscle. I’m sure this is false as you seem like you are built based on your videos. Have you noticed dramatic physical improvements? I’m sure you have more towards your entire posterior and your legs.
Love your simplified training style!
2 Likes
Uncle Ivan is pleased.
1 Like
Thanks for the compliments.
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No, but this is less a “strategic choice” than it is merely a personal preference. I like low-rep sets better; I feel that I do a better job maintaining crisp technique on sets of 2-3 reps than I would at high reps; and anecdotally, I believe that I recover very well from this sort of high-frequency, low-volume approach.
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Um…while I’d love to write a book about some super-secret, complex formula to get rich and retire early…it’s pretty much totally by feel. When I hit a weight consistently and feel total ownership of the weight…then I’ll work up to trying something heavier at some point. Most of the time I train somewhere between 75-90% of my established max. Probably the best way to explain this is my path from a 550 deadlift to a 600 deadlift. If you look back a few pages in the log, I hit a 550 deadlift sometime in the spring (checked back - it’s post 696 in the log, on May 6 of this year). Over the next few months, I did lots of squatting and bunches of deadlift singles at 500. On 6/18, I hit 565. From that point on, almost any time I deadlifted, I went up to at least 545. On 7/15, I hit 585. Again, I carried on, going up to 545 almost every time I pulled. On 8/6, I hit 600. The truth is…all the work to get from 550 to 600 was the accumulated volume of pulling and squatting that I did all year. I just had to do enough reps a little bit heavier to know for sure that I had 600 in the bag. Once I started consistently hitting 545 in any given deadlift workout, I was pretty sure that I’d be good for 600.
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I don’t know about “dramatic” physical improvements, and my legs would look like shit on a BB stage, but I certainly do believe that I’m carrying more muscle around than the average bear. I think people tend to conflate what is “optimal” for something with whether another approach works at all. Higher reps may well be better for hypertrophy than lower reps; that doesn’t mean lower reps cannot stimulate muscle growth. I remember reading once, somewhere, a quote something like “there is no one that can squat 405 for ten reps with small legs.” While I cannot squat 405 for 10 reps, the basic principle got through to me - get strong, and muscle would follow. Since I vastly prefer training in this style to a BB split with high reps, I decided just to get strong, and trust that muscle growth would occur. It has.
Now, if you want to be part of the real aesthetics crew, I would refer you to @EyeDentist and @Serge_A_Storms - both of whom possess admirable physiques, likely far preferable to mine, mostly built by pink dumbbells and nutrition, as far as I can tell. If you just want to be a big-ish and strong-ish guy with a pretty simple lifting program that can be done in 30 minutes a day, I strongly endorse the ActivitiesGuy “Do Some Squats And Some Deadlifts More Days Than Not Using As Much Weight As You Feel Like That Day” Program. That will be $19.95 for the e-book or $39.95 for the paper version.
10 Likes
No problem man. I believe in simplicity (not just in lifting, but life in general). I am the same way. I like reps under 6. I’d rather do more sets than reps per set. Probably why I’ve liked 10x3 more than 3x10 haha.
Oh ok great man! So you just slowly move up and when you feel like you “own” a weight then you try to go for a PR/add more weight.
I whole heatedly agree with that statement! I think if you are strong, you are gonna look strong (in someway) no matter what. This reminds me of some of the guys doing Olympic lifts at the gym. A few of those guys are not that big at all, but you can tell they are strong/have dense muscle just by the way they look. But for you it definitely has man!
Thanks for taking the time out of your day to respond to my questions.
I know you are just joking, but I honestly feel like 99% of the population would benefit from this type of program!
Not sure about @Serge_A_Storms’ physique (I’m pretty sure it’s mainly attributable to head spins + popping and locking), but as for mine, I can sum it up in two words: Shake Weights.
7 Likes
I have worked up to the orange dumbbells, thank you very much. Only on days where I’m going heavy, but I still deserve to be properly represented. Orange is the new pink.
7 Likes
Thursday 10/26
Deadlift
5x135
5x225
1x315
1x405
1x435
1x465
1x525
1x595
2x500
The single at 595 was a grind to end all grinds. I did get it, but it was brutally hard, and I’m kind of a stickler for hitting solid, clean lifts. I wanted to cleanse the palate after that, so I did a nice solid double at 500 to finish up.
Now I am chowing down on a massive bowl of spinach ravioli slathered with pesto and a rich Sierra Nevada Imperial Stout to wash it down:
7 Likes
Friday 10/27
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x345
1 Like
Saturday 10/28
Deadlift
5x135
5x225
2x315
2x405
2x435
2x465
2x500
2x500
1 Like
Sunday 10/29
Yard Work (2 Hours)
Deadlift
5x135
1x225
1x315
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
1x405
KB Press
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
1x88
2 Likes
Monday 10/30
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x315
2x315
1 Like
Tuesday 10/31
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x320
2x320
1 Like
Wednesday 11/1
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x325
2x325
1 Like
Thursday 11/2
Back Squat
2x135
2x165
2x195
2x225
2x255
2x285
2x315
2x330
2x330
1 Like
Friday 11/3
Deadlift
5x135
2x225
1x315
1x405
1x440
1x440
1x440
1x440
1x440
1x440
1x440
1x440
2 Likes
Saturday 11/4
Back Squat
5x135
5x165
5x195
3x225
3x255
3x285
2x300
2x320
2x335
Deadlift
5x135
5x225
3x255
3x285
3x315
3x405
Brother came over to lift and hit a nice squat single at 320 for a PR. Really impressive strength - he’s got plenty in the tank as a squatter, just needs to harness it with continued practice.
3 Likes