Hypertrophy Specific or Westside?

Bigger Stronger Leaner Competitive Bodybuilding
1

Over the last two years I’ve mainly done hypertrophy oriented routines, but the last 3 months I switched to Westside training and have seen some good results. I’m about to do Poliquin’s super accumulation program, but I’m not sure what routine to follow it up with…

Two years ago I was 160 lbs with maxes around 275 squat, 275 deadlift, and 225 bench. Now I’m 198 lbs with maxes at 355 squat, 400 deadlift, and 295 bench. I’ve got some fat to cut but I’m more concerned with getting my size and strength up a bit more before I do so.

I think part of the reason why I saw quick improvements with the Westside training was because it’s a different style and I had been ignoring close grip bench and good morning variations. Although I’ve taken a 3 month break from my hypertrophy routines, it’s dominated my last 2 years of lifting. Poliquin’s program is also inclined towards hypertrophy.

My leg size and my squat max are my biggest concern, so what type of routine do you think I should do next?

Thoughts? Comments? Insults?

2

[quote]PureNsanity wrote:
Over the last two years I’ve mainly done hypertrophy oriented routines, but the last 3 months I switched to Westside training and have seen some good results. I’m about to do Poliquin’s super accumulation program, but I’m not sure what routine to follow it up with…

Two years ago I was 160 lbs with maxes around 275 squat, 275 deadlift, and 225 bench. Now I’m 198 lbs with maxes at 355 squat, 400 deadlift, and 295 bench. I’ve got some fat to cut but I’m more concerned with getting my size and strength up a bit more before I do so.

I think part of the reason why I saw quick improvements with the Westside training was because it’s a different style and I had been ignoring close grip bench and good morning variations. Although I’ve taken a 3 month break from my hypertrophy routines, it’s dominated my last 2 years of lifting. Poliquin’s program is also inclined towards hypertrophy.

My leg size and my squat max are my biggest concern, so what type of routine do you think I should do next?

Thoughts? Comments? Insults?[/quote]

Great progress man! Thats always good to see. My first observation is that something needs to be fixed with your squats. Because if you gain 70lbs on your bench over a period of time you should be gaining quite a bit more on your squat if you are working on that as well… How is your squat form? Been able to get your back locked in so it is a hip exercise?

I honestly am not sure what I would do if I were you, but one thing is for sure, that your squat needs some work just based on progression not so much numbers.

3

Well I will do you more of a favor than the first guy. I personally would rather not have some waste my time by bullshiting me and telling me “Great progress” when you have accomplished Shit!! Yes, I said you have accomplished basically nothing.

You have gained 38 pounds but you have gained almost no strength with respect to bodyweight per pound. I assume you are not happy with results or at least I hope you aren’t because I would not be…

However, I am just not joining to leave you with insults. I will give you the best advice I can with the limited information. To start with your bodyweight, given you are starting to put on fat stop eating so much and/or so many carbs.

It appears to be obvious you are not putting on much more muscle or putting on weight efficiently as you should be with respect to your desired strength increase. Another assumption is that you are young. This is just my interpretation given I was once a young lifter. It is easy to maximize strength. Just follow a few basic principles.

With regards to strength: FORM FORM FORM!!! If you want to increase strength do every rep the exactly the same. Ofcourse you are sitting there thinking but I do that already. Well from looking at your results you probably don’t. Lets see what lift should we start with…We will go in powerlifting order.

Squat: Put the bar lower on your back and stop setting the damn thing on your neck. I hope you are using a pussy pad (I assume you aren’t). Head up, Chest out, Ass back, Feet wider than shoulders and turned slightly out. This is the best stance for strength.

Bench Press is simple…very simple. Slow down and pause on chest then up as hard as possible. With respect to form: Bring the bar to the chest BELOW the pec with elbows IN then push up (AFTER YOU PAUSE) and you should naturally move towards the rack with the bar.

Deadlift: Feet about 8 inches apart, hands where they naturaly grip the bar outside of your legs, ass down way down, head look to the ceiling, chest out duh, and EXPLODE but keep form.

How do I know this guy knows what he is talking about. I will give you my creditials(btw i can’t spell worth shit mostly cause i don’t care) When I was 15 years old I totaled over 1100 pounds in the 148 weight class setting the American Record in USAPL Nationals the most respected drug free powerlifting association in the U.S. Simple go to Google and type in Jonathan Huczko.

Last note: Didn’t mean to sound cocky or harsh. I personally do not like to waste my time training and working hard to accomplish nothing. I hope I have helped you. If you have questions I would not mind giving you advice so you can spend your time “training” as efficiently and effectively as possible.

Sincerely,
J.W.H

4

[quote]Jhuczko wrote:
Well I will do you more of a favor than the first guy. I personally would rather not have some waste my time by bullshiting me and telling me “Great progress” when you have accomplished Shit!! Yes, I said you have accomplished basically nothing.

You have gained 38 pounds but you have gained almost no strength with respect to bodyweight per pound. I assume you are not happy with results or at least I hope you aren’t because I would not be…

However, I am just not joining to leave you with insults. I will give you the best advice I can with the limited information. To start with your bodyweight, given you are starting to put on fat stop eating so much and/or so many carbs.

It appears to be obvious you are not putting on much more muscle or putting on weight efficiently as you should be with respect to your desired strength increase. Another assumption is that you are young. This is just my interpretation given I was once a young lifter. It is easy to maximize strength. Just follow a few basic principles.

With regards to strength: FORM FORM FORM!!! If you want to increase strength do every rep the exactly the same. Ofcourse you are sitting there thinking but I do that already. Well from looking at your results you probably don’t. Lets see what lift should we start with…We will go in powerlifting order.

Squat: Put the bar lower on your back and stop setting the damn thing on your neck. I hope you are using a pussy pad (I assume you aren’t). Head up, Chest out, Ass back, Feet wider than shoulders and turned slightly out. This is the best stance for strength.

Bench Press is simple…very simple. Slow down and pause on chest then up as hard as possible. With respect to form: Bring the bar to the chest BELOW the pec with elbows IN then push up (AFTER YOU PAUSE) and you should naturally move towards the rack with the bar.

Deadlift: Feet about 8 inches apart, hands where they naturaly grip the bar outside of your legs, ass down way down, head look to the ceiling, chest out duh, and EXPLODE but keep form.

How do I know this guy knows what he is talking about. I will give you my creditials(btw i can’t spell worth shit mostly cause i don’t care) When I was 15 years old I totaled over 1100 pounds in the 148 weight class setting the American Record in USAPL Nationals the most respected drug free powerlifting association in the U.S. Simple go to Google and type in Jonathan Huczko.

Last note: Didn’t mean to sound cocky or harsh. I personally do not like to waste my time training and working hard to accomplish nothing. I hope I have helped you. If you have questions I would not mind giving you advice so you can spend your time “training” as efficiently and effectively as possible.

Sincerely,
J.W.H[/quote]

Hmmm, after looking at his numbers and weight, I would say you are correct, he did gain quite a bit of weight and not much strength relative to that weight at all. As far as your advice on the lifts though dude you have no fucking clue what you are talking about.

Obviously you are an excellent powerlifter and definitely know quite a bit more than myself on the topic. But I do know this much. If you think your form critique is what this guy needs to get going in the right direction you are are real nut.

You are describing the technique in these lifts like they are easy, there is no way this guy is going to pick up the form just because you describe what you do very well. I would also agree with your nutrition advice, as most likely spot on and this making his numbers look poor respectively. With all that said I dont think he has done bad at all.

He increased all his lifts nicely, but I do believe he has a squat issue, not able to make it a hip exercise or something I would imagine, because relative to the other lifts it could be improved form wise I bet.

5

With regard to Shadowss I think you had it right when you said “Definitely know quite a bit more than myself on the topic.” Then you should have probably just stopped typing. I feel dumb haveing toexplain this to you and I have better shit to do. Therefore, I will give you something to think on and let you get back to me. Here is the question?

What is the difference from people who want to get big vs people who want to be strong with respect to “training”?

For example I want a “big” chest vs I want to bench press alot?

If can’t derive the importance of form from this…it is your lack of knowledge of strength training not my “critique”.

J.W.H

6

[quote]Jhuczko wrote:
With regard to Shadowss I think you had it right when you said “Definitely know quite a bit more than myself on the topic.” Then you should have probably just stopped typing. I feel dumb haveing toexplain this to you and I have better shit to do. Therefore, I will give you something to think on and let you get back to me. Here is the question?

What is the difference from people who want to get big vs people who want to be strong with respect to “training”?

For example I want a “big” chest vs I want to bench press alot?

If can’t derive the importance of form from this…it is your lack of knowledge of strength training not my “critique”.

J.W.H[/quote]

When I said you definitely know alot more than me on the subject of powerlifting I totally meant it. The reason I didnt stop typing is because, you should know better than anyone that your advice on a thread is close to worthless. If this guy improved based on anything you said everyone would being squatting, deadlifting and bench pressing with excellent form and good weight.

You should know it is harder than you make it sound, and if it didnt at least take some hard, consistent work on form and such, and you didnt have to work hard you just had to keep training and never really had to worry about your form from the get go, then you probably dont know shit since you never had to fix any problems.

To answer your question, I would say this.

The difference between people training to get a “big” chest vs. training the strength of pushing is the former is going to work onexercises that they can focus on a certain muscle group as well as the classic strength exercises, while the latter is going to perform exercises where they can use the heaviest load and work on increasing it without caring about the chest doing the work.

What the fuck kind of question of that? I gave you respect because you have good numbers powerlifting. But I’ll tell you this, just because you are good at what you do doesnt mean you can instruct others how to get there. And after that last post Im not convinced you arent a fucking retard. You need to deflate your ego a little bit dipshit.

7

Well I am not going to respond to everything you wrote, again. However I will leave this “discussion” with this. I learned on my own. So it is possible to learn with out being “instructed” or “taught”. Which gets to my initial point don’t waste time training if you aren’t doing it right.

With respect to my question. Strength lifting is training a MOTION and size lifting is training MUSCLES. Just think about it…I am right. Now with this assumption what is the most important thing is training a motion, doing the motion the same way every time and doing it the best way possible. Try to think broadly and analyze outsie of just weight training with respect to the correlation of motion and form.

It is that easy to do…unless you just go through life doing with out thinking or analyzing. Then I would say well it sucks to be you then. Well or maybe not ignorance is bliss?

8

Well, I’ve put on more fat than I wanted too, but at 160 lbs I was more concerned with gaining weight. That’s why my strength with respect to bodyweight hasn’t gone up as much, and why I mentioned that I’ve got some fat to cut.

My squats didn’t go up as much because of my form with heavy squats and my lack of variation for the first year. I’ve since corrected the issue but am lagging a little in terms of progress on my legs which is why they’re my main concern at the moment.

I’m not the biggest or the strongest but I’m working on it and I’m working on the things keeping me from it. So with that in mind, hypertrophy or westside?

9

[quote]PureNsanity wrote:
Well, I’ve put on more fat than I wanted too, but at 160 lbs I was more concerned with gaining weight. That’s why my strength with respect to bodyweight hasn’t gone up as much, and why I mentioned that I’ve got some fat to cut.

My squats didn’t go up as much because of my form with heavy squats and my lack of variation for the first year. I’ve since corrected the issue but am lagging a little in terms of progress on my legs which is why they’re my main concern at the moment.

I’m not the biggest or the strongest but I’m working on it and I’m working on the things keeping me from it. So with that in mind, hypertrophy or westside?[/quote]

You dont need to do “Westside”. You do need to work on your strength primarily. I would use Mark Rippetoe’s program from Starting Strength.

10

[quote]Jhuczko wrote:
Well I am not going to respond to everything you wrote, again. However I will leave this “discussion” with this. I learned on my own. So it is possible to learn with out being “instructed” or “taught”. Which gets to my initial point don’t waste time training if you aren’t doing it right.

With respect to my question. Strength lifting is training a MOTION and size lifting is training MUSCLES. Just think about it…I am right. Now with this assumption what is the most important thing is training a motion, doing the motion the same way every time and doing it the best way possible. Try to think broadly and analyze outsie of just weight training with respect to the correlation of motion and form.

It is that easy to do…unless you just go through life doing with out thinking or analyzing. Then I would say well it sucks to be you then. Well or maybe not ignorance is bliss?[/quote]

Where are you coming from? I didnt say anything about training “muscles”. No shit strength training is about training a “motion”, it is an acquired skill, like a jump shot. I’m aware of that asshole.

11

I don’t know you are so dead set on picking a program. You have at least two years of experience from my understanding, I think if you eat normal and lift correctly your lifts and leg size should increase. I am not saying these guys don’t have good programs, but who needs a program. It is more simple than that.

For what you want just do squats deadlifts and legpress correctly and the size and strength should come naturally. You experience the greatest natural increase in leg strength and size with minimal effort compared to other lifts and body parts.

Despite what training program you decide just remember doing any exercise correctly and consistantly should give you good results.

12

Just from looking at where you where before and where you went after I think your greatest growth just came from training your legs properly and putting weight on your lower body.

Having a 275 Deadlift and 275 Squat is pathetic for a person with a 225 bench. Your current numbers now make a lot more sense.

If you’re in the middle of a strength program now, don’t stop. If your 8 weeks or whatever is up, then you’ll want to pick which is more important to you, your leg size or your max squat.

If you want to switch things up and do something that would give you leg size fast, then try a program or design a routine that uses high volume for legs. I’ve found if I train in a rep range above 10 for legs I get more noticeable gains in size.

13

You could always switch things up and go with a bodypart split, but still have Max Effort movements incorporated. Barbell Bench Press variations on Chest days, Deadlift variations on Back days, and squat variations on Leg days.