Hey CT! I need another recommendation.
My one question: when would you recommend adding lat/biceps work to my routine?
I realized that not only is this new cycle I plan on doing lacking stimulation for these muscles, and they are the two body parts that are missing in my physique. It totally makes sense too because I often skimp out on these two muscle groups. I would much rather be squatting!
As I mentioned in my last forum post when I needed a recommendation on snatch pull continuous ramping, this is the new cycle I will be doing.
Day 1: Lower Body Pressing
Front Squat - Ramp to 80% of 3RM and wave load
Olympic Squat - Ramp to 80% of 3RM and wave load
High Pull from hang - Ramp to 2 or 3RM
Day 2: Upper Body Pressing
Push Press - Ramp to 87.5% of 3RM and wave load
Incline Press - Ramp to 87.5% of 3RM and wave load
Bench Press - Ramp to 87.5% of 3RM and wave load
Front Squat - Ramp to 80% of 3RM and wave load
Day 3: Explosive Pulls
High Pull from hang - ramp to 2 or 3RM
High Pull from blocks - ramp to 2 or 3RM
Low Pull from blocks - ramp to 2 or 3RM
Push Press - Ramp to 87.5% of 3RM and wave load
My plan was to schedule the week to look like this:
Day 1 - Lower Body Pressing & High Pull (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 2 - Upper Body Pressing & Front Squat (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 3 - Explosive Pull & Push Press (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 1 - Lower Body Pressing & High Pull (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 2 - Upper Body Pressing & Front Squat (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 3 - Explosive Pull & Push Press (Secondary Emphasis)
Day 7 - Neural Charge Day
If necessary, I can train for about 20 minutes first thing every morning.
I also have access to a sled.
Of course, if you (or anybody) see any changes that could be made to maximize performance, please let me know as well!
Thank god I’m not the only one who skews arm work for more squatting…
I think a solution may lie with Chad Waterbury. Maybe doing pull-ups/ chin-ups with high frequency for X amount of total reps, a la HFT?
It seems to me like you are already working on these muscles in your workout as a secondary muscle as suggested by Pabro you should consult the coach. Maybe he can take away one of the exercise out and replace it with these two body parts.
You could include an isolation/targeted complex at the end of your workouts (the day after high pulls ideally).
Something like:
A1. Chin-ups or lat pulldowns (yeah, not technically an isolation exercise, but in your plan it will work)
A2. Rear delts raises
A3. Preacher curl (or standing curl)
8-10 reps focusing on the quality of the muscle contraction, not on “lifting weights”
[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
You could include an isolation/targeted complex at the end of your workouts (the day after high pulls ideally).
Something like:
A1. Chin-ups or lat pulldowns (yeah, not technically an isolation exercise, but in your plan it will work)
A2. Rear delts raises
A3. Preacher curl (or standing curl)
8-10 reps focusing on the quality of the muscle contraction, not on “lifting weights”
15-30 seconds between exercises.
1 minute between sets.
3-5 sets.
Can be done twice a week at the end of a workout
[/quote]
The day after the main high pull work?
So it would be after my main work on day 4 and day 7?
And thanks CT. That looks great.
EDIT — I found your reasoning in your Micro-PA log. I thought it was a typo at first, which is why I asked.
For anyone else interested in what CT described, I COULD BE WRONG, but here’s what seemed to be his reasoning.
found here: Biotest Supplement Advice - Forums - T Nation
FROM CT:
What I’m experimenting with is doing the hypertrophy work THE DAY AFTER high threshold work.
For example I could do heavy bench press on monday and on tuesday hypertrophy work would be done for the muscles involved in the bench press (pectorals, triceps, delts).
My reasoning is as follow:
Protein synthesis is upregulated in a trained muscle after training and remains elevated for a 24 hours period. However numerous studies have shown that it can take as much as 72 hours for a muscle to rebuild itself after an intense session.
Everytime you train a muscle you upregulate protein synthesis in that muscle. With the use of Micro-PA that upregulation is even more important.
By doing hypertrophy work that has little impact on the nervous system 24 hours after you’ve done heavy work for a group of muscles you basically extend the duration of the period where there is an upregulated protein synthesis in that muscle. Which means that the second session can actually make the muscles you trained on your heavy day get rebuilt faster and grow larger.
This is a personal experience: when you train a muscle two days in a row, the mind-muscle connection is A TON greater on that second day. When doing hypertrophy work on a second day you become that much better at recruiting a targeted muscle.This is particularly interesting if you have a lagging body part that you can’t “feel”.
I started playing with that idea when I trained IFBB pro Daryl Gee. And got a glimpse of what it could do but it wasn’t optimal yet.
The methods you want to use on that second day should be based on constant tension training… feeling the muscle do the work every inch of every rep… on that day it’s NOT about “reps” or “weight” but rather on flexing the muscles against a resistance. We never want to relax the muscle during any point of the set.
YES these methods will create a big pump, but the pump itself isn’t really the goal. The goal is focusing on having the muscles maximally tensed during every millisecond of every set!!!