So while in my off season I had this very cool idea but im not sure how itd work in reality. Basically the program woul be to do 5 very heavy singles of the powerlifts (like bulgarian light but 5 sets),do it for bench 4x a week,squat 2x,and deadlift 2x once conventional once sumo. And then for the rest of the workout isolate muscle group with high reps 12-20 with low weight to accumulate volume,and increase volume accordingly with how you respond to the amount on a 3 week basis. Basically the second portion of the workout would serve as both hypertrophy work and sort of recovery for the joints,while the heavy part would work as a highly specific powerlifting work. Id appreciate some feedback from someone who has had a lot of experience over time with programming.
I had something set up similarly to that some time ago.
Looks like a decent outline to me. Thats a lot of benching, so if you find yourself stalling, I see no reason to not play around with how frequently you throw it in from week to week.
For the assistance, or second portion of your training, I do believe it would benefit you more to conjugate your supplemental lifts. I’d honestly suggest conjugating your whole approach, simply because you’ve got a lot of heavy work packed into one week, and One or more of those lifts is bound to stall out. You can keep your benching at that frequency, but instead of typical competition bench style, opt for JM presses at a 1-3RM , or Floor presses at a 1-3RM, etc, then have two days out of the week where you’re actually training the competition bench press. Same for Squat and Dealift, but you can probably cycle in variations a bit slower.
So the setup would be kind of like:
Monday: Compeition Bench, Compeitition Squat
Tuesday: Bench Variation, Conventional Deads
Wednesday: Rest
Thursday: Squat Variation
Friday: Competition Bench, Sumo Deads
Saturday: Bench Variation, Compeition Squat
Sunday: Rest
Divvy up rest days how you wish, I was just giving an example, and assistance would go as followed, or how you oringinally wanted to have it set up.
You don’t necessarily have to conjugate your assistance movements, But generally speaking it does prove effective.
Otherwise, you’re treading very closely to 5/3/1 territory, and I’d probably suggest pulling info to further shape your training from any number of the principles in Wendler’s writing.
Yeah seems about right. I think im gonna try not conjugating my main lifts for a while just to see what happens since im not going to go on full on maxes but rather something like an rpe9-9.5. Ive planned on channging my accessories when the volume gets too high,so ye i think ill do it. Thanks for the input,ill let you know how it goes.
Good luck! Have fun with the programming.
Your setup looks like the opposite of Power Building.
The idea is to do higher reps on the Big lifts, so that you build some muscles while you get gradually stronger.
And then you go heavier on the accessory work, so you get stronger all over while you Build bigger muscles.
Here are 2 big strong dudes talking about it.
Here are two more experienced guys talking about how the Bulgarian style doesn’t Build much.
2 more experienced strong guys
I don’t know why I get that confused with something else, but I agree.
No its the opposite. Maybe u missunderstood my post
Its not bulgarian,i just said its somewhat similar to bulgarian light,which is a variatioj of bulgariaj. Ive seen the vids before.
It’s cool. We don’t need to get all caught up with the labels.
What’s in a name? That which we call powerbuilding, by any other name would smell as sweet.
Here’s another strong experienced guy talking about “mixing his power lifting and all his body building as one unit.”
No i meant your description of it,its the opposite of that. Main moves with high intesnity and low reps(1) and isolation work with high volume low weight.
Im sorry i cant watch the video right now so excuse me if im making assumptions here,but im assuming you mean those 2 cant be mixed? What i mean is you do singles for the main moves,singles at 90% wont be enough to make you fatigued,so youll be able to do your isolation work. And the isolation work is going to be low weight so its not gonna interfere with the strengh moves. Its gonna serve as recovery for the big lifts and hyperteophy at the same time. I havent seen Ed Coan or anyone else really do it this way,so i dont think thats what. im talking about. Its 12-20 reps that arent taken to failure.
Yes! Now you see what I’m getting at.
Nobody with a lot of experience with programming over time does what you’re describing. Lots and lots of guys with lots of experience with programming over time do the Opposite of what you’ve described.
But Ed Coan did do it like this… Ive seen videos of him and checked his programs,he used to do bodybuilding work after his main lifts. In fact i remember watching a whole podcast of him talking about doing it like that. They will perhaps split it into blocks,but blocks last 3-4 months and do include both main lifts and hypertrophy work.
Not the way you have it written. In the video Flats put up, Coan does emphasize Rotation/Cycling. As one of his lifts went up so did the others.
Thats the only reason I’d really suggest Conjugation. You can keep the heavy movements, but you’re going to have to rotate them, because I’ve done the exact same thing you’re trying to do, and my bench and squat came to frustrating halts.
He did do bodybuilding coupled with the powerlifts, but again, he emphasized a Rotation or Cycling of his lifts. You can go ahead and see just how far you get, but why not continue to progress with a more solid programming scheme, because you’re going to have to revise programming sooner or later.
If you want to go the power building route, Flats is spot on with his suggestion.
Yes i know. Ugh this turned into a mess. He was saying that Ed Coan does not mix bb and strengh,i said that he does and gave my proof,i wasnt saying Ed does it exactly like me,i just said that he does mix them both. Ed does say that he did do blocks,which is what im doing,this is a hypertrophy block,otherwise the second part of my workouts would be useless.
I have tried conjugate several timea and every time lets just say i have had less than desirable results. I respond really well to specificity,thats why i wanna give it a try
Alright. Have it your way.
Im sorry if it sounded rude but thats what works for me. Everyones different. Thnx for the input tho.
My feelings aren’t hurt, I’m just trying to help you.
This isn’t exactly like your lay-out, but Check out this CT program.
Pretty frequent “Big Lifts” with lower reps and “smaller” lifts with slightly higher reps. And a plan to adjust reps slightly as you progress through the blocks.
Consider varying your intensity/volume on the big lifts.
Week 1: sets of 3
Week 2: sets of 2
Week 3&4: sets of 1
I’d also consider using close variants that dont stress you as much as you get towards the end of the week. Paused, extended ROM, slowed eccentric , etc versions of the main lifts.
Specificity is great but you also need to balance it out with dimishing returns. That’s where additional volume and variations come in to allow you to counter the dimishing returns of doing the same movement at similar intensity week in-week out.
Josh Bryant has a E book over Powerbuilding
