Questions About Training

Training
321

Should I, as a 17 year old (very soon will be 18), focus mostly on strength or hypertrophy? My goal is to be a bodybuilder, but I do understand, from reading and experience, that heavy lifting is what builds good muscle. I ask because I am looking forward to the training protocol. Also, if strength gains lead to size gains (which for all intents and purposes is true), do size gains lead to strength gains? I mention my age because I have a few years to do things and want to know what a good strategy for me would be.

To get an idea of what my resources are: I do not have access to a coach (for all of the olympic lifts) and I go to a commercial gym.

Thank you.

322

Coach I finished the Get jacked program about 3 weeks ago and have about 3 weeks to go until beach shape time would you reccomend a portion of the Get jacked Program for a 3 week fat loss blitz such as the ā€œhell week sessionā€ or perhaps something like your destroying fat article that employs more interval work and meatbolic workouts for the next 3 weeks along with very low carb. Typically my body responds better to outside sprint work for maximum fat loss, but I also end up losing muscle with it.
I would like to drop down to 8% and I am at 10% right now.

Thanks

323

Thib,

What is the best way to make use of an exercise like the one-arm barbell curl or one-arm barbell press? These exercises would certainly produce fantastic MU activation when performed properly due to the high amount of tension. Is this alone a powerful growth and strength stimulus, or should these be used in an ā€œactivationā€ type of role prior to an exercise that can be loaded more heavily?

I also had a quick question about the Garhammer raise. For best results, should the femurs be internally rotated somewhat to further limit the line of pull of the muscles flexing the hip?

324

Thibs,

For
ā€œA1. Partial deadlifts in the power rack (pin pulls), in week one you start the bar just above the knees and every 3 weeks you lower the starting position Try to reach that maximum in 6-8 sets
Work up to a 3RM then work up to a 1RMā€

Due to the lack of equipment I use a makeshift rack from stepper blocks, is a 2inch drop (one stepper block) every 3 weeks too much? When I dropped it by two inches my 1rm dropped by 27pounds! (359 to 332), perhaps I should do a drop every 4 weeks or so? Maybe until I build up close to my old higher pr of 359?

B1. Functional isometric top half deadlift (from just above the knees)
4 x 9 seconds

Just to be sure, B1 is always the same position and the starting position doesnā€™t change?

Thank you, this program has made me very comfortable with heavier weights.

325

Hello, I was hoping you could critique my training regimen for upper on tuesdays.

I want it to focus mainly on shoulder and trap specilization, I run a Lower, upper split - but here is tuesday. What can I change around , in the exercises to focus mainly on traps and shoulders?

(1) Lateral raises
(2a) Chin-up Ć¢?? medium-width grip
(2b) Seated dumbbell shoulder press
(3a) Renegade row - alternating
(3b) Telle-fly
(4) Barbell rollout Ć¢?? from standing if able; from knees otherwise

Upper 1

Day 2 Week 1
Sets Reps Rest
Ex 1 3 x 12 60
Ex 2a 6 x 6 60
Ex 2b 6 x 6 60
Ex 3a 3 x 8 10
Ex 3b 3 x 8 90
Ex 4 2 x AMRAP 60

  • this is not my program , so i do not want to be an idiot and critique stuff without understanding his point, but I would like it to focus more of what I want and need.
326

You mentioned the importance of having strong/big forearms. Whatā€™s a forearm specialization scheme you suggest if they are lagging?

327

[quote]TheBlade wrote:
You mentioned the importance of having strong/big forearms. Whatā€™s a forearm specialization scheme you suggest if they are lagging?
[/quote]

Use the search function dude!

Besides from this one, there are more forearm/grip specialization programs here on T-Nation.

328

I was going to start a 3 day a week full body routine based on rest-pause training. Should I mainly concentrate on using about a 6RM or is it ok to drop down to maybe a 10RM on one day? I didnā€™t know if dropping weight would dramatically reduce the effect of the training.

329

[quote]BBriere wrote:
I was going to start a 3 day a week full body routine based on rest-pause training. Should I mainly concentrate on using about a 6RM or is it ok to drop down to maybe a 10RM on one day? I didnā€™t know if dropping weight would dramatically reduce the effect of the training.[/quote]

Listen, other coaches will have different opinions. This is just what is my current belief:

  • Sets below 80% of your max are not heavy enough to maximize the benefits of rest-pause training. So a starting weight of lower than our 6RM is likely to be sub-optimal.

  • Rest-pause is WAY more powerful than what most people think. Even its greater proponents have little idea of how strong an impact on the nervous system is has. Doing a whole body workout of rest-pause will be too much neurally for optimal gains. Doing it three times a week is thus overkill.

330

[quote]Mondy wrote:

Due to the lack of equipment I use a makeshift rack from stepper blocks, is a 2inch drop (one stepper block) every 3 weeks too much? When I dropped it by two inches my 1rm dropped by 27pounds! (359 to 332), perhaps I should do a drop every 4 weeks or so? Maybe until I build up close to my old higher pr of 359?[/quote]

2" is sub-optimal. 1" is the ideal progression in ROM. You can still get away with 2" though but there is ONE position where there is a significant drop off in strength and that is when you go from starting just below the knees. So you will have a big drop off when you first go from above the knees to below the knees as a starting position. But after that you will be able to maintain lift levels dropping every 2-3 weeks.

331

Thibs,

Thank you for the response! Iā€™ll rig something up and continue on my journey to a double bw deadlift.

Just wondering,

Do you have any drills to activate the CNS before workouts? Maybe some ā€œseizure hopsā€ and explosive pushups and pullups? I seem to have a really slow cns recovery rate, I need two days of rest after my lower body session, otherwise my weights on subsequent upper body session wont progress. Any good techniques or tips to speed it up? Due to financial reasons I canā€™t afford any powerdriveā€¦ The product is very well priced but the shipping costs nearly as much as the product.

332

Thib,

What do you think is more optimal when doing a powerlift trice a week: use heavy/med/light approach, or go heavy every time, but lower volume, e.g.:

1/week : 3x3 @ 90%
3/week : 2x2 @ 90% each day

and another quick question : I used your 1-2-3 ramp method and it felt great, but I was able to use only around 85% - is it satisfactory?

333

[quote]Thy. wrote:
Thib,

What do you think is more optimal when doing a powerlift trice a week: use heavy/med/light approach, or go heavy every time, but lower volume, e.g.:

1/week : 3x3 @ 90%
3/week : 2x2 @ 90% each day

and another quick question : I used your 1-2-3 ramp method and it felt great, but I was able to use only around 85% - is it satisfactory?[/quote]

I modified the ramps and actually dropped the set of 2ā€¦ so itā€™s basically 1 x 1, 1 x 3, go up in weight, 1x1, 1x3, go up in weight, 1x1, 1x3, etc.

The set of two really didnā€™t contribute much to the activation phenomenon and created too much fatigue.

334

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
matt_t2004 wrote:
Hi coach, I am starting to do some mma, and am needing a little help on training. I want start emphasizing my explosive power and strength, but also need to work on my conditioning as well. I do not believe in doing cardio as a main system of conditioning as I will not be running in the middle of the ring.

So I was planning on doing some metabolic and plyometric stuff on 2-3 days out of the week (for conditioning). That leaves 2-3 days out of the week to focus on power and strength. What would be a good split that could incorporate all of this in a weeks time? Also should I be using para workout nutrition for mma practice? Thanks for any help.

Go easy on the plyo, while effective they can get very stressful on the CNS and joints. Also understand that metabolic days and power/strength workouts are both stressful on the nervous system, but for different reasons.

Metabolic work that increases lactate production disrupt the neuromuscular connection at the neuromuscular junction while power/strength training has more of a central impact. But the point is that both are hard on the CNS.

I do not like having more than 3-4 CNS-intensive sessions per week, therefore 3 metabolic days and 3 strength/power days would likely be excessive, especially if you perform MMA on top of that.

A better solution would be to do the metabolic work at the end of the strength/power workouts.

For example:

DAY 1. WHOLE BODY STRENGTH AND POWER
At the end perform metabolic work involving the whole body

DAY 2. Low-intensity auxiliary work (abs, forearms, grip, lower back)

DAY 3. LOWER BODY STRENGTH AND POWER
At the end of the workout perform metabolic work involving the lower body only

DAY 4. UPPER BODY STRENGTH AND POWER
At the end of the workout perform metabolic work for the upper body

Monday: Day 1
Tuesday: Day2
Wednesday: OFF
Thursday: Day 3
Friday: OFF
Saturday: Day 4
Sunday: OFF[/quote]

Do you think it would be ok to set up my strength workouts in the morning and do the metabolic workouts in the evening? I remember seeing that you thought splitting workouts into AM and PM workouts was always better, but i wasnt for sure if this applie to these type workouts or not.

Also I have been noticing in practice that my arm and grip strength is sub par, and I really need to work on that. Any advice on this would be great as well. Thanks CT.

335

[quote]matt_t2004 wrote:

Do you think it would be ok to set up my strength workouts in the morning and do the metabolic workouts in the evening? I remember seeing that you thought splitting workouts into AM and PM workouts was always better, but i wasnt for sure if this applie to these type workouts or not.

Also I have been noticing in practice that my arm and grip strength is sub par, and I really need to work on that. Any advice on this would be great as well. Thanks CT.
[/quote]

Yes, doing the metabolic work as a separate session would work well. There are very few exceptions where twice-a-day arenā€™t superior provided that the total daily workload isnā€™t increased too much.

Keven (one of the test sujects for or new protocol) is a forearm freak, he wants oversized bowling pins! So I have him do staggered forearm work: between sets of his normal exercises he performs a set of forearm work. Either Thorā€™s hammer, wrist curl, wrist roller or ironmind captain of crush gripped.

336

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
BBriere wrote:
I was going to start a 3 day a week full body routine based on rest-pause training. Should I mainly concentrate on using about a 6RM or is it ok to drop down to maybe a 10RM on one day? I didnā€™t know if dropping weight would dramatically reduce the effect of the training.

Listen, other coaches will have different opinions. This is just what is my current belief:

  • Sets below 80% of your max are not heavy enough to maximize the benefits of rest-pause training. So a starting weight of lower than our 6RM is likely to be sub-optimal.

  • Rest-pause is WAY more powerful than what most people think. Even its greater proponents have little idea of how strong an impact on the nervous system is has. Doing a whole body workout of rest-pause will be too much neurally for optimal gains. Doing it three times a week is thus overkill.[/quote]

Thanks Coach. I had one more quick question. I noticed in your body transformation series you used the OVT which is a split routine. Do you think you could get the same results with full body training? Iā€™m trying to clean up my diet taking in carbs at breakfast and post workout, but I find that training 4 to 5 days a week is too fatiguing.

337

Thib,
Do you still believe in ā€œmirror trainingā€ as outlined in one of your older articles?
As recent articles indicate, you prefer to keep intensive low-rep sets even on deload, but cut volume instead.
Do you see any reason for a strength athlete to go higher reps than 5 and lower load than 80% any time of the year?

338

Coach I know you are coming up with a great new plan but if you could give a hierarchy of most important Biotest products what would they be?

Present training goals are to get to 8% BF and I am at 10% and then slowly work in carbs. I donā€™t tolerate them well. I train in the 3-8 reps range 4-5 days week pairing antagonist together with primarily compound movements.

PS: I know Flameout and Superfood should be a mainstay and I always include them any other suggestions for someone on a budget or do we wait until the new program?

Thanks

339

[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:

Keven (one of the test sujects for or new protocol) is a forearm freak, he wants oversized bowling pins! So I have him do staggered forearm work: between sets of his normal exercises he performs a set of forearm work. Either Thorā€™s hammer, wrist curl, wrist roller or ironmind captain of crush gripped.[/quote]

Thib,

With staggered work, do you select one forearm movement per session to focus on or do you sometimes have the staggered sets coming from multiple choices? e.g. Thorā€™s Hammer throughout the session vs. something like Thorā€™s Hammer for a few sets, grippers for a few sets, etc.

Do you find that pinch grip exercises can be of value in the quest for forearm size or are they mostly going to increase strength but do not possess the potential for hypertrophy like the choices you listed?

On one quick side note, the son of a friend of mine will be getting into training with us for the first time this Summer. Being new to training, is it possible that including some dedicated grip work right from the start can help to ensure that grip is rarely the limiting factor that it is for most over the course of his lifting career?

340

[quote]ThorsHammer wrote:
Christian Thibaudeau wrote:

Keven (one of the test sujects for or new protocol) is a forearm freak, he wants oversized bowling pins! So I have him do staggered forearm work: between sets of his normal exercises he performs a set of forearm work. Either Thorā€™s hammer, wrist curl, wrist roller or ironmind captain of crush gripped.

Thib,

With staggered work, do you select one forearm movement per session to focus on or do you sometimes have the staggered sets coming from multiple choices? e.g. Thorā€™s Hammer throughout the session vs. something like Thorā€™s Hammer for a few sets, grippers for a few sets, etc. [/quote]

To be quite honest I simply rotate through the various exercises. I might pick the Thors hammer between sets of my first exercise, wrist roller between sets of the second exercise and grippers between sets of the third exercise. I do not have a specific plan, its just bonus work.

[quote]ThorsHammer wrote

Do you find that pinch grip exercises can be of value in the quest for forearm size or are they mostly going to increase strength but do not possess the potential for hypertrophy like the choices you listed? [/quote]

An exercise devoid of dynamic work is less effective at stimulating growth. However it an still have a positive impact if the sets are long enough (20-30 seconds) but not too long (means that its too light).

However pinch gripping will target more the fingers than the forearms per se, doesnā€™t mean that its a bad exercise, just that you shouldn;t expect it to contribute that much to forearms size.

[quote]ThorsHammer wrote
On one quick side note, the son of a friend of mine will be getting into training with us for the first time this Summer. Being new to training, is it possible that including some dedicated grip work right from the start can help to ensure that grip is rarely the limiting factor that it is for most over the course of his lifting career? [/quote]

Yes, Iā€™ve worked with numerous athletes who were born on farms and did a lot of manual labor as kids and their grip strength was always much higher, relatively speaking, that the main pulling muscles.