Westside Questions II

Training Bodybuilding
41

Don’t recalculate your numbers until your done with a cycle. If your just starting out, then I’d play around with DE days to figure out what percentage works for you while your keeping fast still. They say 40% + mini band on DE bench, but I’ve recently changed to %46 and am just as fast to my lockout point.

For ME bench days … your working your lockout. Which is tricep lockout powah! haha.

ME bench movements are listed in the Eight Keys articles here on t-mag, but there are a few:

board presses

floor presses
pin presses
reverse band presses
incline close grip (I like thse w/ chains)

42

For the people like Glute out there who are worried about overtraining the CNS by performing PRs every week: don’t worry about it.

Even if you’re not someone who’s well-suited to powerlifting like Goldie or Steve, you can do this without experiencing problems. As I’ve mentioned many times before, I’m a 41 years old ectomorph, and I’ve been doing just what Goldie suggested above for about a month and a half now, and it’s been working great. Example: yesterday was a ME Bench day. Last week I got a 5 kilo PR on the “regular” bench; yesterday, I did rack lockouts and got a 5 kilo PR there as well. Easily. So I loaded another 5 kilos on the bar and missed. (But I strained!)

Rotating your ME exercises works as Westside says it’ll work. Which leads us into a very murky area of “what does it mean when you say that you’re ’ working the CNS’”…but I’ll leave that for another thread.

One thing that I have noticed is that about every four weeks or so I have a bad week (not just one workout) and will have to do two things. One, I change my exercises up. This is recommended by Westside. Two, I use CP’s idea of reducing the volume by about half for all of my supplementary exercises. Although this is not something that Westside promotes, it allows me to recover better and may be one of those areas where those of us who are less pre-disposed to powerlifting have to make some allowances. At least, that’s what it looks like to me at this point.

43

Just a quick question; whats the difference between a squat and deadlift suit? They look the same.

44

Man, I don’t look at this thread for half a damn day and there’s so much stuff to talk about…

Anyway, here’s what I have in no particular order:

1)chrismcl…drive your traps, shoulders, and neck into the bench properly like we talked about and your back shouldn’t come up off of the bench. In any case, I think you could probably stand to add a little bit of weight to the bar on your DE day from what I observed a few weeks back…

2)Big Martin…I love the Metal briefs that I have. Just call or write Dave to check out whether or not the IPF squatter is USAPL legal. Sometimes if you catch Dave at a down time you can end up chatting with him for quite awhile and discuss some cool stuff.

3)Patricia, you could post it in both places for all I care. Let it be known that I am not a self-proclaimed expert on equipment, but rather just try to absorb as much as I can from the guys who have been in this game for years and years (who DO know their shit better than almost anyone).

Oh, and about the sticking point and speed issue…I agree that speed work is obviously in order, and that some speed pulls once a week is a great idea. I don’t know how crazy I am about the “pulling against the pins” idea, especially if your problem lies in speed issues. In all honesty, it’s tough to make any recommendations without seeing you actually perform the lift, but if you’re dying at the knees, you probably just need to keep beating the hell out of your lower back and abs.

4)Char, Westside certainly does promote taking “down time” when necessary. Cybernetic periodization is the term Dave likes to use to describe one of the facets of Westside; it is essentially another way of saying “training on instinct”, which, for many, is a load of shit, but for vets like yourself is perfectly legit. When you feel that bad week coming on, take down the volume a bit if need be.

You’re right on track with things, Char…

45

chrismcl, the cut and design are slightly different (no shit, Steve)…I know, shitty explanation, but it’s different from brand to brand so going into much more detail might be useless.

Many people prefer to pull in their squat suit, so, for some, they are one and the same.

46

Wow, I just spent like 3 hours reading Louie’s articles on Elitefts. My brain is fried.

Steve, so should I drive my feet into the ground just enough to keep my neck and traps on the bench without having my ass come off?

47

This is one point I have never understood about westside. I bench 2x weekly, heavy (80+% irm), plus one lighter for speed work. I dont overtrain. I dont sleep that well (work nightsn and doing research durign hte day).
I dont consider myself freakish in anyway.
How does changing from maximum floor press, to maximum 3board press change the overall loading onto the CNS?

48

The conjugate method uses special exerscices that will increase awarness and cordination. Its pourpouses are to raise the classical lifts. Think about this if you go 80% of your max bench that means that you are stimualting your chest,tris,delts all with 80%.well you continue to do this week after week you will alwys train your chest,tris,and delts the primary movers in the bench at 80%. This fucks you in a couple ways. A. you never learn how to strain. B. You use less MU activity each week, that means less muscle fibers will fire. C. you give no special attention to the primary movers D. you neglect your weak points. They say a max bench takes 3 seconds to complete, well with 80% you strain for about 1.5 seconds, and if you do 3 reps you still are not straining per lift for any where near 3 seconds. So at 80% your getting understimualed and you cns grows used to it. Now Look at it like this…if you use 100% or more every week with the bench your progress will go down. YOu are stressing your primary movers at diffrent percents. Say your max bench is 300 pounds and you max out on it each week…well your chest can hnadle 285 but your delts can handle the 300 and your triceps are just strong enough to lock out the 300, so tell me how bencing 300 every week is going to make your tris able to lock out 350, or get your delts up to 310??? So now this is where the conjugae method comes in handy here is a example.
on week 1 for max effort work you are going to train the lock out primary mover tris for 100% plus with 4 board presses so this week you are taking a big load off the chest and delts. So now the tris are going to go over 100% and get stronger. Now on week 2 you are going to do reverse band press wich will bring in the delts and chest into play with over 100% and they get stronger. It will also work the tris but with less that your 100% lock out so now you are not frying your whole primary movers in 1 movement like you would do with max regular benches… Hope this clears some shit up its not real scientific but it shows how the conjugate method works…good luck Big Martin.

49

Martin,

Good reply. Just curious how you cycle your ME bench lifts? I like how you mentioned start your phase week 1 w/ board presses to simply concentrate on the tris, then reverse band presses the next week to incorporate the delts. Good stuff. I’ve always picked movements out of a hat type of thing.

Also, any particular way you cycle your ME squat/dl lifts?

…

I just ordered a z suit for my de squat day … pretty pumped!

Next week I’ll be max’n out again, and I’ll make sure I post results. I have a feeling I’m going to shock a few people with my deadlift and squat from my previous maxxes. Hopefully I shock myself as well :slight_smile:

50

Landon- Well I wouldnt sy I have a exact cycle or plan when it comes to particualr Max effort exerscices per week, but I do select the movement or range of motion. With my bench I alternate from a full range movement to a lock out movement each week. And my accessoy is the opposite of the main movement for 5x5 or 3x3. So a 4 week cycle would go like this…
week 1- max eff. lock out movement 4 board press
asseccory- Incline dumbell presses 5x5
week 2- Full range max eff movement reverse band press
assecory- Lock out 5 board presses 5x5
week 3 - lock out max eff movment- floor press
assecory- Full range steep close grip decline press5x5
week 4- full range max effort movement shirt work off 1-2-3 boards
assecory- 6 board presses for 5x5 or 3x3

Thats how i cylce my bench work… I dont know the exact exerscice I am going to do when I get to the gym, I pick the one I am in the mood for (well my training partner is), but we do know that the week will provide the range of motion.

My max effort squat and dead work is simple it goes in 3 weeks cycles, week 1- a low box squat, week 2- a deadlift, week 3- a good morning. we dont pick the exrscice untill we get to the gym.
we select one of the hybrid movements. so for example-
week 1 - safety squat bar 12 inch low box squats
week 2- reverse band sumo deadlifts
week 3- good morning squats

we dont care what kind of assecory work we do on this day as long as it is heavy 5x5 or 3x3 and hits the low back, hamstrings, and glutes. We also do a lot of low intensity stuff for our posterior chain in warm ups for gpp…
hope this helps and good luck Big martin

51

Cool, bm. Good shit. Thanks.

52

Martin,

You feel accessory work with a 5x5 or a 3x3 rep/set scheme works the best for you? I’ve recently switched to a lower rep and more sets w/ my accessory. Hopefully this will help better.

Thanks for your insights.

53

big martin has been a great addition to this thread. I dont know if you saw or not but i used the IPF squatter in my last meet.

54

Landon- This has made a huge diffrence in my training. It has helped me gain mass, bring up my work capcity, and get me stronger. I personally have had great luck with the reverse work out, using my warm up for gpp. I like to do all my low intensity assistance work in my warm up. This way I can bang out 1 or 2 heavy assitance lifts and give them the remaining amount of concentration and effort. Also I work up to my assitance work as this helps bring up work capacity. SO say I am going to do 3x3 on 5 board presses after my dyanmic work out and I want to use 405, Well I work up to the 405 for example I will do 3x185, 3x225, 3x315,3x3405, this is what has worked well for me. Good Luck Big martin

55

Goldberg - Thanks for the compliment. I am going to order the metal IPF approved gear in a few Days. Hope I get the same great results you are getting out of them. Good luck Big martin

56

[quote]. Hope this clears some shit up its not real scientific but it shows how the conjugate method works…[/quote]I know how the conjugate methods work, I have been reading about it waaaay before elite fitness was even online (from plusa)
I have never seen any comments from anyone that shows how changing one neurally taxing lift for another neurally taxing lift stops CNS strain.

57

On max effort day the entire volume consists of unidirectional loading. One training workout con?tributes to the next. Keep in mind that if you train a lift at 90% or more for more than 3 weeks, your central nervous system is negatively and your progress will go backward. But by switching exercises each week (for the high-level lifter), you can use 100% and more each week. The sequence of exercises you use does not matter, as long as the load is maximahttp://www.elitefts.com/documents/conjugate-method.html.
Louie Simmons.

58

When training using the max effort method, the central nervous system inhibition is reduced. Thus the max number of motor units are activated with optimal discharge frequency (Zatsiorisky). The one drawback to using this method is that you can’t train with weights above 90 percent RM for much longer than three weeks before the nervous system begins to weaken. When this happens your strength will begin to diminish.

This is one of the major reasons why progressive overload will only work for so long. With this in mind, Westside set out to find a way around this three-week barrier. The way to overcome this barrier is to switch the exercises used for the max effort method every one to three weeks. This keeps the body fresh so the method can be used year round.

Dave Tate-Periodization Bible II.

59

Certain specific research has shown that overtraining (as an aspect of CNS overtraining) can be achieved with daily workouts with 100%1rm.
I know several people who have trained >90% for weeks on end (aim to over-reach) and performed excellently on the platform.
And I have yet to see any research that changing the exercise will reduce CNS strain. True it will have a different neural pattern, but the overall loading on the CNS will be the same.
Not that it makes much difference in the end, as the program works. But I am just interested in the research side of things.

60

i understand the concept of constantly rotating ME lifts, but I read in one of the Westside articles that they do GMs about 70% of the time for their ME squat and deadlift day. I’m also following the introductory Westside program that Dave Tate wrote, and it has GMs for 6 weeks. Is this simply the because inexperienced power lifters need to take time to really develop the ability to do GMs properly, and they aren’t even close to maxing out on them? Or is it something else?