Program Chatter 2: Where we leave our favorite tool at home.

Welcome to the second edition of Program Chatter! This is our ongoing series talking about programs we’re creating for athletes. I’ll shoot you straight: I love the barbell. Squats, deadlifts, bench, cleans, snatches, jerks. It’s such a simple and effective tool for creating positive physical and mental adaptations. So what do we do when that tool isn’t in the athlete toolbox or goals for the time being? We work without it. So lets talk about this program:

Athlete 1

Background Info:

25 year old female, ~75 kg. 2 years of crossfit, 2 years of weightlifting experience, but hasn’t trained consistently in about 1 year. She has tracked macros for 3 years. History of wrist pain that has improved with extensor strengthening and shoulder stability work in past. History of back pain that has improved with core/hamstring strengthining in the past. S

Goals

Short term: 5 dips, 5 pullups.

Long term: Lose 6 more lbs very gradually, get better at bodyweight movements like: 10 pullups, 10 dips, 10 pistol squats each leg. Return to regular strength training.

Roadblocks:

To quote the athlete she is struggling because: “Being lazy, not wanting to spend the money.” Upon further questioning it was, the gym she would like to go to is about a 20-30 minute drive from her house and the opposite direction of her work. She’s also saving for her first home purchase so she’s trying not to spend a lot on gym memberships. She does have a membership at a facility slightly closer that doesn’t have barbells or gymnastics rings, but it is closer and available so that’s where we’ll start. To me that doesn’t come acrossed as someone who is lazy, but as someone struggling to balance new priorities with old passions, so we’re going to write a plan that is simple, time effective, and can be done when she has time for it.

Plan Outline

So with improving bodyweight movements, we want to build general strength because it will be easier to do a pistol squat if your legs are stronger, and specific strength because even if you’re legs are very strong your balance can still be terrible. What this works out to will be breaking the movements down into specific components to work on what the athlete is struggling with, and coupling that with general pressing. pulling, lunging to build general strength. Our schedule is going to include 4 training sessions per week to start to allow her time to build her work capacity back up. Lets outline an example below:

Day 1 (upper body)

1. 12 minute EMOM. Minute 1: Bench Dips x 10. Minute 2: 3 count eccentric Pullup x 5 (jump asssist if needed).

2. 4 Supersets of 5 DB Shoulder, 8 Lat Pulldowns

3. 4 RFT: 12 pushups, 12 ring rows, 50 m farmer carry.

4. 15 rounds of: 30 seconds fast, 30 seconds moderate on exercise bike

   Day 2 (Lower Body)

   1. Pistol squat to bench - 4 sets of 10 each leg

   2. 4 Supersets of: 10 DB russian Step ups each leg, 10 Hip thrust

   3. 4 RFT: 10 KB Swing, 15 V-Ups, 25 m walking lunge

   4. 2000 m row

Day 3 (upper body)

1. 3 rounds: Max Rep Dips, 60 second plank

2. 3 Rounds: Max Rep Pullups, 30 second side plank each side

3. Superset of 5 DB shoulder Press, 8 DB row each arm

4. Bike 3 miles for time.

   Day 4 (Lower Body)

   1. 3 Rounds of 5 Self assissted pistols quats each leg

   2. 3 Rounds: 10 Reverse Lunges each leg, 10 DB RDL’s, 25m Statue of Liberty carry each arm.

   3. 4 rounds: 8 Poliquin Side squats each leg, 8 Nordic Curls, 16 Med-ball deadbugs.

   4. 3x500m row. Negative split each round. 90 seconds rest between rounds.

Explanation:

So this would be our week 1. With bodyweight movements we’re going to focus on progressing to full versions of each of the movements over about 4-6 weeks depending on athlete feedback, and then progressing volume. This is a general phase to help the athlete progress at movements they’d like to improve at and build work capacity/stamina. One concept that may not be familiar to all of our readers is the negative splits on the rows on day 4. All that means is we would like each 500m to be faster than the one before it. So if your time on the first 500 m is 2:00, then your target for the second one might be 1:55, and 1:50 the third. The goal is to try to work harder as you accumulate fatigue and get tired.

So there’s our general plan for this athlete’s first week of training. If you’d like to talk more about your goals, then book a consult for free!

Program Chatter 1

Welcome to the first edition of Program Chatter! This will be an ongoing series where we discuss program design for athletes. As this is the first one, I’m just going to dive right in and start outlining the program for an athlete we recently started working with:

Athlete 1

Background Info:

30 year old male, ~100 kg bodyweight. He has been competing in weightlifting for 5 years. Career changes are making it hard for him to keep up with his current trianing schedule, so he’d like help better managing his time in the gym. He has a history of a valgus knee movement, and his lifetime squat PR is much higher than his lifetime deadlift or pull pr (630 lbs vs 500 lbs). He has ran high volume squatting protocols and pulling protocols before, has a self-reported good tolerance to volume and enjoys training often. Their quote from the intake interview is: "I hate not training for more than 3 days.”

Goals

Short term: 270 kg Olympic Total (current best is 264), 220 kg back squat, 182 kg front squat. Be able to make improvements without hip pain.

Long term: 303 kg Olympic Total, 250 kg back squat, 200 kg+ front squat.

Roadblocks:

This athlete’s main road block is schedule right now. He just started a new career meaning that his training schedule has had to change. He had been used to being able to run two a day training sessions multiple days a week, but due to the new job and life obligations that’s not really feasible right now. In addition, to reach his long term goals we’ll have to get stronger while staying injury free, which will take strategic planning to be able to do. He also has a couple of old injuries, namely: Thoracic Outlet Syndrome and a Pars Articularis fracture. Both are cleared for normal activity at this point, but will require some modifications to the overhead volume and jerk technique respectively. Due to the Pars fracture, the athlete tends to use a power jerk in competition as split jerks aggravate his back.

Plan Outline

So this plan is going to focus heavily on leg and back strength. It’s hard to improve your total after so many years in the sport without getting stronger, so our first order of business will be to put together a plan that allows the athlete to progress towards their short term strength strength goals. In particular we want to address what could be an anterior chain/posterior chain strength imbalance. Where the athlete has a history of a valgus collapse and has squatted more than he has ever pulled, those would indidcate that he tends to have more strength in his anterior chain than his posterior chain. To address this we’re going to have more volume on pulling movements and posterior chain strengthening movements than on squatting. After this first phase of training we would assess what the athlete’s needs are: technical development or continued strength gain. To that end we need to balance technique work and strength because the sport of weightlifting is heavily technique dependent. The athlete has been training continuously the past few months but struggling to make consistent progress.

We’ll start with a 6 week block of training. Our most basic micro cycle of the training plan will look like:

Push/Strength Day

• On these days the athlete will Squat, Power Jerk or Push Press, and perform accessory pressing movements.

• To address strucutral balance the athlete will perform core work focused on obliques and glute specific posterior chain exercises here.

Pull/Technique Day

• On these days the athlete will snatch, clean, and perform accessory pulling movements: Pull ups, rows, back flies etc.

• To address structural balance the athlete will perform anti-extension and more compound posterior chain extercises here.

Since those are our two basic days, from there we want to determine how many days a week the athlete can reasonably workout. In the interview they indicated they enjoy training often and that they can reasonably train 45 minutes-1 hour a day 6 days a week. Given the athletes training history, and goals, and preferences, I reccomend they start with a 6 day a week program. If adherence drops below 90% then we would scale back, but again in the interview the athlete indicated they want to train 6 days a week. They have the time, the desire and the enjoyment in training that often, so lets build an initial plan to meet that by writing out their first week:

Day 1 (Pull)

1. Snatch Lift off + Snatch Pull + Snatch, 8x1+1+2 @ 73%, EMOM

2. Clean Lift off + Clean Pull + Clean, 8x1+1+2 @ 73%, EMOM

3. Segment Clean Pull + Clean Pull, 5x1+2 @ 90% Best clean

4. Five RFT: 8 pullups, 20 m death march, 250 m row

5. Four Supersets of: 8 Seal Row, 15 Deadbugs each side

   Day 2 (Push)

   1. Pause Jerk + Jerk, 8x1+2 @ 73%., EMOM.

   2. Pause Back Squat 5x5 @ 67% Best Back Squat.

   3. Three circuits of: 8 HSPU, 20 m KB walking lunges, 40 m Single KB front rack carry (heavy)

   4. Four Super sets of: 5 Bench Press, 5 Hip Thrusts. Each as heavy as form allows. (AHAFA).

Day 3 (Pull)

1. Power Snatch from Power Position: 6x3 @ 68%.

2. Power Clean from Power Position: 6x3 @ 68%

3. Segment Snatch Pull + Snatch Pull, 5x1+2 @ 90% Best Snatch

4. Five RFT: 10 Ring Rows, 15 KB Swing, 20 Cal row

5. Four Circuits of: 8 Weighted Chin ups, 60 second weighted plank

   Day 4 (Push)

   1. Push Press @ 5x5 @ 67%.

   2. Pause Front Squat 5x5 @ 67% best front squat

   3. Four circuits of: 10 Dips, 10 Russian Step ups, 40 m Single KB overhead carry.

   4. Four Super sets: 8 Hip Thrusts @ 80%-90% Day 2 weight, 30 second J.F. side plank each side.

Day 5 (Pull)

1. Snatch: 10x1 @ 80%. EMOM.

2. Clean + Jerk: 10x1 @ 80%. EMOM.

3. Sumo Deadlift: Work to heavy set of 3, then 1x5 @ 85%H3, 1x8@75%H3.

4. Four RFT: 10 Pullups, 10 weighted back extensions, 200 m row

5. Three Supersets of: 8 DB Row each, 15 V ups.

   Day 6 (Push)

   1. Jerk: 10x1 @ 80%. EMOM.

   2. Back Squat: 7x3 @ 74%.

   3. Three circuits of: 10 DB strict Press, 10 Poliquin Side Squats per leg, 10 Toes to Bar

   4. Three Super sets of: 10 Weighted Dips, 60 second Sorenson hold.

Explanation:

So this would be a week 1 for the athletes new training cycle. each week, intensity would work up some degree and exercise selection would change as the athelete moves through the training cycle, so we start light in week 1 to allow the athlete to get used to the volume and see if there’s anything that needs to be changed before the next week. The general progression beyond just getting heavier through the training cycle is going to be: less variation in the complex on day 1, lower hang positions and less hang-powers on day 3, and less EMOM work/volume as the program in general progresses. It is a lot of accessory volume, but the athlete is on a more general phase of training, so we’re expecting to drop the accessory volume down around week 3 of the 6 week cycle. The weirdest thing we have in there is a Sumo Deadlift on day 5. Why is there a sumo deadlift on a weightlifters program? For general posterior chain strength and to address this athlete’s weaknesses. The sumo position should help strenthen the glutes and low back in general, and its a change up movement from the snatch/clean pulls the athlete is performing earlier in the week. Likely the sumo deadlifts would be replaced with a snatch or clean deadlift around week 4.

For load selection, we used a relative intensity progression. For this training phase the athlete will peak at 90% RI, but in week 1 we’ll be working from 74%RI to 80% RI. The intensity loading for the week goes: Moderate, light, heavy, so the first two days are moderate intensity and volume, the next two days are light intensity and volume, and the last two days are heavy intensity and volume. A little wave through the week like that is built in to allow the athlete chances to recover throughout the week while still being able to train often. Overall this should be an easy week of training.

Want a program that fits you? Book a free consult and we’ll see how we can help.