Maintaining

I had wondered if anybody had tried these guidelines-especially the way DMA so clearly laid them out. Good to hear, congratulations!

thats a great job 90-95% ill take that anytime, i may have to give that a try (3x3xx80%). this is what i did last year but it only allowed me to run fast at the very end instead of the whole season.

week 1: 80x3 82x3 82x3 85x2
week 2:80x3 82x3 88x2 90x2
week 3: 80x3 82x3 82x3 82x3
week 4: 82x3 88x2 90x2 95x2
week 5: 80x3 82x3 82x2 85x2
week 6: 82x2 88x2 92x2 100x2
week 7: 2x2
week 8: 2x2

hey do we suppose to use a flat of 80% or take ur 3rm and divide by 1.2

I used 80% just because that’s the number that got thrown around alot when discussing Maintenance weights. Earlier in this thread David W says “3x3 @80%” for example.

It worked for me anyways.

my bad i did the math not that big of a diff for me 80 vs 77%

I did it pretty much as DMA summarized-he took my posts and posted them in a way that was probably easier to read-if you got a 3rm I would divide by the 1.2 he lists rather than just 80% as you point out below not a great deal of difference but I would personally opt for the slightly lower % you indicate-77%.

I did not taper as rapidly as he did but what I did with most athletes depending upon at what point we finished max strength relative to the end of the season. This as a few of the athletes were competing another month beyond some of the others. If I was doing a 7 wk main. phase as he outlined, I would probably have week three as 3 x 2 instead of 2x2 and then drop a set in week four.

do u think 77% is enough weight to maintain max strength?? do u do bp and pc and if so, did you use the same rep/set setup?

Yes, if the strength work is being done in the presence of other training elements. If you are only strength training and are trying to achieve a strength rebound via maintenance work I would think you could go 77 to 80%. Also, with strength training only I would include an extra set at the top -i.e. 4x2 instead of 3x2.

We used the same numbers for bp, bs, and pc/clean pull/or mid-thigh pull.

For athletes in sports with numerous training elements track,football, etc. I think those numbers will work out very well just be sure to use compen. acc. I used to tell the athletes once into the maintenance phase(though they should always endeavor to move the weights up quickly) that if the weight feels light(relatively speaking)-to show it, accelerate maximally. Originally I picked some of those numbers based upon how CF brought down his main. wts. in comparison to the max. #'s and then adjusted very slightly after based upon how many of the athletes responded over a number of track seasons.

just curious why use these numbes with clean or snatch since they dont wear the body like squats do? do u think u could still hit the bp heavy as normal since it dont drain the body as much?

If you look at the training of olympic lifters to gain insight as to why they do what they do, you see that the majority of their rep numbers are singles and doubles. This is true for snatches and cleans(some triples as well) due to the high technical demands of the lifts and keeping the rep numbers very low helps to develop efficiency that higher numbers would likely not. This, where fatigue could likely make a rep a bit sloppy when getting to higher numbers-even four to five reps with moderate to moderately heavy weights.

An occasional heavy bp(as used by CF) to stimulate up to (I think) 35% of the body’s mu’s without generally fatiguing the muscles used in the sprint could be okay. I have wondered, in the past, if a heavy pull up or db/bb row could be used occasionally in much the same way.

In general, though, I personally would not deviate much from those numbers-not sure what your goals are or what you are training for.

I’d like to add that if you are sprinting and using the weights to supplement your training in the presence of many other training components stay with the DMA list. The only major deviation being if you are completing the max strength further out than the 7 weeks he outlined as that was just an example. Trust the numbers and remember that your other training elements, sprints/plyos will go a long way towards assisting you in not only maintaining your strength but achieving a strength rebound. Of course, more importantly, you should achieve a new peak in power output if you periodize the other components correctly.

what u guys think bout david w main phase:

Maintenance: Repeat to season end

The target competition should fall within four weeks of initiating the maintenance phase (beyond that strength, and therefore track performance, will decline)

Clean
5x2r @ 80%
5x1r @ 90%

Squat
4x3r @ 85% 3RM
3r @ 85% 3RM

Bench
4x3r @ 85% 3RM
3r @ 85% 3RM

ok it seem like it did a good job maintaining ur strength, what bout ur performance while on this cycle?

During this cycle, I’d say I was jumping 5-10% higher on my dunks which were the only quantifiable activities I was doing during that time. I was doing some dunks that I haven’t done since high school, etc. And doing them much more consistently too.

My standing jump didn’t improve much if anything.