When I’m in the gym I often see local ‘weeners’ training. Most of their sessions start with 4+ high rep sets to, and beyond, failure on the bench. Then they’ll move the pins and follow up with 4 sets of incline. Then, just as I’m thinking, ‘that’s rather excessive’, they’ll move the pins yet again and do military press! Now these guys are 10 stone wet through and have a max bench of 60k
An example exchange:
Me: How many sets did you do on the bench
Weener: 4
Me: Why didn’t you do 12?
Weener: …because that’s too much
I often play the same game with Olympic lifters:
Me: How many sets did you do of cleans
Lifter: 6x2r
Me: Why didn’t you do 12 sets?
Lifter: Too much
Me: What are you doing next
Lifter: Clean pulls: 6x3r
The question of how best to include both technical lifts and pulls is an issue I’ve given significant thought to. The exercise that is performed second will always suffer from any residual fatigue caused by the first. One possible solution is to alternate cleans with pulls (at plus 10%). My experience with this approach however, is a breakdown in timing and efficiency of the technical lift. Instead here are some guidelines as to total pulling volumes at >80% per session:
Low: <10 reps
Moderate: 10 – 20 reps
High: >20 reps
I have found pulls useful to maintain total volume in the moderate range as technical lift volumes decrease and intensify. In my programs only two sessions per 4 week cycle fall into the low volume catagory whilst none fall in the high volume catagory!