I have been training for 7 years now. I have been very consistant, lifting 3-4 days per week, although I have not seen an increase in my bench press in nearly 2 years. I have increased my squat by 50 pounds and my clean by 30 in that same time. I bench press twice per week and do legs 2x week also.
I would like to know what I should concentrate on in terms of workout strategy. I go until failure on almost every set of bench/dips/triceps/squats etc.
Ever since I hit that plateau, I just tried to just blast through it by going extremely hard. My question is, Is that the correct way to train? I eat well, I usually eat quite a bit. I have not gained much wait, however. I would like to know what kind of workout is best for breaking through a plateau? Should I continue to go really hard all the time, or should I try “planned undertraining” as in ‘leaving reps in the tank’? Or is it a matter of me just needing to consume more and more calories? Like 6000 a day…
I would like to do anything I can that would increase my strength without hurting my speed. (Its winter, and since my sport is football I have to get my whole body stronger, so I need to increase my strength, not just my speed)
In my groups of athletes, they usually see a nice “unexpected” jump in bench strength after doing about 3-4 weeks of sprints of less than 40m in length
Going to failure is not required on all sets.
Do you periodize your weights? ie, 12reps for say 6wks, 8reps for 4wks, 5 reps for 2, 2 reps for 1-2wks. That type of thing, not necessarily that exact wks or reps by any stretch of the imagination.
Do you do weights for mass or strength only?
Do you incorporate weights training and Speed training in the same day?
eg - Mon = weights and speed, tue = game practice drills, wed = weights n speed etc etc
Or do you do it like eg, Mon = weights, Tue = speed, wed = weights, thur = speed etc etc.
6000 Calories!! How big are you?
How many grames of Protein per day are you taking in?
Scrap the burnouts and training to failure. You’ll make better gains, long term, by training within your capacity. Stay sub-maximal and only push the weights occasionally. By push I mean you work nearly to your limit (at times-not all of the time is pushing to even this degree a good idea) but you still have a rep or so left. That’s not to say don’t work hard but killing yourself repeatedly with sets to failure is a good way to stall progress. You have to trust that this works and that’s why so many people quit making gains-they fear if they don’t pound the muscle into submission, they won’t make gains. Quite the opposite is true.
If your planning is effective/realistic, you’ll rarely, if ever, miss reps and as a result, you’ll make much better gains long term.
Also, if you choose to split the weights into upper/lower, it’s probably better to put the sprint work WITH the lower body work and put the UB training on the non speed days. I prefer to put all of the weights on the speed day but I know people who get fine results with the Speed/LB and tempo/UB set-up. Otherwise, I think your legs will never receive adequate recovery.
Do you find it very difficult to sprint after a heavy squat workout? To me that means one of two things: you are either a) lifting how you mentioned- not lifting to failure= thus allowing more energy for sprinting or b) in good enough condition to do a sprint workout after a difficult leg strength workout…?
I have heard a lot about “reps in the tank” weight lifting. And you’re right, I was always afraid to really try it- for fear of just wasting my time. I think Im ready to give it a serious Go.
Could i ask you how you would suggest a workout regimine?
For instance: (keep in mind, i am working for Strength and Size, and speed as much of all of it as possible…)
Monday/Thursday Upper Body
Incline bench DB: 4x8
Flat bench: 4x6 (with weight I can do 8 times?)
dips, triceps, push-ups… auxillary lifts-- not to failure…?
Tuesday/Friday Lower body
Parallel squat: 4x6 (with weight I can do 8 times?)
step ups, split squats, lunges, one leg squats… auxillary lifts-- not to failure…?
+speed, although, during the winter i am trying to concentrate on strength and have not done much speed/sprints/plyos
I’m coaching but the sprinting always takes place before the lifting UNLESS it is done as a split as in morning lifting and sprinting in the afternoon. The typical CF recommendation is at least 4-5 hours between sessions. Otherwise, the best option is to sprint/mb throws/plyos and lift afterwards since the lifting is there to help the sprinting and not the other way around in our case since we have sprinters/hurdlers/jumpers.
Also, due to weight room restrictions (too small to accomodate an entire team) we have to go with a morning group to lift and sprint in the afternoon and another group to sprint and lift afterwards in the afternoon. If I had the proper facility, I’d have everyone sprint first and lift after though the option we have to use with some seems to work fine.
I understand the wanting it all mentality and you can certainly achieve improvements in most areas but you cannot maximize everything at once. You have to go with optimal levels of each. So if sprinting is the priority, and I’m assuming it is, you can only gain but so much at the same time in those other areas but you can still make improvements in many capacities.
On your UB session, where is the back work? I see a great deal of pressing movements and that is necessary but I think you need to balance out the work you do and provide some stimulation for the upper back- pulling actions. Pull-ups, chin-ups, bb or db rows.
You could use some total body pulls as well such as cleans, clean pulls, mid thigh pulls, deadlifts and some low back/hamstring intensive work such as RDL’s, hypers, glute-ham raises, reverse hypers etc. Note that I’m not advocating you do all of this at one time but you include some of it at any given time.
It looks like you do too much pressing and too much direct leg work with very little work done on the upper back, lower back or hamstrings (other than the involvement in the exercises you have listed by those muscle groups).
If you are a sprinter, then you need to be doing some amount of sprint work and plyos nearly year around.
I think you need to look into purchasing some of Charlie’s products. I have many of them and highly recommend his works but you will need to learn much of the basics. I hope you understand I’m not trying to rip on you but it would be very useful if you saw how he lays out a training program. This would be helpful so you have a better understanding of the interplay between the various training components.
Don’t get caught up in using the same sets/reps for exercises nor the same exercises year round. That will also lead to plateauing.
I do UB back and bicep work too, I just didn’t feel i needed to mention it. I have improved in weight in rows, pull downs, pull ups, shoulders etc.
I mainly just squat heavy and then lunges/step ups, one-leg squats, cleans, glute ham raise. I find plenty of stuff to do to supplement my squatting- and that hasn’t been a real problem.
Well, if you mention what kind of work you are doing to show what your program looks like, I would think it would be important to point that out too(the upper back work) since the omission, in my mind anyway, demonstrated some important aspects to pass along. No problem though.
Regarding biceps they will certainly be affected by the back work so no need to do any isolation movements-IMO. The same goes for triceps movements, if you are doing a significant amount of pressing and it looks like you are, you are unlikely to need any isolation movements.
Don’t just think of the other lifts to supplement your squat, think of the influence or effect that each can have in their own way on your general strength and power. Also, each movement likely has an effect on your sprinting and jumping performances.
If you are a sprinter, I think you need to make sure you have sprinting and most likely plyos and med ball throws in the program for the majority of the year. I, personally, think it’s a mistake to just lift and then bring in the sprint work later.
Maybe it’s just a case where it’s not very clear what your goals are. I understand you want everything but there absolutely have to be some compromises when you are engaging in various types of training-sprinting, plyos, lifting etc. Then again, if you are going long stretches with lifting only there won’t be too much of a strength power compromise from the weights themselves as you’ll just need to you have enough intensity and set/rep variation and changing some of the exercises in your programming to elicit long term improvements. This goes back to the previous post about being realistic about what you can do and planning to the point where you rarely if ever miss reps-avoidance of the training to failure mentality. If that is the case, though, and you are lifting the majority of the year and not sprinting, in a relative sense, all that much during the year, I would think that reaching your potential in the sprints would be more limited.
What about a total body pulling movement as mentioned earlier? I see you do cleans but where are they in program (order or sequenced within a workout) and are they a regular part of your program or are you doing them more as an assistance ex.?
I am finished with my track career, but i still play football and want to increase my speed. However, I need to gain strength and mass as well, and thought it would be best to concentrate on that during the winter, and then during the spring I will start doing speed/agility/plyos. Then, during the summer- intensify the speed/agility/plyos and cut back on the weights. Then during the month of july, I plan to eliminate all lower body weightlifting and focus on speed.
I have experimented with this stategy during my high school senior year of track. I thought i made tremendous gains in my sprint times once I eliminated all lower body strength training.
So, by doing that in july, i hoped i could really improve my speed, while still maintaining most of the strength i had accumulated over the spring and summer.
One thing to say right off the bat is you should not eliminate all lower body work from the training. Certainly reducing the volume and/or intensity (and possibly frequency) would be a good idea but if you don’t continue to do some lower body work, IMO, your power will start to decrease at a higher rate due the lack of strength maintenance work than it would with the inclusion of such training.
I would say with regards to the lifting in the winter that you would still likely be better off by doing at least a small volume of sprint work and plyos during phases of even a strength power focus. This is the concept of vertical integration. I don’t see a problem with a month or so of weights but some speed work (even in the form of hills) done more year around would likely be a better idea.
I would venture to say that if you were doing sprint work over a longer period of time than to just bring into the training later, your opportunity for greater speed development will be increased over performing the training serially. Vertical integration.
I can’t recommend CF’s works enough to achieve a better understanding of these concepts.