We are talking about the chronic tightness and inflammation in the tendon insertions and things like that.
Funny how the best weightlifter in the USA does not follow a program even remotely similar to this. He even does sets of 10 at times. The lifters in many other countries do higher rep work and pulls and presses.
Often times the people with a huge hard on for bulgarian style training are very emotionally attached to it. Good luck even discussing any other training but that with them.
I hope you are joking…
Gotta learn to work the cut… That’s the key to success in sport.
I’m only familiar with another use of the word “cut” and it doesn’t seem to apply in this situation so please enlighten me.
Tightness inflammation and issues you mention come from muscles working inappropriately (poor biomechanical position,faulty firing patterns),not from training per se.
Sub-Max training is surely more forgiving for such lack of competence,as well as a good guarantee to perform short of potential career long.
Good luck with that too.
BTW, I’m not making fun of anyone.
Uh, who knows it may take 100 attempts and maybe I’ll call it quits ; )
So you are telling me if I squat to max daily and my itb and other tendons around the knee and hip become extremely inflamed it is because muscles are not working appropriately?
Yes.That is correct.
Have you ever squatted to max daily or at least every other day?
Have seen and personally worked with athletes doing it.
Please detail.
No injuries?
Sprinters pbing…?
You feel this is the best method for strength gain?
General Organism Strength: develop strength anywhere and you develop strength everywhere. Charlie elucidated it and I have personally seen it over and over again with my athletes. It’s real.
Converse in relation to the postulate of general organism strength: the less you to everywhere the more you can do anywhere. Practically: the less multi-targeted the training, the more frequently you can load a particular stimuli; even if it is of a high CNS, neuromuscular character.
I worked with an Olympic Lifter who came to live with me for a few months. Following our time together he was invited to Abadjiev’s camp in San Francisco. While he was there I was able to get direct knowledge of Abadjiev’s tactics; at least with my guy. Interesting enough, when he eventually returned home he preferred my approach to training him and we picked up where we left off.
My point: while he was at Abadjiev’s, following a shoulder injury from snatching, Abadjiev had him perform nothing but back squats for 4 days as the main stimulus. In 4 days he performed 27 individual squat sessions at near max loads; after which he made a 20kg improvement in the squat relative to where he was at prior. Keep in mind he was already a very strong squatter having done just shy of a 3x bodyweight back squat 2 years prior to going to Abadjiev’s.
Moral of the story: there were no other conflicting demands and it is for this reason why Olympic lifters and powerlifters are able to train at relatively high intensities at high frequency’s. As soon as you enter alactic speed work into the equation, however, you will experience an entirely different result all together.
Like I said, nothing special about it. Just one method that has gotten results.
I recently resolved the symptoms you mentioned on an athlete with quadriceps massage (focused on VMO), and soft-tissue releases on glute medialis and maximus, as well as iliopsoas. It took about 45 minutes.
I know that you are capable of doing that and have had similar done to me. Sometimes simple foam-rolling if done consistently can keep that away.
But are you alluding to you training your athletes following the Bulgarian method?
Example of National caliber lifter.
Trained under a somewhat well known coach who is Bulgarian influenced basically using the same method as described by Broz. He plateaued and was constantly injured. Switches to a Chinese coach. Obviously Chinese programming has some Bulgarian elements (they may max on the classics on a weekly basis if feeling it) but it is largely Russian based and involves substantial amounts of auto-regulation based on how they feel for the day.
Many others I have talked with that experienced the same. One I know used both methods and achieved the same PR’s using both methods (Bulgarian and Russian). He was just less injured while following a Russian plan.
Again, not saying the method doesn’t work, it is obvious that it does, but why use a method with typically higher injury rates?
The injury/risk argument against it is echoed by numerous world class coaches around the globe.
I agree with you,and James,perfectly understanding the scenario you are talking about. Nevertheless: in my experience with professional athletes from many sports,injuries,injury rates,emerging limitations (maladaptive responses) in applications of max daily outputs of non-conflicting nature are primarily related to biomechanical and functional faults in the system,which create sub-optimal firing patterns and hence inflammation,starting the injury cycle,and short-cutting the recovery process in an otherwise extremely efficient training approach.
And the points worth to discuss here were originally two in my mind:
Both points proved to be very effective strategies for me with many half recovered and half nothing professional athletes who I have had the chance to work with during the last five years or so. That is the only reason why I wanted to share and discuss.
If you want to get strong fast then maxing as often as possible is hands down the best way to do it. I can say hand on heart that it is the only system that I have ever tried where I said “holy crap this actually works” and I’ve tried alot of methods.
I train with my sprint group but plan my weights on my own. They usually never lift heavier than their 5rm and wonder why their track and weight results have not budged in 3 years. We all started in the same group and now 5 years later I am squatting exactly double what three of them squat despite starting with similar squat numbers and my sprint and jump results have increased massively with the improved strength.
I weight train 3 times a week after my speed sessions and max out everytime year round. In season I keep the weights to 1-2 times per week. Maxing out is easier on my body then rep work I find and allows me to make linear progress non stop. The only time I make zero gains is when I go back to conventional methods, however this time I have learnt my lesson and will never lift sub max again. Also I dont buy the injury thing, I’ve never had a knee/back injury in my life, maybe if I was maxing out on snatch and Clean&J 3 times a day I might have some pain.
If it is in fact true that you perform maximal attempts 1-3 times a week throughout the entire year as a sprinter then you must consider yourself highly fortunate to remain injury free and in possession of extraordinary CNS stress tolerance and somatotpye which renders you extraordinarily durable. It is individuals in possession of your traits who were the most successful in Abadjiev’s system.
The pertinent question, however, is what are your current best lifts, 100m PR, and at what bodyweight?
For someone to perform regular sprint training 2-3 times per week and max the weights every session (1-3x per week) they would, in my view, have to be:
i have a couple hair splitting questions for you guys regarding squatting (or any lift in general i suppose)
First of all, I understand weights are “general”
My first question regards breathing. When you’re squatting and performing sets of 2 or more reps, how much pause at the top is too much? Taking 1 deep breath in at the top seems fair to me, but taking any more than that seems like it turns too much into an aerobic exercise. I say aerobic because I compare it to the amount of breaths it takes to accelerate up to 30-40m. (Usually just 2 or 3 I think) It’s also aerobic because I would not be able to complete the lift without the extra breath in between reps allowing O2 to get to the muscles. Again, I know Im splitting hairs here, but perhaps one should decrease the weight on the bar in order to complete 5 or so reps without taking 10 second breaks at the top of each rep.
Second question. Is it possible to progress weight too quickly-- even if technique does not falter? I have gone up in weight rather quickly in the squat and deadlift lately, but I question whether im actually gaining strength linearly with my progress. Of course, squats are a means to develop hip power for sprinting. The idea is to squat to develop those muscles to improve your sprinting– not just to improve your squat. Im thinking that the idea of squatting a bunch of weight is the common athletes misconception of a measurement of power. The true measurement of power is the sprint itself, thus the squat strength is expressed due to the body’s amount of strength and power from the hips. (If Im making any sense 
)
In other words, ALL of my lower body lifts will improve if my power is increasing. They will increase fairly linearly with my speed because I will be developing power in the hips not just a big squat.