Anyone using a westiside barbell workout or one with some of their principles?
I don’t use a traditional WSB template, however i have talked w/ Louie Simmons and Dave Tate and found out how to use their principals in creating training that is specific to my sport(K-1 style kickboxing). Basically I use a lot of box squats, box jumps(up, never down), band work, pulling, and sled pulling.
We bench westside style for safety, and we also use many of the prinicals of variation…
Currently I’m implementing a Westside program. I’m actually working on a way to add in Olympic lifts into the program.
I really like the focus on the posterior chain and the fact that my hamstrings get a real good beating at least twice per week.
Maybe you would post your Ham workout Chris?
[Or is it the standard W/side program]
I’m looking for ideas - balancing …
- sprinting,
- Tempo,
- Strength-work (weights)
- Flexibility
… all for the Hams, without over doing it and straining them takes a carefully organised program.
I want to maximise my posterior chain work, but not stupidly…
Chris,
If you go to t-mag and search the forums there, Chris T. posted on how to implement some olympic lifting into westside. For some reason I couldn’t find it, but I know its there and I might have it at home. If I remember correctly, olympic lifts are done during DE days. I’ll try to find it and post it here.
through your w’s in the air
weeeeeesssstttssssidddde!!!
Thanks for the heads up about the CT article but I’ve already seen it.
The Oly/Westside hybrid program was shown to me by a guy who used it for throwing hammer and shot and actually discussed with Louie Simmons and Dave Tate about the program that hes doing (the #1 and #2 guys at Westside).
Timothy, the Westside program really hits your hams good and sometimes leaves you with DOMS (muscle soreness 1-2 days after training) so it would probably be best to not use it a week before a meet.
About maximizing all those different aspects of hamstring strength, I’m not sure what to tell you as I’m not too familiar with the physiology of the muscles (namely hamstrings). Right now my hammies are about as strong as a field mouse’s so I’m just gonna work on strength right now and worry about the other aspects when track season comes around.
Guys a few points:
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Westside perform speed squat/bench because they don’t do any other exercoses to increase RFD. Sprinters and Olympic weightlifters do not need this stimulus because they get it elsewhere.
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Powerlifters wear heavy knee wraps, power suits and have a stance most probably double the width of yours. Be very careful therefore when applying WS principles.
Accomodated resistance for example, increases resistance in the outer range - exactly where the wraps and suits fail to assist. THat’s also why they do so much work on the lock out in bench. It’s uniquely specific to WS.
The change in resistance is dependant on how one configures the resistance i.e., the chains and / or the bands. If you look in your Supertraining book (chapter 7 biomechanical graphs) you will note that the resistance is not monotonic (continual increase without any decrease). According to Dr Siff the resistance fluctuates and reaches another peak very close to the point where maximum squatting strength is displayed (around 145-165 degs of knee angle), not simply right at the end of the squat.
No, you misinterpret Siff. With bands alone, the resistance is most definately greatest in the outer range. Obviously chains do offer greater variations in load through the range.
Are you referring to maximum force at a given joint angle? THis is never straight forward anyway because the degree of flexion at the knees, hips and spine all interact and effect muscle Length:Tension relationships and joint moments.
Westside do not use any knee wraps and/or squat suits, etc when training. They leave these for competitions only.
During training, the basically use, wrist wraps, belts, singlet.
Chris, where you from in Buffalo? I live in Amherst.
The greatest thing about westside is that their workout template can be easily adapted to any athletes needs. The program is not set in stone.
If you check out elitefts site you’ll see that when they write about training athletes they reccomend a narrower squat stance than for powerlifters. Also in the training diaries the coaches include OL as part of their programs.
If you do not have acces to a qualified OL coach (not many do) the Speed squats and bench is an excellent alternative.
And while they do compete in PL it is hard to argue against their results. Despite the use of equipment in competition I bet Chuck V could No, No, No squat more weight than everyone on this board.
The bottom line is that their training will improve your absolute strength and speed strength levels. The workouts are fairly low volume (4 ex/workout) and can easliy be fit into a 3 or 4x/wk lifting split and shouldn’t lead to over training. Bob Youngs even wrote an article detailing his first six months at WS and he was only doing 3 ex/workout.
Finally I’d like to add that I recently read an article by louie where his closing statement was that we are all on the same side. That’s the truth. it’s not about OL vs PL or anything else. We all want the same thing, results. We should all put the ego aside and come together for the betterment of S&C.
I agree. I found a great way to use some of the westside ways but I also put in oly lifts and plyos…It has helped my strength and power greatly.
Westside have had experience of coaching World Class sprinters.
A few years ago Butch Reynolds came to Louie,looking for help in his event(400m).
Butch said his problem was that often with 100m to go he felt like he had nothing left in the tank,and was willing to try new methods in order to correct this problem.
So over the period of a few months,Butch worked on all the well known Westside exercises,Box Squats,Dimmel Deadlifts,Pull Throughs etc,etc,and some of the lesser known ones Sled Dragging,Band walk with sled.
This culminated in him being able to perform 45 Box Squats(slightly above parallel) in 45 seconds with 225 on the bar and chains.
Straight after this training programme,he set a new world record(now beaten) in the 400m.
And it is fair to say solved the problem.
Westside works for sprinters,granted there are modifications,here and there but Louie has some great ideas on how to Coach speed athletes,and anything the Westside club say on this matter has to be worth listening to.
The story sounded good untill you said 45 box squats in 45 seconds with 225 and chains. Can anyone back any of these comments up. What his max for full-squat then.
Here goes my first post. Joe Kenn from AZ St has an interesting template that he developed and evolved with WS help. It also incorperates Oly work. If anyone is interested I can expound on it.
Adam
The Butch story is the biggest load of crap I’ve ever heard.
How can you do 45 box squats in 45 seconds?
Assuming he was able to perform the decent in half a second and the ascent in half a second cough, cough how do you perform the essential element which defines a box squat from its normal squat counterpart - THE UNLOADING ON THE BOX.
Butch also ran his races so that he ALWAYS had a tonne left in his last 100m.