Best ways to ad hoc adjust training duration

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hello Drs -

I’ve searched the online forum without success on this topic, so apologies if it’s already been addressed. My question involves how to adjust some of the templates to non-routine time constraints.

I work full-time and am a PhD student so my schedule is sometimes haphazard, though I imagine it is nowhere near as difficult as what you’ve experienced as a medical school student. However, it has made it difficult to perform some of the templates as prescribed. For example, there are weeks in the Hypertrophy template that tend toward 1.5 hours or more of continuous work. Unfortunately, there are some days when that block of time can’t be consistently carved out in my schedule. Is there a preferred way of approaching this? A couple of thoughts that have crossed my mind are:

  1. Just complete as much as I can and stop when I have to, skipping the last exercise set

  2. Perform a myo-rep scheme for the last exercise or two, depending on the time constraint

  3. Just take a rest day and shift the workout schedule to the next time I can complete it as Rx’d

  4. Split the workout into two separate efforts on the same day (e.g., a.m. and p.m. workouts)

I’ve used the Time-Crunch and Low-Fatigue templates which, in general, I don’t run into this issue. But I would like to switch up my training a bit. At the same time, I would say many (or most) of the workouts can be completed, it’s just a day or two a week that I’d have to adjust.

2

Bumby,

Thanks for the post. I think the frequency to which this occurs may change what I recommend. If it’s one a month or so, I’d go with number one. If it’s weekly, I’d probably do number 2. You could also reduce rest periods to 2-3 minutes or superset the last two exercises.

-Jordan

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