I’m in the last week of the hypertrophy template (old version). It seems to have worked well for me, as I’ve made some subtle but noticeable gains in muscle size (particularly in the arms and chest), and my work capacity is up. I’ve also managed to put a few pounds on the bar for each exercise, so life is good.
I’d like to start doing strength-focused work again at the end of this template. However, I’d also like to continue bringing up my work capacity. It would also be great if I could keep some amount of hypertrophy-oriented work in the routine as well. To that end, I’ve taken a shot at writing my own program. It’s an HLM program based on some various approaches that I’ve seen floating around the internet. I’ve also tried to incorporate what I’ve learned from BBM style programming. If anyone would be willing to have a look at the program below and offer some feedback, I’ be grateful. Does it seem like a solid program for the goals I’ve mentioned above? If not, what could be modified? Bear in mind that this is the first time since I’ve started taking this stuff seriously that I’ve tried to program for myself, so if I’m way off on what I’m doing, let me know.
So Monday and Friday are the same in terms of exercises, but Monday is heavier weight with fewer sets. Wednesday is support exercises at lighter weight and higher reps. I’ll also be throwing in a day or two of GPP as work and life allow.
Well I personally wouldn’t run that myself. There’s also no progression scheme, RPE’s listed, or percentages listed (what is heavy? what is medium? what is light?), and every week would be the exact same as there’s no variation over time in any variables. Why not just do BBM’s HLM or Bridge 2.0 template? Both would fit your goals and likely do a better job than that. Once you’ve run those templates a couple of times I think you’ll have an idea how to modify those templates to put your own personal touch on them, should you ultimately desire to program for yourself in the future. You’ll also acquire a bit more data on what works for you and what doesn’t to give you some context to work with in your program design. As an engineer by trade (my whole career has been learning new concepts and skills, as soon as I’m comfortable with something it’s obsolete, lol), what I have found is that the best way to learn a new trade/concept/skill on your own is to start off by imitating something good that already exists, then start to take it apart, examine it, and playing with it. Start asking yourself why it is built the way it was built? Look at each of the fine details and ask yourself what other ways it could be done differently, and what result would come from making any of those changes? Then go ahead and make some changes and see what result comes from it. Did that result match your initial expectations? If so, why? If not, why? It’s much easier to go down that rabbit hole with something tangible as a base to start from (i.e. a template) than it is to go in blind.
I just finished week 7 of hypertrophy with a sligth caloric déficit, my results were
Squat my e1RM sucks now ( I had a injury in rectus femoris which is being traited, I changed to High bar now, and it’s better in regards of pain )
Press is almost the same, since I always trained it 1x/week, greater progress was not expected because the volume was about the same as the other intermediate programmas I did before
Bench > the same as press ( I mean the volume didnt change)
DL I had good results, because volume was greater than the other programs
Work capacity is MUCHHHH better now.
So instead of creating a completly new program, i’ll just adjust the volume for comp lifts in the 7wk hyper program and maybe for the supplemental litfts in some weeks. I could change to HLM but the 1x/week squat is appropriate due to my injury but now (as well as other comp lifts) i’ll do 6@8x4 instead of 3… I’ll also add myoreps for the press in slot 3 of day 3.
Or instead of running it 7 weeks again, I could run the first 4 weeks of the program as a developmental mini-block. Does any of that make sense?
Just to be sure, how many slots per week of squat are there in the HLM program?
Would HLM be also usefull in a caloric déficit?
@tavccp What is your reasoning and what are your expected outcomes for those changes? Also, after training a certain way for 7 weeks, do you think it would be useful to redo something similar, or to try something more varied and come back to this later?
You can also just stick to high bar and squat variations that don’t bother you so you can squat more frequently. Rippetoe is not going to come down from the heavens and curse you for squatting high bar, lol. And yes either HLM or Bridge 2.0 would be a fine way to run a more strength focused block in a deficit.
My reasoning is that 1 more set may help to increase my e1RMS, specially for those lifts that regressed, it would be an experience… but maybe also a waste of time in terms of quick progress. I think you’re right it’s better to try something diferent for better outcomes.
After my first message I went training and did LBBS almost painless, but I felt it later, but nothing terrible. I’ll stick to HBBS until LBBS gives me 0 pain afterwards
I might buy HLM or the Brigde, i’m more towards the HLM
1-The low / high bar squat thing… could u check my form? I already tried in the forums and in fb group but did not have any commentary would u mind to check, even if you don’t know much about? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLF-DVLJAH4 they seem ok to me, first time I did them. RPE might be off
The thing is that I’ve been low bar squatting for 2 years now and there’s an entire book about low bar squat (ss book), every pwlifter I follow on instagrm do low bar, so seeing them frequently gives me some insights about mty own form… alan thrall videos, bbm videos and those things. my e1RM of high bar is 375 and I did 425@10 low bar before my injury. But I don’t bother doing high bar if I need to
2-I’d like to ask you how are u doing in training? why? because you said somewhere (I think it was you)you’d do something like an annual periodization conditioning>12wk>hypertrhopy>etc> repeat, something like that. Do you think that by the 2nd or 3rd time you do the 12wk program you still have progress? what is your experience so far? just for curiosity
3-If i pick HLM for example, can I start in Week 2 knowing that i’m currently doing week 1 of hypertrophy (low stress week)?
To me those look pretty solid. I only see 2 small things: the first is I might bring the hands in a bit more just to keep that upper back tight, and second is that on some of the reps your heels come off the ground at the top which leads me to suspect you may be a little off balance of mid foot forward (though it could also just be an exaggeration on the explosive lockout). At the end of the day you gotta prioritize longevity and sustainability over everything else. So, I would at least stick to high bar until you’re healed, then slowly start trying to bring low bar back in.
My training is going ok considering I’ve been leaning out for the last 2 months, though I’m also probably not the best person to use performance as a benchmark for any template as I tend to be very much on the training resistant side of things. I have to optimize the shit out of my training just to make any progress at all. It sucks, but that’s life. What am I gonna do, not train? As I’ve been leaning out these last 2 months I’ve been mostly focused on improving my work capacity so my body can handle more volume than I’ve done in the past when I swap back to gaining again, and hopefully in turn more gainzZz.
I think the comment you are referring to was me, but that wasn’t exactly what I said. I generally prefer a bit more of a bottom up approach as opposed to a top down approach. However, if there were a hypothetical post-novice person out there that had access to all the BBM templates and they wanted to run them in the most effective order, I think the order that makes the most sense would be Endurance => Bridge 2.0 => 3 day hypertrophy => HLM => 4 day hypertrophy => 12 week strength => Time crunch and repeat. The reasoning for that order would be two-fold, first there’s a natural progression from lower volume to higher volume while rotating GPP and strength blocks. There’s also a wash out period at the end with the time crunch and endurance that allows for some volume re-sensitization. Then there’s also some nice phase potentiation in the ordering of the templates (see Scientific Principles of Strength Training if you want more info on phase potentiation) as endruance/work capacity improvements benefit both hypertrophy and strength blocks, and hypertrophy improvements benefit strength blocks. As for whether you would still see progress running the 12 week strength multiple times. If you run it the way I laid out above you would only see each template about 2x per year, so I think there would be enough time in between for it to be novel again. However, over time as you advance and need more volume the templates may need to be modified to add more sets here or there, or to to be modified to swap some variations out for more novel variations in order to continue to drive progress. I think once you run these programs through you’ll have a better idea how you respond, and have a more intimate understanding of the programs so you could modify them successfully in the future if need be. The first run I would just do as is laid out on paper so you can get some baseline data (except for obviously swapping low bar variants out for high bar variants).
There’s no need to do 2 low stress weeks back to back.
“However, I’d also like to continue bringing up my work capacity. It would also be great if I could keep some amount of hypertrophy-oriented work in the routine as well”
Kudos for wanting to self program, but honestly, you may as well just run the Bridge if thats your goal. Its free, the loading protocols are solid, and you can always just swap out exercises to suit your plan.
There’s no need to reinvent the wheel.
What you have got there looks somewhat reminiscent of the Texas Method.
Man, straight sets of the big four means those session will be long as f…u…c…k…
I think going from deadlifting once a week for ~4 sets of 6 to deadlifting 3 times a week with 5x5, 3x10, 3x5 is probably going to crush you.
And as Dave_E said, your M and F workouts are going to take 2.5-3 hours unless you’re working with closer to 60-70% for intensity and keeping your rest times really low.
Similarly unless you’re arbitrarily lowering intensity, I would bet money you’ll be under recovered for pressing movements too – not sure why you’re pressing and benching every day – if you’re an intermediate it’s time to choose one. If you like them both, run blocks with bench focus and blocks with press focus.