So I was going through my social feed and saw this article come up about pyramid training. It seems like a simple concept and would appear to be quite friendly to doing warm ups and things like that. Is there a reason why the train at home article (How-to Exercise at Home | Barbell Medicine) doesn’t recommend it?
Should I stay away from this kind of training?
To me its more of a daily strategy than a long term training plan. Its not something to avoid, but it also isn’t any special type of training. To me it would come down to personal preference. You can design a hypertrophy workout with pyramids or without. You can design a strength workout with pyramids or without.
Hypertrophy example
Lets say you did this for bench one day:
Set 1: 65% 1RM 12 Reps
Set 2: 70% 1RM 10 Reps
Set 3: 80% 1RM 8 Reps
Set 4: 70% 1RM 10 Reps
Set 5: 65% 1RM 12 Reps
So you got 5 sets with 52 reps. To me that seems like a decent hypertrophy workout. Another option for a hypertrophy workout would should be to do 5 X 10 @72.5% of your 1RPM. I think the adaptions to the two workouts would be similar. So do you prefer to do sets across at one weight or to mix it up. Mixing it up can be fun, but if you are in a hurry, not having to change the weights could save time. Regardless though, the workout would be just one workout in a hypertrophy block–you still need a long term plan with hypertrophy and strength blocks.
Strength example
Set 1: 95% 1RM 1 Reps
Set 2: 90% 1RM 3 Reps
Set 3: 85% 1RM 5 Reps
Set 4: 90% 1RM 3 Reps
Set 5: 95% 1RM 1 Reps
Technically, this may be an upside down pyramid. So you 5 sets and 13 total reps. For a non-advanced lifter this probably wouldn’t be that bad, but for an advanced lifter, I could see it being fatiguing. Alternatively you could just do 5 sets of 3.
Lets look at another scenario
Set 1: 65% 1RM 12 Reps
Set 2: 80% 1RM 8 Reps
Set 3: 85% 1RM 5 Reps
Set 4: 90% 1RM 3 Reps
Set 5: 85% 1RM 5 Reps
Set 6: 80% 1RM 8 Reps
Set 7: 65% 1RM 12 Reps
That is a harder workout in my opinion 7 sets, 53 reps (1 rep more than the previous). This one has an element that the article mentioned–its training both hypertrophy and strength at the same time. To me this workout looks fun, but its seems ill-advised if you training lifting as a sport because its harder to fit in a long term plan. It doesn’t really fit into a hypertrophy or strength block. It would be fairly fatiguing, especially for an advanced lifter.
My guess is BBM doesn’t use that strategy because their training plans are designed to help lifters reach longer term goals. I think the question is what benefit do you get by programming it? If it makes training more fun for some clients you’d factor that in and program a strength or hypertrophy workout that has a pyramid in it. But I don’t think pyramids can achieve any adaptations that cannot be achieved through other types of programming.
For what its worth I can enjoy an occasional pyramid. To me its a nice change up to sets across at one weight. That said if you did it every workout it would get stale quick.
Issues with pyramids:
I find it easier to hit the correct RPE if the number reps in each set stays the same.
There are some exercises that I don’t like using some rep ranges with, for example I dislike squatting sets of more than 5 reps and I dislike Leg Pressing sets of less than 6 reps.
Some people prefer sticking within a very narrow rep range at certain times, for example not going above a triple right before a meet.
Some may dislike the amount of ‘noise’ generated by the varying intensity and reps per set.
Generates significant fatigue before the heaviest set.
It is hard to modulate intensity that precisely with BW exercises (so I don’t think they would make much sense in the at home template)
Benefits of pyramids:
they (almost) interleave different intensities, which may be beneficial for technique practice.
If you’re drawn to them, they may increase buy in and lead to better adherence and placebo gainzzz (or avoid nocebo that was associated with other training)
The extended warm up may reduce injury risk (I’m kinda doubtful of this one, because you can get an adequate warm up without pyramids)
Varying intensity may reduce injury risk
Convenient way to train the same exercise for different goals within the same workout
Pyramids are a tool that have some application but you can probably train without ever using them and not leave any gainzzz on the table.
I watched this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9xP8P-LhOs where Mike Israetel explains how different rep ranges maxmize hypertrophy for the three types of muscles fibers and it made curious about whether pyramids could be beneficial in a single hypertrophy workout. Lets say you wanted to target fast twitch and intermediate twitch muscles a pyramid such as
Set 1: 12 reps at RPE 8
Set 2: 8 reps at RPE 8
Set 3: 6 reps at RPE 8
Set 4: 8 reps at RPE 9
Set 5:12 reps at RPE 9
It also made think of the potential of dropsets to maximize hypertrophy for fast twitch and intermediate twitch muscles in the same set
6 reps at RPE 8, take some weight off so you can do about another 6 reps or so. Granted your fast twitch muscles will only be able to take a few set of drop sets, but according to the video that is all you really need to train them.
I would say neither pyramids nor drop sets would have much use in a strength block, but within a hypertrophy block you could get creative with them. Probably less so if your goal is powerlifting because in powerlifting training you want to maximize hypertrophy of fast twitch muscles even if it means not maximizing hypertrophy of the intermediate or slow twitch muscle fibers, but if you wanted pure size or to bodybuild I think you program in pyramids and drop sets.