Texas Volume Training

 

     Recently, there has been some renewed interest in my Texas Volume Training program that I wrote a little over a decade ago, based on the amount of views my original post has had of late and based on some emails I have received the last several months.  With that in mind, I thought it was time that I did a new post on this form of training.  What follows in this essay is an amalgam of a couple of my earlier articles on Texas Volume Training, and some insights I’ve garnered from lifters that have used it in the years since I first created it.

     First off, TVT is a powerlifting program.  And though this might sound as if it’s hyperbole, and though I might obviously be biased since I came up with it, I think it’s one of the best programs anyone could ever use for powerlifting, but you have to be advanced enough to handle the amount of workload involved.  Also it’s not a program for people who only want some hypertrophy or only train for aesthetics, although it definitely will add muscle mass.  It’s also not for athletes in other sports.  I suppose you could use it as an off-season program, but even then it wouldn’t allow you to work on other aspects of your training.  To excel on this program, you need to devote all of your time and effort to the program itself, and not anything else.  If you were to use this while playing football, you might end up as the strongest powerlifter on your team, but would probably be a much worse player.

     After years of powerlifting, and training multiple powerlifters, I have come to the following conclusions regarding the three powerlifts:

     Most lifters will increase their squat the most by using a fairly high amount of volume combined with frequent training.  Two days per week should be the minimum amount of squatting, while most will get even better results by at least 3 days per week.  There are even good programs out there that have you squatting every day—or almost every day—of the week.  But if you’re going to squat more than 3 days weekly, whether it’s an “easy strength” method or a “Bulgarian” approach, you would have to use less volume than what this program uses.  The right balance of frequent training and volume lifting is the key, I believe, to making the squat a big-time lift.

     The bench press should be trained with a moderate to high amount of volume, and a moderate amount of training.  I don’t know many lifters who need to bench press more than 2x per week; in fact, I think twice-weekly training is the ideal way to train your bench press.  Unlike the squat, it’s a bit easier to overtrain your movement pattern on the bench press, and, also unlike the squat, the bench press is not a lift (either biomechanically or for injury prevention) that suits itself well to such frequent training.  With 2x per week training for the bench, most lifters also do well by only actually bench pressing on one of those training days.  One day can be devoted to some derivative of the bench press (dumbbell benches, board presses, incline bench presses, weighted dips, etc.) while the other day can be devoted to the lift itself.

     Most lifters can increase their deadlift the most by using a fairly infrequent training scheme combined with high-intensity, as long as they are training the muscles that are used in the deadlift frequently enough.  There are–and have been—exceptions, of course (the great Bob Peoples comes to mind).  However, I think that even lifters who are “built” for this lift would do better to train less frequently than that.  Although, I am probably mechanically built for the deadlift better than the other lifts with my short torso, large back, and ape-length arms (I am in no way built for the bench press, but I am as strong of a squatter as a deadlifter), I seem to do the best when just working my deadlift hard once-per-week, and training with near-maximal percentages at that.  Here is the kicker, if you will, however: I would probably need to deadlift more frequently if I wasn’t squatting frequently during the same time period.

     In brief, that is what I feel  is the current “best” paradigm for a raw powerlifter who is advanced enough to benefit from this kind of training. Now let’s see what the program will actually look like.  Keep in mind that there are actually myriad programs you could use under the guise of 3x weekly volume squatting, 2x weekly bench pressing, and 1x weekly high-intensity deadlifting.  Look at this program as your “template”.  Your template should rarely, if ever, change.  However, the variety within the template can change as frequently as the lifter needs for it to do so.  Think of the great powerlifting programs of the past: Westside, Sheiko, Bill Starr’s 5x5.  Lifters who train using any of these programs never change the template itself—Starr’s 5x5 is always a H-L-M program performed 3 days per week, Westside is always 2 dynamic effort days with 2 maximal effort days each week—but there is a ton of variety that can be built into the program.  The program I present here should be seen in the same vein.

The Texas Volume Training Program

     You may be asking yourself, “Just why the hell has Sloan decided to call this program ‘Texas Volume Training’?”  Well, the reasoning is fairly simple.  For one, the squatting portion of the program is awfully similar to the “Texas method” popularized by Mark Rippetoe, and used by a number of powerlifters.  I like the Texas Method, not just because I’m a native Texan myself, but because it’s similar to Bill Starr’s H-L-M programs, but it allows for a bit more flexibility.  I won’t get into Texas Method details here, but basically you train three days per week on a full body program.  Day one is devoted to volume training.  Day two is a light, “recovery” day.  And day three is devoted to working up to a max set on your major lifts.

     For another, this program uses a lot of volume.  Although it doesn’t use the same amount of volume as a “Smolov” or “Sheiko” routine, it is more voluminous than most lifters (at least here in America) are accustomed to using.  In that regard, this program is definitely more “Russian” than “Bulgarian.”  It would have been fine for me to call this Texas Russian Training, but I realize that would be a bit too oxymoronic for most (especially Texans), so TVT it is.

      Here is the template for this program.  It’s fairly straightforward.  After I present the training template, we’ll discuss some details to make it work.

Day One – High Volume Squatting, High Volume Upper Body

Day Two – High Intensity Deadlifting (intensity being % of one-rep max, NOT effort applied)

Day Three – Recovery Squatting

Day Four – Off

Day Five – Maximal Squatting, Maximal Bench Pressing

Day Six – Off

Day Seven – Off

     Day One should be the toughest training day of the week.  You should be training with percentages and volumes that probably don’t make you look forward to the training day, unless, of course, you love long, hard workout sessions.  For starting out, I recommend most lifters do a minimum of 8 “working” sets on squats and whatever bench pressing exercise you choose. 10 to 12 sets—possibly as high as 15 on occasion—is probably even better. Do a few warm up sets, then commence with 10 to 12 sets of either 5 reps, 3 reps, or 2 reps on the squats.  Use a weight where you know you can get all of your sets and reps, but a weight that’s still tough—between 75 and 85% of your one rep maximum is probably ideal, depending on the reps.  When you are finished with the squats, you probably won’t feel like performing an upper body pressing exercise, but do it anyway, and use a similar set/rep scheme to what you used for squats.  If you’re weaker at first on your upper body exercise, that’s okay—you will adapt.  It may take a couple of weeks, but you’ll soon be utilizing weight that’s comparative to what you were previously using when not squatting before benching.

     If you feel up to it, you can add some assistance work for the squat and the bench press at the end of the workout.  Don’t go overboard.  A few sets for your tris, front delts, and abs is probably enough.  Don’t do this the first couple weeks, however, and you may find that you get great results by just using the core lifts anyway.

     Day Two is your sole deadlifting day of the week.  And, yes, you are going to be sore on this training day, and there is a good chance before you start the session that you will not want to deadlift.  Do it.  Your body will adapt to the training.  (As the Bulgarians say, “Your body becomes its function.”)  Also, you may be surprised at just how strong you are on this day, despite your soreness.   Even though you’re using much of the same muscles for deadlifting that are used for squatting, the muscles are “challenged” in a different manner, and the bar path is entirely different, which is one reason that lifters are often able to deadlift a lot the day after squatting a lot.  (If anyone has performed one of the Sheiko programs, then you know what I’m talking about.)  Also, and this is perhaps entirely unscientific, but it could be that squatting on the day prior actually neurally enhances your deadlifting capabilities on this day.  I have personally broken some of my deadlift records the day after I had a big squat session.  When this first happened, I was a little surprised (especially considering how sore my ass and legs were the day after squatting), but I eventually accepted the fact that that’s just “how it is.”

     For this day, you have a couple of options depending on how you prefer to train your deadlift with maximal loads.  You can simply work up to a max triple, double, or single, or you can do multiple singles with 90-95% of your one rep maximum.  I prefer the second option, at least for the majority of the sessions.  When you are finished deadlifting, then add in an assistance exercise, possibly two.  Deficit deadlifts, high pulls, power cleans, power snatches, are all great, complementary movements for your deadlift.

     Day Three is your “light” squatting day.  Work up to about 80% of whatever weight you used on Day One, and perform a few sets of 3 to 5 reps in the squat.  You should feel good when you are finished with this session, better than when you started.  (And, once again, yes, there’s a good chance you will be really sore before this workout.)  This workout aids in your ability to recover—not just from Day One’s squatting session, but from the deadlifts too.  Remember this: it’s almost always better to recover by doing something, than by just sitting around and “resting”.

    Day Four is your first off day.  You should be happy – especially for your first week or two of training.  Enjoy the day off from lifting.  (An “off day” should always be taken because you need it, not because you want to take one.)

     Day Five is your “maximal lift” day for squatting and bench pressing.  Work up over 5 to 7 progressively heavier sets of 5, 3, or 2 reps until you hit your max weight.  Occasionally do some singles.  If you have performed a Bill Starr H-L-M program (or one of my H-L-M programs on this blog), then you know exactly what this day should look like, since it should almost mirror the “heavy” day on those programs.

     Take off completely from lifting the last couple days of the week.  You can take leisurely walks, or something of similar “low intensity,” but nothing more than that.  Make sure you eat plenty of food—and get plenty of protein for sure—to prepare you for your upcoming training week. 

     Here is what an example week of training might look like:

Monday:

Squats: 10 sets of 3 reps (after warm-ups)

Weighted dips, board presses, or bottom-position bench presses: 10 sets of 5 reps

Lying triceps extensions: 2 sets of 6-8 reps

Barbell front raises: 2 sets of 10-12 reps

Tuesday:

Deadlifts: Ramps of triples and singles, finishing off with 5 singles at 90% of max

Power snatches: 5 sets of 3 reps

Wednesday:

Squats: 3 sets of 3 reps (after warm-ups) using 80% of Monday’s weight.

Thursday: off

Friday:

Squats: 7 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps (last set should be all-out or close)

Bench presses: 4 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps followed by 3 progressively heavier triples

Assistance work similar to Monday

Saturday: off

Sunday: off

     Remember, that the above week of training is just an example.  You may need more or less work on any of the training days depending on your training experience and/or how you respond to volume.

     Here are a few more tips and thoughts that may help you get the most out of the program:

• This is probably not a good program if you’re a powerlifter trying to stay in a weight class.  Because of the volume, you are likely to gain too much weight.  I know that might be an odd complaint for a program—especially if you’re a bodybuilder reading this—but it’s true nonetheless.  If you still want to try it, you can cut back on the amount of work done on the high-volume day to 5 or 6 working sets, and that might work well for you.

• Having written the above, this is obviously a good program if you’re trying to pack on weight and strength at the same time.  It would be exactly what I would use if I was still powerlifting and wanted to move up a weight class.

• If you’re the kind of powerlifter that responds to less assistance work, and you’ve always gotten good results from basically just training the three powerlifts, then feel free to cut out the assistance work altogether and to do regular bench presses on your high-volume day.

• After a few weeks of training, make sure you take a deload week to help your body recover.  You can use the regular template, but just cut out assistance work, and cut down on your workload on your three powerlifts to half of what you used the previous week.  Or you can always just cut back your training to a couple days that week.

• If you want to stay on this program long-term, then you will need to make sure that you are making regular changes to your sets and reps.  On the Friday workout, for instance, rotate out regularly between sets of 5 reps, triples, and heavy singles.  On occasion, do some higher-rep days, such as 8 reps, but don’t do that too often.  You need heavy weights and variety.  You would also need to change out exercises on a regular basis, swapping out different varieties of the squat on Monday and Friday (front squats, bottom-position squats, etc.) and changing up between sumo, conventional, and deficit deadlifts on the Tuesday session.

     If anyone has questions about implementing this program, then please leave them in the comments section below or send me an email if you want your message to be private.  And if you want some Texas-sized powerlifts, give this program a try!