Skip to main content

Best of the Web: Heavy-Light-Medium System for Strength and Power

For my second entry in this "best of the web" series, I've selected one of my own articles. I wrote this one for the Dragon Door website.

I have chosen this entry not necessarily because it's the best of all of my articles, but because it's probably the one article that more lifters need to read. And they need to read it because they need to give its suggestions a try.

If you're not squatting and deadlifting at least double your bodyweight, and bench pressing at least 1 & 1/2 times your bodyweight; and if you're not comparably strong on a lot of other lifts, then you have no business using multiple-split training, or using bands and chains, or using steroids, or—well, let's just say you have no business doing any of the nonsense a lot of (so-called) lifters do. You save all of that stuff until after you've laid a very good foundation of basic training. And I have no doubt that the workout in this article is the best foundation that you can lay for future—and immediate—success.

Here it is:

The Heavy-Light-Medium System for Strength and Power

For many years now, I've felt that the best all-around system of training is the heavy/light/medium system. It's great for beginning strength athletes since it teaches them how to properly regulate intensity and volume (and how to handle 3 full-body workouts in a training week). It's also great for anyone interested in not just developing strength and power, but also developing the muscle mass to go along with it. Add in the fact that it's capable of getting lifters in great condition, and I think it's hard to argue against its effectiveness.

The best-known advocate for this style of training is probably Bill Starr, who made the system popular through his classic book "The Strongest Shall Survive" (published in the '70s), and in many subsequent articles for Iron Man Magazine. Of course, Starr didn't invent the program. Before his book was published, many bodybuilders and powerlifters from the '60s and '70s used it. (Some of these lifters did prefer a medium/light/heavy system of training, however, thinking it best to save the heavy stuff for the last training day of the week.)

The purpose of the article is to show how to properly use a heavy/light/medium system. Although many people advocate this program as a good means for gaining both size and strength (a search of the many internet forums should attest to this fact), I have found that many lifters don't understand how to utilize it correctly. Since I have trained many others and myself—usually either powerlifters or football players—using the system, I believe I understand its nuances better than most. I have also used this system for extended periods of time (as long as six months), which is something that needs to be done in order to really understand any training methodology.

What follows is a week of workouts designed for anyone that's new to this style of training. Pay close attention to all of the details, and read the training plan several times before you attempt the program. After I have finished going over the program in detail, I will offer a few pointers so that you can properly tweak the system based on your goals and your level of strength fitness.
To read the full article, go here.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Freestyle Training

  Instinctive Mass-Building with Dave Draper’s “Freestyle” Workouts      It’s usually called instinctive training. It’s often referred to as “auto-regulation” these days.   Dave Draper called it freestyle training .      Draper, the “Blonde Bomber,” for those of you who don’t know, was a Golden Age bodybuilder of the highest caliber, but not necessarily just for his physique.   His physique was fantastic, don’t get me wrong (one of the best of that era), but Dave himself was a bit of an iconoclast.   He thought outside of the box, had some unique training perspectives, and was, to boot, a gifted writer.   It may have had something to do with the fact that he was a creative .      Lifters and bodybuilders of all sorts train for all sorts of reasons.   For some, training is a creative expression they undertake for the same reasons that other artists take up particular crafts.   These train...

Heavy, Light, Medium Training: Build a Monster Squat!

  Heavy/Light/Medium Training Part Three: How to Build a Massive Squat      In this, the 3 rd part of our series on heavy, light, and medium training, we’ll take a look at how you can build a superhuman squat using this form of training.   Make sure that you read Part One , as it covers the basics of H/L/M training, before continuing to this one.   Part Two is on “upper body training,” and it, too, would be good to read before continuing here, but not necessary.   As I mentioned at the end of that essay, if this series was a book and these posts were chapters, I’m not sure the order they would appear, outside of the first and last entry.   So, read Part One so that you will know the basics; this article assumes familiarity with all of the concepts presented there.   So, with that out of the way, let’s get on with it…   All Hail the King      The squat.   It has been hailed the king of all exercise...

Heavy/Light/Medium Training for Upper Body Size and Strength

  Heavy/Light/Medium Training Part Two: Bill Starr’s Secrets for Upper Body Bulk and Power +How to Move to a 4 Days a Week Program        This is, as the title indicates, the 2 nd part of our new, ongoing series on heavy, light, and medium training .   If you haven’t read it, then please go to Part One first before diving into this one.   This essay assumes an understanding of everything discussed in the first part.        Here, we will cover upper body training, and more specifically how to build your upper body pressing strength.   I’ll give you the great Bill Starr’s advice along with some of my personal insights.      I was never a strong presser, either on the bench press or on the overhead press.   The most I ever bench pressed in competition was just over 350 pounds in the 181-pound class.   Sure, that’s not bad for the average gym-goer—and, yes, I did win some local be...