Train Hard. Then Back Off… and Grow.

 

     When a lot of lifters or bodybuilders first take up “briefer-is-better” workout programs such as H.I.T., the “Heavy Duty” programs of Mike Mentzer, or the strength-oriented training programs of Dr. Ken Leistner, they are often surprised at how much hypertrophy or strength gains they make in such a relatively short period of time.  This is especially true if they've been “killing it” in the gym beforehand with much more voluminous, frequent training programs.  But then the gains stop, and the lifter just can’t quite figure out what went wrong.

     One problem—and this might just be the problem that plagues the average gym-goer—is the thinking that it is the workout that produces results.  I often refer to this as the erroneous belief of letting the means (the workouts themselves) justify the ends (the results seeking to be obtained).  You see this approach in things such as “cardio classes” or “workouts-of-the-day” in Crossfit.  But that is the opposite approach of what should be taken when designing a workout program.  You must ask yourself how your workout fits into the overall goal and approach of your program.  This is also the reason that I’ve very often used the Vince Gironda quote, “Are you on a training program or are you just working out?”  Random cardio or workout classes of any type are nothing more than “just working out.”  And they, to put it bluntly, simply do not work.  At least, not in the long term.

     When someone gets good results from a workout program—let’s say they utilize a week of ultra high-volume workouts after several weeks of two-days-per-week, full-body sessions—the tendency is to think that it’s that week of high-volume training that produced the gains in size or strength (or both).  But it just doesn’t work that way.  When a week or two of training produces good results for you, you must look back at your training over the previous three or four weeks.  That will typically give you your answer (assuming your diet and recovery—such as sleep and stress levels—haven’t changed any).

     The best way to take advantage of what we might call “the HIT effect”—where a radically new training program (at least for you) produces phenomenal gains—is to gradually build up your workload over the course of three weeks, and then back off for a week or two.  You will often grow the most, or get the strongest, during those one or two “de-load” weeks, but it’s really the weeks before those deload week(s) that produce the gains.

     My preferred way of doing this looks something such as this:

• Week One: This week should be what we might call “reasonable” workouts where you don’t do too much but also you don’t treat it as an “active recovery” week where you’re just taking it easy.  You should feel almost refreshed, however, at the end of each workout, and, generally, pretty refreshed by the end of a week of training.

• Week Two: The second week should be slightly harder than your average, and first, week of training.  You should feel a little tired by the end of this week, but not much.

• Week Three: This 3rd week of training should be your hard week with, by far, the most total workload.  This week, you should really “push” it.  It should be the sort of week of training that you really don’t want to repeat for another week.

• Week Four (and possibly Week Five): This should be an active recovery week—or two weeks, if you find that you do best with even more recovery.  This week of training should be less than the first week.  You don’t want to do so little that you might as well not train, but easy enough that you feel as if you could always do more.

     You can implement this with any sort of training, but let’s look at an example 4-week block of training if you were to apply it using a full-body, Bill Starr-style program.

Week One

Heavy Day:

Squats – 5 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps.  Only the last set here should be “all-out.”  Keep in mind that when using Starr’s system, he never recommended 5 straight sets of 5 reps.

Bench presses – 5 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps

Deadlifts – 5 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps

Barbell Curls – 3 sets of 8 reps (these can be done with the same weight)

Ab work

Light Day:

Squats – 5 sets of 5 reps.  On this day, perform 2 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps and then 3 sets with the same weight as your 3rd set on the Heavy Day.

Overhead Presses – 5 sets of 5 reps.  These can be 5 progressively heavier sets since overhead presses are naturally going to be “light” compared to bench presses from the Heavy Day.

Good Mornings – 5 sets of 5 reps.  As with the overhead presses, perform 5 progressively heavier sets.  The nature of the exercise will make it “light.”

Ab Work

Medium Day:

Squats – 5 sets of 5 reps.  For your Medium Day, work up to around 90% of the weight used on the Heavy Day.

Incline Bench Presses – 5 sets of 5 reps.  For this exercise, you can once again work up over 5 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps.  This is a natural “medium” exercise since you can use a weight that’s in between overhead presses and flat bench presses.

Power Cleans – 5 sets of 5 reps.  Once again, you can utilize 5 progressively heavier sets.

Dumbbell Curls – 3 sets of 12 reps

Ab work

Week Two

Heavy Day:

Squats – 5 progressively heavier sets of 5 reps, 2 back-off sets of 8 reps

Bench presses – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Deadlifts – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Barbell Curls – 5 sets of 8 reps

Ab work

Light Day:

Squats – 5 sets of 5 reps

Overhead Presses – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Good Mornings – 5 sets of 5 reps

Ab Work

Medium Day:

Squats – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Incline Bench Presses – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Power Cleans – 8 sets of 5 reps

Dumbbell Curls – 5 sets of 12 reps

Ab work

Week Three

Heavy Day:

Squats – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps.  For this week, perform 5 progressively heavier sets until you reach the weight for your last set of 5 reps on the previous week.  Now, stick with this weight for 4 sets.  When you are done, drop down in weight and do 4 sets of 8 reps with the same weight you used for the 2 sets of 8 reps in the previous week.

Walking lunges – 4 sets of 10 reps.  These are straight sets done with the same weight.  After the squatting, you shouldn’t need to do any warm-ups.

Bench presses – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps (same methodology as the squats)

Weighted Dips – 4 sets of 8 reps

Deadlifts – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps (same as the squats and bench presses)

Weighted Chins – 5 sets of 7 reps

Barbell Curls – 5 sets of 8 reps

Skullcrushers – 5 sets of 8 reps

Ab work

Light Day:

Squats – 5 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps

Bulgarian “split” squats – 6 sets of 12 reps (each leg)

Overhead Presses – 8 sets of 5 reps, 2 sets of 8 reps.  Use the same method here as all of your “big lifts” from the Heavy Day.

Seated behind-the-neck presses – 4 sets of 8 reps

Power Snatches – 8 sets of 3 reps.  Use essentially the same set methodology as your other big lifts.  I think this is best done with less reps, however, and no back-off sets at the end.

Good Mornings – 5 sets of 5 reps

Ab Work

Medium Day:

Squats – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps

Front Squats – 4 sets of 10 reps

Incline Bench Presses – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps

Flat Dumbbell Bench Presses – 4 sets of 8 reps

Deficit deadlifts – 8 sets of 5 reps, 4 sets of 8 reps

Power Cleans – 8 sets of 5 reps

Dumbbell Curls – 7 sets of 12 reps

Ab work

Week Four

For this week, you are going to train on just two days.  If you trained on, say, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday the first three weeks, then simply train on Monday and Friday or Monday and Thursday this week.

Day One:

Squats – 3 sets of 5 reps.  Do 3 progressively heavier sets.  The last set should be done with several reps left in the tank.

Bench Presses – 3 sets of 5 reps.  Do 3 progressively heavier sets in the same manner as the squats.

Power Cleans – 3 sets of 5 reps.  Once again, 3 progressively heavier sets.

Barbell Curls – 3 sets of 5 reps, performed the same as the other sets

Ab work

Day Two:

Squats: 3 sets of 5 reps, performed the same as the sets from Day One.

Overhead Presses: 3 sets of 5 reps

Deadlifts: 3 sets of 5 reps

Ab work

A Few Thoughts

     After the “hell” of the third week of training, a lot of lifters will get the best results by doing two weeks of “deload” training.  If you know you respond best to less work then, by all means, repeat the 4th week of training for week 5 before returning to week 1.

     Also, I didn’t put them in the program, feel free to add in some loaded carries of various sorts.  You can utilize farmer’s walks, sled drags, tire flips, sandbag carries, or whatever else you have at your disposal.  Just make sure you don’t overdo these on your deload weeks, but, when performed properly, they can also aid in recovery on these weeks.

     One of the keys to making this kind of training work is to slowly push up your workload over the weeks and months until even your first week of training is at least approaching the way that week 3 looks at the start.

     Keep in mind that the above is just an example of how you might arrange your training program.  But the principle still applies even if you train on a typical high-volume “bro split.”

     No matter how you train, just remember that you need to train hard and then back off for a week or two.  It’s one of the simplest but most effective ways to approach your training.