C.S. Sloan's Integral Strength

  Some Thoughts on How and When to Follow Specialization Programs Whether You’re Trying to Improve the Size of a Bodypart or Increase the Strength on a Specific Lift      This morning, I sat down with the intention of cranking out an article I had in mind for strength-specialization on a certain lift.  But, as I was working on it, I started to think that perhaps I should just write a “general” essay regarding my thoughts on when and how to go about setting up a specialization program.  The result is what you’re now staring at—I’ll save the other article I had in mind for another day.  (Hopefully, at least.  I forget more articles, unfortunately, than I actually write.)      First things first, for the most part you shouldn’t follow specialization programs the majority of the training year.  Specialization programs are needed when one of your lifts is falling behind the others—or if you’ve never really focus...

       I first tried using high-set, low-rep training sometime in the early to mid ‘90s.  At the time, I was bodybuilding and not powerlifting, and had just started writing for some of the major bodybuilding magazines, but I still had plenty to learn.  Don’t get me wrong.  I had done some low-rep training, especially for a few sets at the end of a workout, but I had never done low rep training exclusively using really high sets.  At one point, however, I read an arm training article by Greg Zulak, where he mentioned that it was beneficial to do 15 to 20 sets of 2 to 3 reps on occasion.  Now, to be honest, I can’t remember the exact article—I tried to find it in my attic full of old magazines while this essay was churning around in my mind, but to no avail.  Anyway, after reading it, my workout partner Dusty and I decided to see how that kind of workout felt.  We had been training at the time with a lot of sets, but also a...

       It’s quite possible that, at one time or another, I’ve already written about this subject because, I swear, I remember doing so, but when I looked around on my blog—and in the myriad of word documents that I have stored on my computer—I couldn’t find it.  I also have a sense of deja vu, as the reason I started thinking about this subject was because I received an email from a reader who was confused over the different variations within 5x5 training that he had come across.  And I, once again, could have swore I received this same email—or one unabashedly like it—awhile back.  And I thought I had written an essay in response to said email because I figured that there are other readers out there who are probably looking for similar information.  Hence, the deja vu.      Oh, well, I reasoned, even if I have written about 5x5 variations before, I write a lot of articles that often revolve around a similar the...