A Percentage-Based Approach to Calisthenics

Act 1

Pullups can be daunting. 

If all you do to improve your pullups is more pullups, you do have a few options to increase your workload. You can try to increase reps per set, but the limit will be obvious. You can add more sets per session, but you’ve got other things to do, too. You can buy a pullup bar for your home and office and do pullups all day long. You can increase frequency, hitting pullups as often as every single day. All of these are great ideas…assuming you can do SOME decent pullups now. 

For those who cannot do any pullups yet, most people do know the regressions (lat pulldowns, band pullups, machine-assisted pullups). For the fortunate few who excel at pullups, some folks might try their hands at adding resistance by way of chains and weights. For whatever reason, I think people tend to treat resisted pullups, bodyweight pullups, and assisted pullups as distinct exercises. 

What I propose is that we start viewing all of the above as a continuous spectrum of resistance, and apply the exact same approaches we already know to work for every other strength exercise: Use their performance to find an estimated 1-rep max, use this estimated max to prescribe workloads that are appropriate to the rep ranges we would prefer to use for strength and hypertrophy. 

What’s the alternative? Your high performers who can get 15-18 pullups keep spinning their wheels and never hit 20. Your low performers struggle to squeeze out 1-2 pullups, but let’s be honest, they probably jumped into the first one and the range-of-motion on the second one sucked, right? You know what I’m talking about.

Let’s take some case studies and see how they play out. 

Say you have someone who CANNOT do a pullup. To make the numbers easy, let’s say they weigh 200 lbs. You hop them on an assisted pullup machine, set the assistance to 50 lbs, and they can hit 5 solid, full range-of-motion pullups. We can consider the resultant resistance to be about 150 lbs*, and use any estimated max formula we prefer. I tend to use the following:

e1rm = weight * reps * 0.0333 + weight 

Careful with your order of operations, you’ll find that 150*5*0.0333 + 150 = 175, with very little rounding needed. So it makes sense that this person cannot do a pullup yet – chances are they could scarcely do one even with about 25 lbs of resistance. 

Most of the time, we prescribe loads between 60-75%e1rm for hypertrophy and between 70-85% for strength**. As such, this athlete should likely spend most of their time training between 105 lbs and 150 lbs, or roughly 50 to 95 lbs of assistance. If you know your percentages and rep ranges like the back of your hand, you can know what to expect now, and you’ll find it plays out just like any other strength exercise. Prescribe something around 105 lbs (aka 60%e1rm, aka -95 lbs assistance), and you can expect them to easily get 10, maybe 15, maaaybe squeak out 20 if they’re really crushing their progress, and now you’re ready to go to a heavier weight. Or maybe you find they respond best to sets of 5-10RM – fantastic, just stick them in the 70-80% range, and let them have at it. 

Once their e1rm gets to their bodyweight or above it, sure, they could probably squeeze out one pullup. But so what? That’s not a reason to just start them on bodyweight pullups – there’s no other exercise that we just ask people to walk into the gym and hit a 1rm cold. Keep training. 

Next case study. 

Lets say you get an athlete who can squeeze out a FEW pullups, but not many. Let’s say, for the sake of nice numbers, they’re 200 lbs and can get 5 reps. 

200 * 5 * 0.0333 + 200 = 233. 

In theory, this person could probably do a pullup with 33 lbs added! Pretty cool! But that doesn’t mean they should be training resisted pullups, or even bodyweight pullups. After all, their bodyweight is 86% of their e1rm. Again, there aren’t a whole lot of other exercises that we ask people to walk into a gym and start training at 85%e1rm. This person would likely be better served training between 140 lbs (60%e1rm, -60 lbs assistance) and about bodyweight, but bodyweight is the absolute top end of the spectrum here. 

Moving on. 

200 lb athlete. 10 reps. 

E1rm is now 267 lbs. 

60%e1rm is 160, or -40 lbs

85% is 227, or +27 lbs. 

Bodyweight is 75%e1rm. 

This is a person who probably benefits from some resisted pullups, some bodyweight pullups, and some assisted pullups for added volume. 

Again, until I pointed this out, how many coaches and trainers would put an athlete who can hit 10 pullups on an assisted pullup machine ever? 

200 lbs athlete. 15 reps. 

E1rm 300. 

60%e1rm is 180. We’re still using -20 lbs assistance on the low end.*

85% is 255, or +55 lbs resistance. 

Bodyweight is only 67%e1rm.

Unless your goal is strictly hypertrophy***, this is a person who should probably be adding resistance frequently, because there aren’t a whole lot of exercises that we only train below 70%e1rm. 

200 lbs athlete. 20 reps.

E1rm 333. 

60% is 200, or bodyweight. 

85% is 283. 

Unless your goal is exclusively muscular endurance, you’re going to want to start adding some resistance.

Aside: If this is all sounding like a lot of math homework, I should mention that my athletes and I all use Teambuildr, a software that can automatically estimate 1rms using the above formula on the fly, as well as spitting out percentages rounded to the nearest 5 lb increment. This is absolutely not a paid ad, and so I’ll mention that there are plenty of other options, but I do like Teambuildr as a coach because of the wide range of functionality it provides me. If you’re working with clients, I do recommend finding a tech solution so that you can do these sorts of calculations more quickly, even automating the process. If you’re training on your own, you could accomplish something similar with a mildly-clever use of Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets, or lightening-fast fingers and a smartphone calculator.

Caveats: 

*Admittedly, this is an oversimplification – your forearms are hardly moving through space, and don’t provide much resistance to anything other than perhaps your grip endurance. 

**I’m not saying this prescription is optimal, maximal, or magical; that’s a discussion for another article. I’m just saying this is a decent industry standard, and it does get results. 

***And, to be fair, with upper back training, often the goal in training IS strictly hypertrophy. But then why do we have so many people who can barely do 5 or 6 pullups training without assistance?

Act 2

Now buckle up, M. Night Shyamalan, because here comes the twist: we can use this same approach with chinups (duh), dips (okay, sure) and single-leg squats (oh wait, that actually is a novel thought). 

Consider either Pistol Squats or Skater Squats. Again, I’m not here to start a debate on unilateral vs bilateral training (guys, it’s both) or whether pistol squats or skaters are better (sometimes I think we shout “IT DEPENDS” into the abyss and the abyss echoes back). 

If you have an athlete who can easily crush 12-20 single-leg squats per leg, it might be appropriate to start adding load. But how much? If we only consider the weight of the implement when estimating a 1rm, we’ll notice that a 25 lb plate can be a LOT to add to a single leg squat (or a pullup, chinup, or dip). If we consider that most of the difficulty of these exercises is indeed the weight of the BODY itself, then we might realize that we should account for the weight of the body in the total resistance. 

Now, you might ask if we could apply this same mentality to, say, back squats. After all, the weight of my trunk and legs does contribute to the difficulty of the exercise in a way that DOESN’T apply as much in a bench press. 

First, before you embarrass yourself at a party, please don’t tell someone you have a 500 lb squat because you’re a 200 lb dude with a 300 lb squat. Absolutely do not do this. 

However, some people will notice that there is a difference in our ability to perform sets to failure at a given barbell percentage on a squat vs the same percentage at a bench. If we WERE to account for the weight of the body in the squat (and not the bench), we might see this discrepancy go away. 

I’d argue for simplicity’s sake, this is an approach we should only use for exercises where the weight of the body is the majority of the resistance. If you do happen to adopt this approach for closed-chain compound lifts, let me know how that goes for you! There’s no reason not to do it, and we’re already defying convention here. Just don’t embarrass yourself in my name. 

Act 3

I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel here. Coaches and trainers have been prescribing regressions and progressions for ages – I just think this framework is a useful one when working with large groups of athletes, in order to prescribe individualized plans more efficiently and, hopefully, more effectively. Since I started using this with my athletes, I’ve seen a huge swath of athletes Level Up, going from doing zero pullups to hitting their first-ever honest-to-goodness pullups, from a few struggle-bus pullups to a few more decent ones, and from some pullups to many pullups. By no means is this randomized controlled double-blind trial, but I’d certainly be happy (and amused) to see someone (attempt to) design an RCT to put this idea to the test in an academic setting! 

I don’t have a catchphrase (yet), so go forth, train hard, get better.

If you found this article useful, feel free to reach out! Always happy to hear from coaches and trainers who have used my ideas or have some thoughts of their own to share, or from athletes and clients who might be looking for help via correspondence coaching. I do offer individualized training plans via Teambuildr – I’ve had cookie-cutter templates in the past and I anticipate making more in the future, but right now most of what I’m offering is individualized training. If you’re interested, shoot me an email at coachstevebare@gmail.com – can’t wait to hear from you!

The Climb – How to Return to Training After An Extended Hiatus

If you wish to climb a cliff face, the most common approach is to start at the bottom. You could ride a helicopter halfway up, take a running jump out the door, and try desperately to cling to the cracks as your body slams into the rock, but most of us would admit that this is not the safest method. Yet, so many people try to take this approach to training, and with much the same result.

Sometimes, training will be interrupted for an extended period of time. For many young lifters today, this pandemic has precipitated the most significant interruption in your training career; you may have found this agonizing, and you have probably been anxious to “pick up where you left off” so you don’t “lose your gains.” You may be excited to “test your max” to “see where you’re at” before “making up for lost time”.

Those who have been in this game a little longer have probably experienced something like this already. Perhaps you were injured in a way that halted normal training, or some big change in your life (career, family, etc) put your priorities in another place for a while. You’re probably a lot less stressed than these younger trainees, because you’ve been here before, and you know what it’s like to climb out.

As a high school strength coach, I’m writing now to address the young lifters. I actually had planned this article out months ago, but I had procrastinated when I saw that everything I wanted to say had already been said better, by people who are smarter than I am. But from what I’m seeing on social media and hearing from my athletes, not everyone is reading the same articles I’m reading, so my hope is that my modest attempt to communicate will reach ears that would have otherwise missed the memo entirely.

Physicist Niels Bohr has been quoted as saying “An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made in a narrow field.” I joke that this must mean I’m well on my way to expertise, and I’m making progress faster than anyone. I’ve made a fair handful of mistakes over my training career, so I’d like to share them with you, as well as the lessons I took from these mistakes and how I think we could all apply these lessons in the near future. Then, I’ll share my approach to coming back from this particular present disaster.  

What You’re NOT Gonna Do…

When I was about 20 years old, I sustained a boxer’s fracture in my left hand when I had a disagreement with a surprisingly-solid barn door. I distinctly recall immediately calming down enough to ask, “Can someone please drive me to the doctor? I think I just broke my hand.” Lesson #1: Get your temper in check, and you’ll get fewer injuries, aka training impediments. For many of you, that cooldown won’t happen until your mid-20s when your frontal lobe finishes developing and your judgment improves. Until then, do try your best to minimize future regret.  

My hand was in a cast for only about a month or so, and I actually was able to train around that injury by performing cross-arm front squats. Lesson #2: Training around injuries, rather than through them, is a very good idea! Find ways that you can keep active without aggravating healing tissue.

When the cast was removed, I decided to “test my grip” to “see where I was at” by *checks notes* maxing out my deadlift. I’m pretty certain the injury that resulted around 80% of my 1rm was my first disc herniation, though it would go undiagnosed for several years. And just like that, I was sidelined yet again with another injury, and normal training will have to wait even longer. Lesson #3:  Don’t max out lifts you haven’t been training with heavy loads lately! Even if you want to see how all that progress from pushups translates to your bench press, you’re just not ready! I’d really love for this to be your biggest takeaway point from this entire essay – so many people have injured themselves in the name of “seeing where they’re at” after a layoff, and it’s really a terrible idea. Either you injure yourself, or you manage to avoid a danger unbeknownst to you entirely, only to feel disappointed in the result.

Caveat: I have seen high school athletes who seem to be able to max out on their first day back and show that they’re roughly as strong as ever, but this still sends the wrong message and reinforces the wrong behavior – this effect is likely due to the fact that you’re still developing physically into an adult (adults are generally stronger than they were as children), and not evidence of any sort of training-related progress. Further, this individual now believes that their behavior has been rewarded, and is likely to repeat it in the future, where the result may be drastically different, much to their surprise.

This back injury then sidelined me for another month or so, and frankly, I’m lucky it wasn’t longer. I probably wallowed in self-pity at the time, but the fact of the matter there is that all of my misfortune was the direct result of making bad decisions.

This brings us back to you. Worst case scenario, you’ve been sedentary for 6+ months now due to a pandemic, and I am not shaming you for that. Better case scenario, you’ve stayed generally active with pushups, pullups, lunges, and gone for some runs here and there. Great. Maybe you even have some dumbbells or a little weight on a barbell, and you’ve been able to switch to higher rep training of lifts you’d normally train much heavier. Fantastic.

Either way, when you get back into the weight room, you’re going to be very tempted to “test your max” just to “see where you’re at.” Don’t do it.

If you simply MUST evaluate your starting point, I’d rather you warm up to a weight around 50% of your max – a weight that probably will not kill or maim you – and take a few sets of 5 reps before taking your final set for maximum repetitions. Use the formula (weight)x(reps)x(0.0333)+(weight) to find your estimated max, and feel free to compare that with your lifetime best to “see where you’re at.”

Even this is completely unnecessary and comes with some non-zero risk, but at least you’re a lot less likely to sideline yourself for another month or more with an injury by trying to test a 1rm effort. I shouldn’t need to say this, but don’t even apply that light rep-max approach to snatches, cleans, jerks, or probably even deadlifts, especially for most high schoolers. And even if you do use this approach with squats or bench press, make sure you’re adhering to the strictest standards of technique and range of motion.

The Climb

I’ll tell you what I plan to do instead.

Block 1 – Complete Minimalism – Start Low Frequency, Low Intensity, Low Volume; Increase Volume

For the first couple of weeks back under a barbell, I’m going to choose the fewest number of compound movements that hit every major muscle group, and I’m going to hit each just once in the first week. Despite all the running, pushups, and pullups I’ve been doing, it’s still going to take me longer than it used to for me to recover from the training stimulus, so I want to give myself a full week off before hitting the same muscle group again.

I’ll probably choose weights around 30-50% of my lifetime max for that particular exercise. There is evidence that weights this light taken for high rep sets can still stimulate muscle growth, and also 30-50% of what I used to be able to do might really be more like 40-67% of what I can currently do, for all I know.

As for volume, I’ll probably take 3 sets (not counting any warmups) at my working weight in the first week, and increase the sets from week to week to steadily increase the total volume as my body begins to adapt to the training stimulus. I’m not going in with any expectation of how many reps I will get per set, but I don’t plan to take any sets to failure, always leaving 2-3 “Reps In Reserve”. For example, if you were benching 50% of your max, you might get 12 reps your first set,  10 your second set, and 8 your third set, each set dwindling slightly with fatigue. Your reps will drop off faster if you push sets closer to failure, or if you take shorter rests times. That can be okay if you’re short on time, though I’d generally recommend recovering sufficiently that your heart rate and breathing return to near-resting tempo and you’re ready to give your next-best effort on your upcoming set.

Example:

2 Days/Week

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Squat Pullup	Off	Off	Bench Press Deadlift	Off

Week 1: 3 sets @ 30-50%1rm with 3RIR
Week 2: 4 sets @ 30-50%1rm with 3RIR
Week 3: 5 sets @ 30-50%1rm with 3RIR

Remember, your goal here is a safe return to training, nothing more. Reintroduce your body to the stimulus, and don’t get hurt. And before anyone asks, sure, you can throw in some single-joint isolation exercises if you insist – a couple sets of curls, skullcrushers, and calf raises at the end of your session probably won’t kill you.

Block 2 – Double the Volume by Doubling the Frequency, Raise Intensity to 40-60%

Okay, you got through the first couple of weeks without putting yourself in the hospital, great! Time to actually start increasing our volume a bit. Similar approach as before, but now we can either hit every movement twice per week, or include a second movement that hits the same muscle groups. Take a look.

 4 Days/Week

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Squat Pullup	Bench Press Romanian Deadlift	Off	Fr Squat Chinup	Overhead Press Comp Deadlift

Week 1: 3 sets @ 40-60%1rm with 3RIR
Week 2: 4 sets @ 40-60%1rm with 3RIR
Week 3: 5 sets @ 40-60%1rm with 3RIR

Block 3 – Finally Increase the Intensity

Keeping everything else roughly constant, we increase the load range to 60-70% (typical of most hypertrophy programs) and continue increasing sets week to week while taking every set to 3 reps in reserve.

  4 Days/Week

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Squat Pullup	Bench Press Romanian Deadlift	Off	FrSquat Chinup	Overhead Press Comp Deadlift

Week 1: 3 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR
Week 2: 4 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR
Week 3: 5 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR

Block 4 – The World Is Your Oyster

Look, at this point you have about two solid months of training under your belt. You probably have a pretty good idea of “where you’re at,” too. Now the question is where you want to go.

If your primary goal is hypertrophy, you could stay in the 60-70% range and increase the volume further by increasing total number of training days to 6 and jumping on a classic bodybuilding split

  6 Days/Week

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
Squat, RDL, Ham.Curl, Calves	Bench, DB.Press DB.Fly, Triceps	Pullups, DB.Row, Med.Delts, Curl	Deadlift, Leg Press, Quad Ext., Walking Lunges	Overhead Press, DB Inc Bench, Skullcrushers, Deficit Pushups	BB Row, Chinups, Shrug, Curl

Week 1: 3 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR
Week 2: 4 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR
Week 3: 5 sets @ 60-70%1rm with 3RIR
Week 4: 3 sets @60%1rm for half as many reps as your rep PR at that weight (deload)

On the other hand, if your primary goal is strength, you could hop on any cookie cutter powerlifting program of your choice or just increase your intensity to the 70-80% range while also increasing your frequency if you have the time. I should mention now that even if your primary goal is strength, there is still a ton of value in training hypertrophy, both to directly increase your strength as you return from a layoff and indirectly to potentiate future strength gains.

   6 Days/Week

Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
Squat, Sumo Deadlift	Incline Bench, Pullups	Front Squat, RDL	Overhead Press, Chinups	Conv Deadlift, Leg Press	Bench Press, Pullups

Week 1: 3 sets @ 70-80%1rm with 3RIR
Week 2: 4 sets @ 70-80%1rm with 3RIR
Week 3: 5 sets @ 70-80%1rm with 3RIR
Week 4: 3 sets @70%1rm for half as many reps as your rep PR at that weight (deload)

Finally, as a competing weightlifter myself, I will admit that I don’t feel like I am convinced of the best method for returning to training in the sport of weightlifting, but I think an approach that mirrored the approach above but included snatches, cleans, and jerks could be appropriate, but wouldn’t be my choice. The difficulty is that these lifts don’t benefit from massive volume phases the way that bodybuilders and powerlifters can train, and we know that higher rep ranges are associated with higher injury risk, especially in detrained athletes. So if you train light, you can’t safely hit the volumes you’d need to make progress, and jumping right into heavy training isn’t really an option for all of the reasons we listed to start – to that end, maxing out your clean & jerk on day one is certainly more dangerous than the same approach applied to a squat, bench, or deadlift.  

My own plan will be to go through ALL of the above phases before modestly returning to training as a weightlifter at the bottom of Prilepin’s Chart, so that I know that my muscle mass and joint integrity have returned to previous levels before I start adding these speed and power components to my training. I have avoided this before only to injure myself with EMBARASSINGLY light warmup weights. If that means I don’t snatch or clean & jerk more than the open barbell for the first 3-4 months of training, so be it. I’d rather be able to approach weightlifting training with confidence and strength, knowing my body was ready for the demands of the sport.

For my own athletes, let me know when you’re ready to get started and I’ll put you on this program, which I’ll be building in our Teambuildr software. For those who do not currently train with me, feel free to reach out and let me know if you’re interested! CoachSteveBare@gmail.com

You Are Here

The novel coronavirus brought normal training to a halt for many. While those with garage gyms flourish, those who had come to rely on commercial gyms and high-performance facilities languish. How are we to go on?

First, to check my own privilege: I’m writing to those who are fortunate enough to be safe and to have an abundance of time in quarantine. We should recognize that this is a luxury that is not shared by our society’s essential workers. Or, perhaps some of you are parents of young children, and/or working from home full time. My purpose is to provide some insights for those that are able to spend more time and effort than usual focusing on their health and fitness at this time, never to pressure or shame those who cannot or choose not to do so.

Too Long, Didn’t Read: Now is a great time to focus your training on yoga for flexibility, high-rep calisthenics for hypertrophy, and running for endurance, while focusing your nutrition on gaining or losing weight according to your goals…but I doubt this brief suggestion will be sufficiently convincing, so continue reading to get my full train of thought.

We’ve all been thinking about the 90s Chicago Bulls a lot lately, as ESPN releases “The Last Dance.” Strength-coach-Twitter has been abuzz as we all try to catch a cameo of Al Vermeil in the background. Al Vermeil was the strength coach for the 90s Chicago Bulls, as well as the 80s San Francisco 49’ers. Al is regarded as an absolute authority on athletic development, and formed a now-famous hierarchical model to communicate priorities to coaches and athletes. In short, the lower stages of athleticism potentiate the higher stages (this follows similar concepts of phase potentiation and block periodization by Tudor Bompa and Vladimir Issurin).

Al Vermeil’s Hierarchy of Athletic Development

What does this mean? It means that if 100% of your training time is focused on maximal speed, you’ll improve your speed a bit, but then you may plateau hard. If you focus 100% of your training time on maximal strength (maxing out constantly), you’ll improve your strength a bit, and then plateau hard (we all know this guy). But if you spend a good amount of time improving less intense efforts (higher rep ranges with lighter weights, greater distances at a slower pace), it’ll set you up for greater success next time you train for maximal strength or maximal speed.

Brad deWeese phase potentiation for the enhancement of speed

It’s debated as to whether your training needs to be specifically sequenced in this manner, but most coaches agree that training should be composed predominantly of a greater quantity of less-intense efforts in order to build the body towards less-frequent, more-intense efforts. Our cross-country coach, Sean McCafferty, recently directed me a researcher, Stephen Seiler, whose work serves as further evidence of these principles. In short, the greatest endurance athletes in the world spend 80% of their training sessions at low intensity, and only 20% of their sessions at higher intensities. It’s interesting to me that these principles apply similarly to top athletes in endurance events as they do to top athletes in power events.

To that end, top Olympic competitors in power sports like weightlifting are known to take time after each quadrennial competition cycle to focus on aerobic training (especially swimming), which they find to be far less taxing on their bodies, allowing them to heal from the trauma of the intense efforts of their sport, and set them up to have the stamina to train hard and long in the coming months and years in preparation for the next Games.

The lowest stage identified by Vermeil includes Evaluation & Testing, in which he ensured that his athletes were ready to train. Remember, he’s dealing with multi-million dollar athletes here; he can’t let them get hurt because they weren’t flexible, coordinated, and stable enough to train squats and deadlifts! Athletes in this stage should focus on mobility and postural integrity, implementing training modalities like yoga (I tried to find the clip in Episode 3 where the Bulls literally have yoga mats on the basketball court…if you find it, let me know the timestamp) and isometrics for core stability (eg. plank holds and back extension holds). If find yourself often injured or dealing with pain, now is a great time to allow those injuries to heal while focusing on improving your readiness to train in the future. Perhaps you are here.

Al Vermeil told me he never let any of his athletes snatch, clean, squat, or deadlift if they couldn’t hold a back extension for 3 minutes. That’s what we mean by evaluating postural integrity.

After this comes Work Capacity, which includes a great deal: Aerobic Conditioning (what the general public would refer to as “cardio”); Anaerobic Conditioning (recovering from more intense efforts, often with minimal rest; think of Tabata protocols and High-Intensity Interval Training), Hypertrophy (Bodybuilding…need I say more?), and generally improving body composition (losing fat, gaining muscle; the kind of stuff that you’d expect to be the outcome of these sorts of training regimens). If you’re like me, you are here.

I’m actually going to stop there, because the rest has been covered before, and won’t be our emphasis today. You are here. You can’t train maximal strength, but you can train just about everything else.

If your only goal is maximal strength, now is a great time to actually dedicate time to the flexibility and mobility work you’ve been neglecting for – admit it – years. Many strength-focused athletes won’t know where to start, but fortunately there are countless YouTube yoga videos and apps for that.

Plenty of Weightlifters like Mattie Rogers make use of ROMWOD and similar yoga apps for warmups, cool-downs, and recovery sessions to improve mobility and flexibility. 

Maybe you could stand to lose a few pounds; now is a great time to focus on that as well. Download a guided run app (I’ve been using the Nike Run Club app) and start knocking out some miles. Download a nutrition tracking app (I’ve used MyFitnessPal) to hold you accountable to protein-rich diet at a caloric deficit. Don’t worry too much about “losing muscle,” because your muscle cells will retain most of the nuclei they’ve gained, and you’ll gain back what little muscle you scare yourself into thinking you’ve lost as soon as you are able to return to your regular training. Plus, you’ll look and feel a lot better, and probably be able to train harder than you could before, because you’ll dissipate heat more quickly and recover faster within and between sessions.

Myonuclei acquired by overload exercise precede hypertrophy and are not lost on detraining

Maybe you could stand to gain a few pounds! Just about everyone from skinny beginners to experienced bodybuilders can get decent results from high-rep bodyweight exercises like pushups, pullups, Bulgarian split squats, and Cossack squats, while eating a protein-rich diet at a caloric surplus. Download a bodyweight tracking app and weigh in regularly to make sure that number climbs at about 0.5-1% increase per week (1-2 lb gain for a 200 lb athlete) for up to 12 weeks.

Gymnast Jake Dalton can tell you that bodyweight training can help you get jacked.

For now, you are here. The barbell will be there for you when you get back, unchanged, but you’re unlikely to be exactly the same as you were when you left it. My hope is that when you return, you are leaner, fitter, more flexible than you were pre-quarantine, and ready to ease back into the long climb of personal records. And then, we’ll go from there.

To hold myself accountable: I hope to write my next article on how to return to training after an extended period of disruption. Stay tuned.

One Year

This year, we tried something new. We wanted to see how much we could accomplish with strength training within the school day. Thirteen seniors stuck with me for an entire year of training, 2 or 3 times per week, 35 minutes per session at the most. I know, it’s not a ton of time, but they worked hard, and it adds up. These guys put in effort, and we saw some amazing results. I want to share some highlights.

One athlete started the year with a 23.4″ vertical at a bodyweight of 165. He finished out with 27.3″ vertical at a bodyweight of 179. No surprise, he also brought his clean up from sub-185 to 225. Rock solid.

Another athlete started the year with a 23.7″ vertical and 8 pullups at a bodyweight of 117. He finished the year with a vertical of 27″ and 18 pullups at a bodyweight of 123. He also added over 25 lbs to his clean and squat.

A third athlete brought his vertical from 23.4″ to 26.6″, and brought his pullups from 15 to 25.

A fourth brought his already-incredible vertical from 30.7″ up to 33.6″.

The fifth and final athlete I want to mention showed massive increases across the board. This kid started with a 95×10 squat rep-out, 125×7 bench, 21.6″ vertical and 11 pullups at 133 lbs. He finished with best lifts of 255 squat, 190 bench, 160 clean, 25.3″ vertical, and 20 pullups at 145 lbs. You read that right.

The last of these young men continued to lift with me this summer, and on the last day, he thanked me and told me this year had changed his life. Not to be immodest, but I sincerely hope so, I don’t doubt it, and I’ll tell you why. I was that young man not long ago. I had never lifted a barbell in my life, but once someone took the time to teach me, there was no stopping me. It means the world to me, beyond expression, to pass that on to another person.

A lot can happen in a year; even more can happen in a lifetime. My hope for all 13 of these young men is that they carry the physical and mental skills they acquired this year to college (and beyond!), where they continue training and growing, and share with anyone who cares to learn. 

Peaks and Valleys: Bodyweight Tracking

Seen above is a line graph of my last month of bodyweight tracking. Notice first that it is not to scale (pun?); the bottom of the y-axis is 206 lbs, not 0. Notice also that it’s hardly a straight line! I’m sure you’ve all heard this sort of advice before, that weight loss (or gain) is rarely linear, but I wanted to show you with a personal anecdote how having as much data as possible and learning how to analyze it can keep you on track and sane as you change your bodyweight. 

First, as briefly as possible, let’s talk about basic concepts in mathematics. A local minimum or maximum is a point of least or greatest value within a given range, respectively. This refers to the little “peaks and valleys” you see on the topography of our line graph above. 

What you’ll notice is that each  peak and each valley get progressively lower each time. The peaks go from about 222 to 221, 220, 219, and 218 while the valleys go from 220 to 219, 217, and 215. 

Now imagine for a moment that I was scared of weighing in because I preferred not to know, or perhaps some well-intentioned individual advised me to only weigh in once or twice a month, with the intent that I would have certainly seen some change over time. I might weight in at a local minimum of 220 at the beginning of the month, and then again at a local maximum of 218 at the end of the month. I’d think I’d only lose 2 lbs, which isn’t a ton for a 4 week period, when in fact I’d lost 4 lbs between my local maxima and 5 lbs between my local minima. 

As an additional anecdote, last night I ate pretty healthy and sparingly (relative to my usual diet, anyway) and drank a TON of water. And yet I woke up 3 lbs heavier today! I was surprised, but not discouraged, because I knew it was still my lowest local maximum this month. 

And as an aside, I cannot speak with authority regarding how this applies to women, but my understanding is that this same process plays out in the same rate but with an elongated timeline for pre-menopausal adult women. I am told that unlike my line graph above which fairly steadily trends downward, most women will see bigger drop-offs less frequently, though the trend lines would be relatively similar month to month. 

Actionable advice: download any bodyweight tracking app (I use AktiBMI for free), and track under the same condition every day (I am of the opinion that the most replicable condition is first thing in the morning after using the restroom). Data is power if you know how to understand what you’re looking at, take it in stride, and make small adjustments if you’re not seeing the results you desire over a longer timeline. Stay on target, stay sane with small upticks. 

Regarding Integrity

I had the privilege to hear Dr. Mark Brennan  speak about integrity today. Perhaps I should say, he spoke about a lack of integrity, and how permitting even small infractions can lead to an overarching degradation of integrity within an institution. Further, he spoke about how uncompromising adherence to laws and policies can set a tone to build the integrity and consequent reputation of a school, university, or corporation. Perhaps it was the excess amount of caffeine in my system, but this had my mind buzzing all day.

I think, perhaps, that integrity ties closely to conscientiousness as a personality trait, and more importantly to willpower as a strength or ability. One of my favorite lessons in my psychology undergraduate program was the lecture on willpower, and how it can act as a finite resource, but only if you believe this to be the case. This viewpoint has clearly been endorsed most recently by health-food marketing strategists (“One good decision leads to the next…buy our yogurt!”), and it also speaks to the notion that your attitude in life will determine your outcomes to an extent.

I do believe this sort of compounding effect applies to integrity in much the same way in applies to willpower, and I want to extend that beyond the individual. On the small scale, an individual goes through life making a series of decisions, and their reputation (perceived character) will follow as a consequence of these decisions. I believe it follows that an individual who has cultivated a lifetime of integrity will perpetuate it, and I should hope that the same would apply to schools, universities, corporations, and governments. Unfortunately, the inverse is also true.

I was similarly struck by mention of the West Point Cadet Honor Code: “A cadet will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do.” It is all to easy to proverbially wash our hands of the wrongdoing of others, but in doing so, we are complicit in their transgression. If we are to break out of the Nash equilibrium as a society, then it is not enough to hold ourselves to the highest standard; we must also hold others to this standard.

Lastly, a personal anecdote and a challenge to you (my only reader, probably). I’m not sure when this started, but I have a barely-sub-clinical compulsion with picking up litter in my path. For all I know, it may have originated as a karmic superstition, but I’ve embraced it in recent years as a small daily reminder to hold myself to the highest standard, leave the world a better place than I find it, avoid shortcuts and the bystander effect, and to compound willpower and integrity. Today, pick up just one piece of litter. I bet you don’t even have to go out of your way to do it.

More on willpower: http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/willpower.aspx

Paused vs. Rebound Reps for Athletic Development

“Should I pause my bench and squat to build more explosiveness for my sport?”

I’ve received similar questions from a number of people online, as well as with surprising frequency from my athletes.

The short answer is that paused reps are indeed a good idea for many sports, but furthermore that a directed combination of paused and rebound/reflex reps are likely even better than ONLY paused reps or ONLY reflex reps; more importantly, dead-stop explosiveness is more useful in some sports, where reactiveness is more useful in other sports.

Let’s start by defining of some of the terms we are using. Al Vermeil distinguishes “explosive strength” as referring to the ability to generate force quickly (generally from a dead-stop: think of a sprinter or swimmer off of blocks, or a weightlifter pulling a clean off the floor), and “elastic/reactive strength”, referring to the ability of an athlete to ABSORB and consequently DELIVER a great amount of force, quickly. In other words, the distinction is whether the movement starts from a stand-still, or from a countermovement. Elastic movements involve mechanical loading on the tendons, which in turn contribute to a greater amount of force and consequent speed, when compared to explosive movements. This is why almost anyone can jump higher with a step or countermovement, rather than from a dead-stop or seated position.

Cal Dietz, author of Triphasic Training, highlights the importance of a high performance athlete’s ability to absorb and deliver force (Vermeil’s concept of elastic/reactive strength). This sort of athleticism is present in almost all field, court, and track sports; just about any time a human is running, jumping, bounding or rebounding on land, chances are that athlete is utilizing reflexive action. Often, the most gifted athletes naturally display a great amount of reactive strength.

Another perspective on the same issue is that we can view low-speed strength (e.g., grinding out a deadlift) and top-speed movement (top flight in a sprint) as opposite ends of the same spectrum. Eric Cressey presents a similar concept below, relating mostly to pitching speed (hint: all of athleticism follows very similar rules of development)

 

Here’s the thing: strength is far more trainable than speed, so you have to remember that it’s a lot easier to improve low-speed strength than high velocities of sprinting and throwing.  Additionally, improving lower classifications of athleticism (work capacity, hypertrophy, strength) is more effective at improving higher  classifications of athleticism  (explosiveness, elasticity, speed) than the other way around. As such, we work our way up the Vermeil heirarchy of athletic development, or from low-speed strength to high-speed movements. If you have an athlete who is incredibly fast, but struggling to get faster, you can’t just keep throwing speed work at him; at some point, he’s going to get need to get stronger before he can get faster. On the other hand, if you have an athlete who is already immensely strong, but not as explosive or fast as you need him to be, it’s probably time to focus on explosive, reactive, and speed training.

Coming back to our original question of comparing and contrasting paused and rebound reps, you need to look at the constraints of your sport. If you are an athlete trying to improve your ability to generate force quickly from a dead stop (sprinters off blocks, swimmers of blocks and walls, linemen and shotputters…obviously), pausing your reps before the concentric might be a great choice! On the other hand, if you’re an athlete who mostly needs to improve top flight or rebounding (400m sprinter, high jumper, long jumper, etc), maybe you’d be better served with rebound reps.

In short, evaluate the needs of your sport and your own natural proclivities to determine whether you need to emphasize explosiveness or reactiveness/elasticity. Of course, most sports and most athletes need both. You can periodize your programming to include more paused work in earlier mesocycles, and emphasize rebound work in later mesocycles. This will not only afford you periods of emphasis on each, but also naturally transition you from lighter-to-heavier loads and lower-to-higher speeds as you approach your season.

Finally, realize that paused vs. rebound reps can be applied to much more than just squats and bench alone! Some examples include jumps with or without countermovement, medball throws with or without stretch reflex loading, Hang cleans/snatches with or without a dead stop at the knee (or from the floor), and push presses or jerks with or without a pause in the bottom of the dip.

Remember, get fit, big, strong, explosive, bouncy, and fast…in that order!

Push, Power, Squat, and Split Jerks

Had someone ask about the relative advantages of different jerk receiving stances. Most of those engaged in weightlifting will already know of this, so this article is geared more towards the casual observer.  Let’s dive in!
Push Jerks are initiated, received, and recovered with the same stance. It will often be a wider stance, possibly the same as one’s squat stance. These are probably the easiest to learn, but tend to be the least efficient for most lifters. In order to get deep under the bar, you need favorable proportions (short femurs, long torso: built to squat) and a good deal of shoulder mobility, because you’ll likely be receiving the bar well behind your head, with your torso inclined to a significant degree. For example, see the video below of Apti Aukhadov.

Power Jerks are very similar to push jerks, but with some foot movement (usually from a narrower initiation stance to a wider receiving stance). This distinction is often unrecognized, and people may use the terms interchangeably. The benefit here is that most athletes will have more power at the top of their jerk drive from a narrower stance, and a wider-than-typical receiving stance can allow the athlete to have a more upright torso, which allows for less shoulder mobility. Athletes who are built with proportions less favorable to upright squatting (shorter spine, longer femur) will gravitate more towards the Power Jerk rather than the Push Jerk. It may not be entirely necessary to distinguish between the push and power jerk, as athletes will often just do whatever feels most natural, and sometimes the two techniques can blend. For example, see Aleksey Torokhtiy, below.

Squat Jerks are received in the bottom of a squat. These are the least common, as they are the most technically demanding. Some athletes will initiate their squat jerks from their squat stance (like a push jerk) while others will initiate it with a narrower stance (like a power jerk). Squat jerks are the most technically efficient (requiring the shortest barbell travel between drive and reception), but the hardest to balance and stabilize, and of course requiring the most flexibility and dexterity. Of course, you can’t bring up the squat jerk without showing Lu Xiaojun…

Also note, some athletes will catch jerks above parallel (ie, a push jerk or power jerk) until they get to the heaviest weights, which they will necessarily ride down to depth. Below, see an example of Kendrick Farris (jerks at 0:36, 1:24, and 2:06).

Finally, the Split Jerk is received with feet split, one forwards, one backwards. This is the most common receiving position for jerks, as it provides at least the same depth as a push or power jerk, allows for a great deal of maneuverability (eg, in case you have to chase a jerk forwards) and accommodates athletes who have limited shoulder mobility by allowing for the most upright trunk position (though this is not always the case). Please note, it is generally agreed that split jerks should be recovered first with the front foot, then with the back, but again, this is not always the case, as athletes will go wherever they need to in order to recover the bar. See Ilya Ilyin below for example.

The end goal, regardless of your chosen stance, is to move the most weight. Weightlifting athletes (especially split jerkers, due to unilateral imbalances)) and non-weightlifting athletes alike can benefit from rotating techniques in off-season preparatory programming. When peaking for a meet, you will want to choose whichever stance allows you to consistently move the heaviest weights, and become as proficient as possible with that stance.

 

Motivation to Succeed

One thing I studied extensively as a psychology student was motivational states. My undergraduate thesis involved cognitive appraisals of challenge and threat, which are primarily separated by whether or not you believe you can overcome a task. We know for a fact that believing you can accomplish something increases your likelihood of success, as well as bolstering your mental fortitude in the face of failure.
Yesterday, I experienced this phenomenon first-hand. After failing my first attempt to snatch 225 lbs (92% of my best), I felt like it ‘wasn’t my day’.  I felt uncoordinated, tight, and weak. But it was all in my head; the difference between missing and making the lift was entirely technical, and I just wasn’t dialing in. I came back to miss it two more time, but I wasn’t thinking positively. I was motivated to Avoid Failure, because I felt that failure was the most likely outcome. I was making mistakes and reacting to try to correct them. In my head, the narrative ran, ‘you’re too far forward; you need to lean back to compensate’, and then I’d miss the lift by an inch forward.
On my fourth attempt, I felt these doubts creeping in again, so I reminded myself that I have the capacity to accomplish this lift, but I just need to be confident and focus on succeeding. My motivation switched, my mentality switched, and my mind stayed a step ahead of my body. At the floor, I knew where I needed to be at the hip. At the hip, I knew where I needed to be overhead. Suddenly, I snatched 225(92%) like it was nothing.
Then I hit 232.5(95%) on my first try, and 237.5(97%) on my third try. This is heavier than I have snatched since December of last year, and it was August 1st.
Sometimes the things holding you back are all in your head. You doubt yourself, and start fighting an uphill battle of diagnosing your issues and trying to react to them.  Make sure you aren’t Motivated To Avoid Failure, but rather Motivated To Succeed. Change your motivation, and you might change your outcomes.

Early Speed Development

When things click, it’s a great feeling. 
One of the presenters at the Perform Better Summit 2016 this past weekend was Greg Rose (currently with TPI), who spoke about methods for building power in athletes. Part of a much larger conversation, Rose briefly mentioned early windows of opportunity for athletic development. The first is the early speed window, roughly between 7 and 9 years old, where children can benefit from neural adaptations from maximal outputs. He has his golfers of this age focus on driving for distance, without any regard to accuracy. He also encourages the use of all forms of power training, including jumping, sprinting, striking, kicking, swinging, etc, especially training ambidextrously. He stated that this window is crucial to eventually success in power sports. 
Last night, I was reading The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle, shown below. Coyle notes a trend by which younger siblings tend to be significantly faster than older siblings, and even goes on to identify the last ten 100m sprint record holders as being later in their family birth order. Coyle attributes this to a need for younger siblings to hustle in order to keep up with their older siblings. 
Sounds like the early speed window to me!