Strength training is often viewed as a “program.” Is my program
perfect? If not, then why even bother – right? Wrong. At first,
it’s simple: show up and do the program. Walk into the weight room,
follow the Starting Strength linear progression (SSLP) three days a
week, and add 5lb a workout. Life is good. Becoming strong, however
– really strong – is not a program, or a template,
it’s a process.
The reality
is far more nuanced than any template could ever be. Training is not
a simple A-to-B journey from weak to strong. I wish it were that
straightforward. A template, at best, is a starting point, a way to
get the ball rolling. But we’re talking about training human beings
here, so believe it or not, shit does happen. An experienced coach
knows this, and is aware that it’s every bit about the individual,
as well as their commitment to the details. We have enough evidence
and experience to know that Starting Strength is a great place to
start – hence the name – but the traditional SSLP is precisely
that: a start.
Programming,
at its core, is the delicate dance of three main factors: stress,
recovery and adaptation. While a basic template may initially
suffice, as one progresses the dance becomes more intricate. The
amount of stress and time needed to achieve the adaptation increases.
So, naturally, the program’s complexity does too. Starting out
simple, basic, and general, it morphs into something more complex,
individual, and specific.
One’s
personality and environment play significant roles in success, as
mentioned in a previous article. The desire to excel and push beyond
one’s limits cannot be programmed. It rather comes from within. Being
around ambitious lifters who demand greatness is a different
experience from training in a cold garage gym while your cat coughs
up a fur ball mid-set. A lifter’s character, culture, and
environment cannot be manufactured.
A template
doesn’t take into account individual differences, such as skill
level, body type, and genetic predispositions. For example, achieving
a big squat may require a focus on gaining body weight and increasing
overall size, while a big deadlift’s success may rely on factors like
leverage and technique. Similarly, building muscle mass is crucial
for a big bench, while a press may balance quite literally on the
lifter’s ability to be proficient in the double layback.
Progressive overload applies to all lifters. Simply put, we need to
add more heavy circles of iron to the barbell over time. The exact
dose changes from lifter to lifter, and that’s the art of
programming.
Ultimately,
the key to programming lies in the tinkering. Like working on a
vintage car. It’s about experimentation, and knowing what not to
do. That’s where an experienced coach’s skill pays off, and can
take years off your training age, as you will probably encounter far
fewer mistakes and training plateaus than when you’re doing it
alone, learning through trial and error, groping around in the dark.
No pre-made template can account for all the challenges or specific
hurdles you may face.
Success
leaves clues. If habits were on the stock market and training was a
currency, I’d put my entire savings into consistency, sleep,
protein, and creatine monohydrate, in that order. As we know, great
habits breathe success into any strength quest. How you manage your
life to stay successful is the real training.
Training
humans is messy, and is not an exact science. We are not robots, and
no one can predict lifting outcomes with total accuracy (unless maybe
you’re training the Soviets). So unless you want to be locked up as
part of a government program, forced to take a bunch of steroids and
not see the outside world beyond the four walls of your residence and
gym, then life will inevitably get in the way of your best-laid
strength plans. It’s about how you adapt and work to find solutions
to keep you consistent, eating and sleeping enough, and doing what
we’ve been telling you to do ad nauseam on this site. That’s the
key to progress.
Creating a
situation that sets you up for success and also meets you where you
are right now is the best thing you can do. Ideally you keep adding
momentum to that. Getting your ducks in a row and having your eyes
firmly fixed on the future – that is what creates long-term
progress. It’s a life skill that I find highly rewarding. Once you
have had success, you reverse-engineer the magic spark that got you
there so that you can repeat it again and teach others. It usually
comes down to habits and mentality. You can’t teach talent, but you
can teach yourself habits.
If I had to
list off the basics of successful programming in the weight room, I’d
say it’s a combination of form, programming, and recovery – what
I call “The Triangle.” Pick any lift you want and the progress
you achieve will ultimately boil down to these three variables
flowing in the right direction. It’s not overly complicated, I
know, but from my anecdotal coaching and lifting experience the
Triangle is the key.
Is your technique
legit? Yes or no – work on that. Are you program-hopping, missing
workouts or doing straight-up dumb shit? Yes or no – fix that. And,
of course, the age-old favorite: are you eating and sleeping enough?
Yes or no, do better on that. I know you’re probably bored of
hearing that, but it’s true. Especially the recovery piece. We all
know about sleep, but we simply ignore it or are quick to downplay
its importance; enough caffeine to function does not replace sleep.
As for protein, it has to have had a soul and a pair of eyeballs –
that’s the only form worth ingesting. Vegetables, you ask? Ha.
That’s what my protein eats.
Let me
briefly leave form and recovery aside and focus the third element in
the Triangle: programming. Regardless of ability or training
advancement, programming boils down to two things: intensity, and a
minimalist approach to exercise selection. This is something I have
repeatedly rediscovered during my own training and programming.
Stripping away the fluff and focusing consistently on the core lifts
– squat, press, deadlift, bench, and power clean – yields the
best results in strength for the majority of people I see.
To be clear, I’m not
talking about powerlifters, just normal Average Joes who want to be
strong. If you’re in that category, then you don’t need
distractions like curls, advanced squat protocols, contrast showers,
or the conviction that you’re a special snowflake who needs more
volume.
It’s so obvious to me
now as I discuss the problem that I find myself wondering whether,
maybe, people don’t really want to be strong. Putting 600lb on your
back or doing a 315lb press is hard, so perhaps when people say they
need volume it’s really more that they don’t want intensity.
Intensity is hard, and they know what’s lurking in the shadows,
waiting to be conquered. Unfortunately, if you want to progress to
the intermediate stage, sooner or later you do have to face your
intensity demons and find out how much you really want to be strong.
A heavy barbell needs to get incrementally heavier, and that’s
scary. This mentality is the reason many people remain weak. As
usual, Rip is proven right. Simple, but not easy – and harder
always works better.
So what’s
the takeaway here? Strength training is a dynamic, living and
breathing process that demands a personalized touch and
constant refinement. Hence, I don’t sell programs on my website.
While templates can provide a starting point, and are useful for that
specific purpose, true progress is achieved through critical
thinking, experimentation, conquering your fears, and – most
importantly – an unquenchable thirst for strength. There is no
template for that. These are simply the intangible factors that turn
good results into great results. So if you’re just starting out,
SSLP will do the trick. But cracking the code to turn a three-plate
deadlift into a six-plate will be individual to you. That’s
programming. Staying focused, keeping the goal the goal and
building lifestyle strength habits – now that’s a template I can
get behind.
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