Planning guidelines

June 1999

Hi Shaun, Just thought I would review with you some planning guidelines in the hope of making your task a bit easier.

First,order is important. Try to proceed sequentially if you can.

Step 1: Draw up your monthly planning sheet as illustrated on p.122 (prep) and p.123 (comp) remembering to add in the "other squat" and "pressing" categories.

Step 2: Establish the number of workouts and number of lifts per workout for each of the four weeks. Here we use the guidelines set up by Laputin:3 day: 24%.28%,48% (not necessarily in that order)4 day: 15%,22%,28%,35%5 day: 13%,15%,15%,27%,30%

And since no one workout should contain more than 135 total lifts max 3 day volume is 280 lifts,max 4 day 385 lifts and max 5 day 450 lifts. This should cover almost all circumstances that arise.

Most prep cycles will have one 3 day week, two 4 day weeks,and one 5 day week. Most comp will have two 4 day weeks and two 3 day weeks (even though 3 of the weeks are usually under 280 lifts, the intensity is alot higher).

Now arises a critical question: Do I combine high volume workouts together with a high concentration of high intensity lifts and if so,how often? Roman on p.121 says "It is this "shock" training (combining high volume with high concentration of high intensity lifts) that secures the further development of the organism, its trainability; and consequently, the improvement of results. The spasmodic character of the training load gives the athlete the opportunity to rest and recuperate after a significant amount of work."

Interestingly though, if you look at the weekly load example on pp.122-123 you will see that the ratio of high intensity lifts to total lifts is rather close to being uniformly distributed. (30/130,13/40,26/95,22/135,10/50) so he is really contradicting himself with this example. In my view the high intensity lifts from the 40 and 50 lifts days should be transferred to the 130 and 135 days and the 26 HI lifts on the 95 day reduced a bit (to say 18) and the other 8 transferred to the high volume days.Then you have the shock days offset with days of active rest so you can recover more effectively.

But to have these "shock" days each week is too much strain .This is what I would recommend: In the prep cycle in your two higher volume weeks (high 4 day and 5 day) have the shock days on the two 100 plus days in the 5 day week and on the 100 plus day and tha day closest to 100 lifts on the high 4 day week. Make the other 2 or 3 days as easy as possible (low volume, low intensity). In the other two weeks concentrate your high intensity lifts in the 2 medium volume days (low 4 day week) and in the medium and low volume days in the 3 day week. The high volume days in these weeks will consist of low intensity work. The comp cycle is different for two reasons: 1)you do not want to tax yourself with shock days that close to a meet and 2) the amount of high intensity work increases proprtionately (absolute decline is only 256 to 229 and relative share increases from 20 to 25% and worst of all submax to max volume (90% plus) doubles. This requires a more uniform distribution both between weeks and within weeks of high intensity work.

In the prep cycle low volume,low intensity days can usually consist of 1 or 2 combination exercises and maybe a few light squats. High volume, low intensity days will require 2 combo exercises,light squats,and some high rep (3-5) sn or cl (classic or power) from the hang (50-65% in sn 50-60% in cl).You would be suprised how easy you can accumulate 130 lifts using these groups. "Shock" days will need a mix of high intensity work together with some of the above mentioned stuff.

The matter of just how to distribute the high intensity work is very important also. For low class training I think it best to proceed as follows: Concentrate your HI work into 2 workouts (prep cycle) in each week.In the 2 lower volume weeks in one workout use pow sn off plinths and pow cl off plinths and funnel most of your 70-79% lifts here (70% for doubles and 75% for singles). In the other session do only 1-3 (70-79%) total reps (as warmup for heavier weights) and do ALL of your 80-89% and 90% plus( rarely exceed 90-92.5% in prep cycle) as well as HI squats (100% c+j plus) . This would be too much at a higher level but for low class its ok. In the 2 higher volume weeks the procedure is basically the same except for the fact that there will be too many 80-89%lifts to do in one session as before so some must be switched to the other session. So do not do pow sn and cl off plinths but instead do either classic sn or cl off plinths or pow sn or pow cl from floor . Again, funnel most of your 70-79% lifts here and some 3-6 singles of 80% lifts. Do them in this manner: do first set of 2 reps with 70% and 1 single with 75% if you wish and then do all singles wth 80% and then drop back down to doubles with 70% and finish all needed reps. As I said the comp cycle will require a more uniform distribution ( I would not do power sn or power cl off plinths but rather the classic sn and cl off plinths in addition to pow sn and pow cl off floor to better prepare for the total day). The two 90% plus sn that you transfer out of week 4 in the comp cycle can be done off plinths in the third week in a separate workout from the the other 90% plus sn planned for that week. Very important: in the comp cycle distribute 90% plus lifts in the following way 90-92.5% (65%) 95% (20%) 97.5% (15%) so this means sn: 90-92.5% (13) 95% (4) 97.5% (3) c+j 90-92.5% (7) 95% (2) 97.5% (1) Make sure you use the middle class tables even though you are 69kg! So after all that:

Step 3: distribute high intensity lifts first (use only 3 sets of 2-3 reps as warmp for HI lifts to arrive at total lifts for that exercise.

Step 4: Flesh out reminder of each workout using above guidelines.

Step 5: Write out 1, I repeat 1 week of workouts. At the end of the week evaluate the feedback you got and repeat steps 3-5 for the next week. Hope this is all clear as I did it from memory only but if I missed something or you have questions just let me know. I really feel this system can work for you given the proper time and effort. Best of luck. Jim