Archive for hypertrophy training programme
3 methods to build muscle whilst maintaining strength: bonus volume method
Posted by: | CommentsYes you heard it right, heres another method of building hypertrophy that works well in conjunction with these methods.
Just in case you missed the first few parts here they are:
The Volume Method
This is essentially a session design that allows for extra volume to be included at the end of the session which I call the 6 in 6 method.
Quite simply, you complete 6 exercises in 6 minutes. Targeted around the key musculature that you want to develop.
The advantage of this method is that you can complete a strength session beforehand and use this method for 1,2 or 3 rounds for a total of 6/12/18 minutes to complete your workout thus emphasising the volume component of hypertrophy development after your strength training. This works well as an add on to any of the other methods where you simply pick out an area to focus on for a round or 2, or you can put a little more time into it for 3 or more rounds for 20-30 minutes.
With my rugby players, I tend to give them sheets of thus stuff to do in their own time outside of scheduled gym sessions so they can get some additional hypertrophy work in.
Each exercise you will do for 40s and rest for 20 whilst you prepare for the next exercise.
The goal with this is not to pick up a light weight and blast crazy speed reps. Pick a weight that you will hit 10 reps at a push!
I like to alternate bigger, more traditional strength exercises with more supplementary exercises with this method.
An example for the pushing muscles would be:
- DB Bench
- DB Flyes
- Military Press
- Narrow Grip Push-Ups
- Single Arm Cable Press
- Swiss Ball Push-ups
Here’s one for the lower body:
- Trap Bar Deadlifts
- Clock Lunges
- Walking Lunges
- Goblet Squats
- 10. Swiss Ball Leg Curls
- 11. Glute Ham Raises
So you have 40s of tension per set, and 6 sets of work. And if you really have the pain threshold you can repeat for 2 or 3 sets or do a pulling version to finish!
Conclusion
Thats the end of the series. To be honest there’s nothing new in this at all, just maybe a more focussed way of looking at the fundamentals to achieve a specific goal. Hopefully it’ll give you some ideas for your training.
BC
3 methods to build muscle whilst maintaining strength: the cluster method
Posted by: | CommentsHere we go with the third part in the series.
The first part covered strength hypertrophy supersets whilst the second covered eccentric training.
The third part is the Cluster Method.
In this method there are two options.
I generally use 4 sets for both methods.
The first method is to take your standard 8 rep load for the exercise in question. Somewhere around 80% of your max is a good starting point.
- Begin by completing an 8 rep set of any given strength movement
- Rest for 2 minutes and add around 2-3% additional load
- The next set split it into 3 mini clusters of 3 reps with a 20s rest between each one. This includes racking and unracking of the bar.
- You might only get 7-8 reps in three sets but continue until you get the full 9 reps out and lower the weight for the next set. The goal has got to be on gradual accumulation of volume rather than intensification so you don’t want to be doing single repetitions with this method.
-Rest for 2-3 minutes and repeat for 4 total sets.
The second option is to use a higher initial loading of around 85-87% or a 5RM load on any given day. You will use 2 clusters with this format.
- using this load, go to failure on the first cluster set which will be 4-5 reps.
- rest for 20s
- attempt to get 2-3 further reps for a total of 8 reps.
- rest for 2-3 minutes and repeat for 4 sets
- Increase the loading if you are completing more than 8 reps.
Some Advise
Use caution with these methods if your coming from a tough phase of training. Not all of your programme needs to revolve around them you can kind of drip feed them into your programme for the key movements as shown above.
Cluster training is pretty stressful in general, irrespective of which option you go for. My advise is start with the hypertrophy supersets and go through each method for 2-3 weeks, 2-3x per week. That way you will have trained for 4-6 weeks before you get to the cluster method and be ready for the change in stimulus.
Good luck with your training, stay tuned for a bonus method that can be used as an additional training block or incorporated within these 3 methods.
BC
3 methods to build muscle whilst maintaining strength: The eccentric method
Posted by: | CommentsFirstly, click for the first part on building muscle whilst maintaining strength just in case you missed it!
The second method is one that I use on a pretty regular basis with various athletes.
The Eccentric Method
Charles Poliquin, the canadian strength coach, states that in order to develop hypertrophy there is a time under tension requirement of 40-70 seconds per set. If the emphasis is on the strength element as well as pure hypertrophy, this time under tension requirement needs to be at the lower end of the spectrum, around 40-50s in total per set which allows for more load to be used in the exercise. The higher the load the greater the emphasis on strength which is our goal.
In addition to this we know that there needs to be a significant amount of intramuscular tension to cause that stress response in the muscle. Eccentric training produces both these meaning that strength and hypertrophy can be developed simultaneously.
I like to incorporate eccentric training for periods of 2-3 weeks for my athletes using the key strength building movements that we all know and love. I’m sure many of you have experimented with eccentrics for developing hypertrophy, it’s nothing new however in this method the goal is to gradually extend the length of each rep, with an overall increase in the TUT of each set using a given load of around 83-85% 1RM or a 5-6RM on any given day.
You need to keep that loading constant for the entire 3 week phase of training so you know that your increasing the TUT with that given load and building eccentric strength.
Here’s how it could work:
Your first week the goal is to introduce the added eccentric stress to your body, so go with a total TUT of close to 40 seconds. Your second week look to add an additional second of eccentric tension to each rep so go from a 6s eccentric to a 7s eccentric. For a 6 rep set that will add 6s of overall tension with the same load. Powerful stuff no question!
Here’s some examples of formats you could use in the first week of training:
Back squat: 6 reps with 6s eccentric, 1 second concentric. TUT = 42s
Chins: 6 reps with 4s eccentric, 2s concentric, 1s hold at top position. TUT = 42s
Dumbell Bench Press: 5 reps with 4s eccentric, 2s isometric at bottom position, 2s concentric. TUT = 40
You get the picture, other movements that this works well with are TRX Rows, Split Squats, military presses, stiff legged deadlifts and the list goes on.
The eccentric method is so versatile it can be applied in many ways. You can even play around with isometric pauses which add another dimension to the session.
Give this method a go, it will add another dimension to your training!
BC
3 methods to build muscle whilst maintaining strength: The superset method
Posted by: | CommentsOkay so you know the drill, you’ve been here before with your training. You’ve just been through a good phase of strength training, improved your max’s in the key movements, and more to the point your loving it! Your loving the fact that your stronger, more explosive and pulling big numbers in the gym.
But there’s also that nagging feeling in the back of your mind, that little voice that’s keeps whispering in your head when you least expect it.
“you need to do some hypertrophy work and get those muscles pumped”, it says.
Okay I might sound like a bit of a psycho now and trust me I don’t get too many little voices whispering crazy things to me (except my girlfriend when she’s after something of course!)
But the thing is that voice might actually be talking a little bit of sense. See, a strength training phase is not about muscle damage. Especially if your involved in sports and strength train for that purpose. It’s about the mind body connection. The neuromuscular pathways that activate those high threshold muscle fibres that move the bar. Doing sessions of 3-6 reps won’t cause you to waste away in the slightest, but nor is it the optimal method for building mass.
How about the best of both worlds, increasing mass whilst developing serious strength in the process?
It is certainly achievable. You get to do the stuff you love be it strength or size training and reap the benefits of the additional goal. What’s wrong with doing what you enjoy in the gym? Hell it’s better than sitting on your ass eating chips and drinking beer (well, that’s debatable)!
And with that in mind here are a number of methods you can use for this.
Strength-hypertrophy Supersets
With this method you use a major strength building exercise followed by a synergistic assistance exercise. The strength exercise can be taken from the strength phase you’ve just finished, as you’ll know roughly what loading to use and you’ll be trained on this movement. The goal is obviously to lift as heavy as you can for the strength movement for any given set and use the assistance movement to add additional time under tension which helps in the development of hypertrophy.
Some examples that I use with my athletes are:
A Back Squat x 5 reps
B Walking Lunge x 8 each leg
A Trap Bar Deadlift x 4 reps
B Single Leg Squat x 8 each leg
A Weighted Chin x 5 Reps
B DB Rows x 8 each arm
A Close Grip Bench with x 6 reps
B Narrow Grip Push-Ups to failure
A DB Press x 5 reps
B Single Arm Barbell Power Press x 8 each arm
We usually do 4 or 5 sets of these pairs and these are examples taken from a variety of sessions for a variety of athletes. At the moment I have basketballers, badminton players and combat athletes doing some of these and have used them a lot with rugby players over the years producing some good results over the 3/4 weeks that we will use them.
I tend to allow 2-3 minutes rest between the supplementary exercise and the strength exercise but no rest between the two strength and supplementary movement.
You can also fill this 2 minutes with a different superset eg lower and upper body but be careful the session doesn’t get too much into the metabolic zone as that is not the goal and will affect the loads used on the strength exercises.
You really do need that load to develop strength and the time under tension to stimulate hypertrophy.
So that concludes the first part of the series, stay tuned for the second method coming up this week!
Quick Session # 5: Hypertrophy Supersets
Posted by: | CommentsHeres some supersets i’ve been using to develop hypertrophy with an emphasis still on strength.
A Back Squat x 5 reps
B Walking Lunge x 8 each leg
A Trap Bar Deadlift x 4 reps
B Single Leg Squat x 8 each leg
A Weighted Chin x 5 Reps
B DB Rows x 8 each arm
A Close Grip Bench with 4s eccentric x 6 reps
B Narrow Grip Push-Ups to failure
A DB Press x 5 reps
B Single Arm Barbell Power Press x 8 each arm
Most are a simple bilateral strength movement supersetted with a unilateral synergistic movement. Extremely simple but good old tough training that works!! We usually do 4 or 5 sets of these pairs and these are examples taken from a variety of sessions for a variety of athletes. At the moment I have basketballers, badminton players and combat athletes doing some of these and have used them a lot with rugby players.
Give em a go and leave a comment to let me know how you get on!
BC
Quick Session # 4
Posted by: | CommentsThis session is part of the elite badminton programme at carnegie for some of the players there. They are moving into an intro power phase hence the introduction of basic power movements into this session with an emphasis on general strength predominantly. Give it a go and let me know how you get on by leaving a comment below!
Brendan
Quick Session # 3
Posted by: | CommentsHeres a neat little basic strength session for you. Total body, superset based, give it a go and let me know if you enjoyed it by leaving a comment below! Ive used this session this week with one of my heavyweight MMA fighters preparing in his strength phase amongst other stuff too of course. Rest is pretty much minimal throughout, try to keep working and you will improve your work capacity and basic strength with this session.
So you want to be an S&C coach? Part 3: Continuing your development!
Posted by: | CommentsFirstly, if you’ve missed any of the past 2 parts you should go back and read them before you read this.
Click here for part 1 which is all about getting the knowledge required.
Click here for part 2 where I look at how you can get your coaching experience.
This post is all about once you’ve got some experience and are working in the industry, how do you keep on evolving and progressing into the coach that you really want to be.
We all have specialist areas of interest within the umbrella term of strength and conditioning coach. You need to have a level of competency in all the areas of job which are:
- Coaching and designing strength and power sessions and programmes.
- Coaching and designing speed, movement, and conditioning sessions and programmes.
- Rehabilitation and injury mechanisms for your sports and all sports.
- Periodisation and annual planning for the training units above.
- Nutrition, lifestyle support, psychology basic understanding and application.
- Underpinning knowledge of anatomy, physiology, biomechanics, S&C principles.
- Monitoring and recovery and principles behind these.
- Comminication with coaches/athletes and clients. For some this comes easy, for others it has to be the primary area of focus as this is what really gets you results!!
- S&C for specific populations- Rugby, MMA, Youth, etc etc.
But within these areas (and you may include more than me) most people will have a specialist interest. For me it is the strength and power training as well as movement and agility training. But I also have a strong interest in nutrition and injury prevention too. There’s a lot to keep up to date with and there are so many sources of information out there to read/watch/listen to.
The hardest thing as a full time S&C coach for me is finding the time to keep up to date, but at the same time I personally believe that it is absolutely imperative to do so!! So managing your schedule to include reading time, reflection time etc is very important. You’ll never have as much free time as when you are studying and immediately following your studies when you’re looking for work, so I would make the most of it and try to get through as many books and DVDs as you can!
I still read a fair few books, but I find it easier to digest information through blogs, websites and DVD’s.
Here are a few websites/blogs that I would highly recommend you check out:
- Vern Gambettas blog on athletic development- a pioneer in the field with a huge amount of experience.
- Eric Cressey Blog- Eric comes up with some gems of knowledge generally on the corrective exercise side of things.
- Mike Boyles strengthcoach.com website- another pioneer in the field and a wealth of information on this site.
- Strengthcoach.com podcast- a great resource to listen to on your way to work.
- Strengthpower hour podcast- a great resource featuring the one and only Bill Kraemer. Well worth listening to purely for his gems of wisdom.
- NSCA online journals- a very good resource in general that you can tap into quickly and get some good info from.
- Professional Strength and Conditioning (UKSCA Journal), most of you will be members but the journal has good overviews of research areas that are worth reading.
- Precision Nutrition- John Berardi’s website has some great nutritional information for coaches that I’d highly recommend.
- EliteFTS website- a must for the strength and power training, this site has some great practical info (including a handful of articles from myself 
)
- TNation- A bit of a bodybuilding site but some good authors on there contributing some good stuff all be it with a physique slant. Still well worth checking out though.
- UK Athletics coaching website: Some great podcasts and articles on speed training, strength training recovery and more on here.
Reflection is the Way Forward!
One of the best ways I have found to improve my coaching is to find the time to regularly reflect on what it is I’m doing. I don’t mean sitting cross legged with some whale music in the background, unless you really feel the need, its more about finding 5 minutes to think about how that session went, or how your exercise selection could be improved for the next phase of training. I always carry a diary with me and regularly write notes when I have an idea for a movement or exercise for a specific population. I also scribble down websites to check out when people mention them to me in the gym, and anything else for that matter. I keep the pad by my bed at night too so that when I wake up in the night I can remember the ideas that come up (and pass it to my therapist). Incorporating this into your week will improve your performance as a coach, so make time to do it!
Continuing Education:
This is of course a key concept, not only for developing as a coach, but also for maintaining our accredited coach status with any reputable organization.
Here’s a few courses that I’d recommend you check out along with a load of books that are worth a read too:
- Mobilis Performance Injury prevention workshops: These are written by top physio Martin Haines. This guy is an encyclopedia of knowledge and experience. The courses are good, some is difficult to apply in an S&C setting but worth the investment.
- UKSCA Annual Conference: Always an excellent couple of days and a bargain at the price. Duncan French has done a great job organizing it these last few years.
- Movement Dynamics Physical Competency Workshop with Kelvin Giles: Kelvins philosophy has been a great influence on many coaches including myself. Get to his workshops if you can.
- Optimal Shoulder Performance- Cressey and Reinold. Another great product from these guys and well worth the investment if your are interested in this area.
- High Power Plyometrics DVD: Jim Radcliffe is an authority in the area. Fairly basic but good overview of plyometrics.
- Training for Warriors DVD- Martin Rooney: A good voerview of what a practicing coach is doing with their athletes. Great watching!
- Kelvin Giles Movement Dynamics- Physical Competency screening and athletic development manuals- The best screening process out there in my opinion from a leader in the athletic development field.
- Practical Programming for strength training- Rippletoe: A great guide to periodisation from a practicing coach. Well worth a read.
- Starting Strength- Roppletoe: An in depth look at the basic barbell exercises which form the cornerstone of most S&C programmes. Great investment.
- Developmental Essentials: IYCA manual: With contributions from some great coaches, this manual is a must if you work with young athletes.
- Tapering and peaking for optimal performance- Mujika: This is the text to get if you wanrt to learn from the authority on tapering. Truly a great resource.
- Athletic Development- Vern Gambetta. Need I say more? Buy the book.
- Nutrient Timing- Ivy and Portman: Released a while ago but a good look at the science and practice behind nutient timing.
- Sport Physiologuy for coaches- Sharkey and Gaskill: Some interesting stuff on monitoring training loads as well as basic physiology which is always good to go over again.
- Theory and application of modern strength and power methods- Thibaudeau: Great little text on strength and power training with a good overview on the more commonly used methods.
- Stretch to win- Frederick: Really good book on fascial and general stretching methods. Highly recommended.
- Qualitative analysis of human movement- Knudson. A great look at kinematic biomechanical analysis of movement. Helped me a lot during my MSc studies.
- Stability, Sport and Performance Movement- Elphinston: Great book recently released from a UK physio covering screening info, progressions and regressions from late stage rehab through to healthy.
How do you want to develop?
There’s a load of different topics covered on this list from strength training to stability and stretching to nutrition. All of which are part of the S&C coaches scope of works so to speak. You need to have a good understanding of all these areas from and theory and applied perspective. All the learning material you need was covered in part 1 of this series. When you are coaching everyday you will find the gaps in your knowledge through your experience which should lead you to the right resources to check out. Following this it is down to you as the individual to decide which areas you want to develop more or less than others which for most of us will be based on our personal interests as we all like to read the things we are interested in. However its still important to keep in touch with other areas that are important within the role. For me I’ll always be happy to read up on athletic development, strength and power training, and sport specific S&C, sometimes I need to push myself to read up on nutrition as there’s always something else that you can put to the top of the pile, even though I have an interest in this.
Where are you and where do you want to be?
Identifying your areas of development is a better way to develop your knowledge than simply reading random stuff you come across on the internet or wherever else. Its nice to have time to read what you want to read, I think this is very important, but I would also recommend having a kind of must read list, which should be based on your development needs as a coach. I try to get my interns to write up a competency map as I call it when they come into the programme which is basically a profile of where they are in terms of knowledge and experience coming into the post on a 1-5 scale with 5 being the best coach you can be in that area. I usually talk this through with the individual and then identify areas of development. It works very well You need to get to a baseline in each quality in order to be able to do the job well and this should be addressed first, from there you can choose to go down a specific path to improve your knowledge in that area. Then you can bring up your weak areas when you feel like they need improving. Very often this will be triggered by something that goes on at work, or a conversation with a colleague about programming etc which meakes you think you need to brush up in that area. These are all healthy things to be doing and will improve your competency as a coach no end.
Who’s in your network?
One of the main ways you can keep yourself sharp is to pick up the phone and call up someone else in S&C. Have you ever heard that phrase ‘you are the sum of the 5 people you spend the most time with’, make sure those 5 people challenge you in some way and from an S&C perspective get you to think about your programmes and ideas. Even if you decide to keep everything the same at least you’ve rationalized your programme.
So that completes part 3 and the series as a whole. Had a load of good feedback on this series which makes me think that it was probably worth writing! Again to your success, Brendan
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Quick Hypertrophy Session
Posted by: | CommentsHere is a basic hypertrophy session for the upper body that I have used this last 2 weeks in a 4 day upper/lower body split.
Its a tough but really good session incorporating hypertrophy supersets and time under tension through eccentrics, give it a try!! Don’t forget you need to earn the right to lift weights by mastering your bodyweight first, read this post for more info
Oh and don’t forget to sign up to my email list so you can download a load of free sttength and conditioning info including plyometric guidelines, a warm-up model and much more!!
Earn the right to load up!
Posted by: | CommentsThis is a session from my high performance badminton general prep programme and is part of a 3 day, total body development programme.
The goal of this session is to build work capacity in these players following a break from a tough competitive season. However the reason I put this in is to demonstrate the emphasis that I put on bodyweight movements such as push-ups in the programme. In this session which is done on mondays it is in the first superset of the day paired up with front squats. I’m a big believer in building body weight competency before loading people up with weight hence a great emphasis on push-ups in this opening phase. Its amazing how many people struggle with the most fundamental of movements including the stronger guys in the group I might add! Although you could say that badminton players don’t need large amounts of upper body strength its my belief that athletes at minimum need to be able to complete some good push-ups with excellent form! Putting in a few different variations in this way keeps it a little more varied, and provides a break in the set to allow for recovery. The athletes need to complete 6 reps before they have a break. They don’t need to complete all 18 reps straight but of course that is the goal of the phase and actually most of the group are pretty close to that after 3 sessions combined with all the other movements in the programme to back this up.
As Kevin Giles says you need to ‘Earn the right’ to progress! So get good at push-ups before you even think about bench pressing. I like my guys to be able to do 3 sets of 12 reps with perfect form before they move to dumbells or bench presses.
What do you think? Are you thinking about progression in this way with your athletes? If not I think you are missing one of the key concepts of the athletic development process!
Don’t forget you can sign up to my newsletter by entering your email in the sign up box, you will then be able to download a load of free stuff including my recovery guide that I give to all the athletes I train.
Good luck with your training and coaching people!
BC
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