FT Questions....

[Scott Stevenson]

Just wondering if there is a 5 day template out there? Only found a 3day template...

(no i dont want to change, dc is perfect for me, but a good friend of mine tought about that...)

Not that I'm aware of.

-S

[Jason Newman]

Hi all.
I have a few ideas as to what to do here but man I fo love a good topic of intelligent conversation.

#1 Issue is warm up sets. Mainly for thigh movements. I can do multiple warm up sets to get ready to squat or leg press etc. Or, I have done my quad and hamstring movements for the day before. Especially calves which leads to increased dorsiflexion in my squats.Possible issues are weakening of the muscles leading into llower weight moved on the compound movement. Issue 2 less overall work done due to less total sets.

#2 muscle rounds. For those of us who do no cardio and are in poor cardiovascular shape, it can often hinder the work we can do. For example my legs could do a MR of squats with 250ish but due to my cardio performance I only do 225lbs. Would it be advisible to add in some conditioning work to the week so that eventually I can do the poundages possible or shall one just stay at the 225lb?

[Scott Stevenson]

Hi all.
I have a few ideas as to what to do here but man I fo love a good topic of intelligent conversation.

#1 Issue is warm up sets. Mainly for thigh movements. I can do multiple warm up sets to get ready to squat or leg press etc. Or, I have done my quad and hamstring movements for the day before. Especially calves which leads to increased dorsiflexion in my squats.Possible issues are weakening of the muscles leading into llower weight moved on the compound movement. Issue 2 less overall work done due to less total sets.

If you are fatiguing yourself with your warm-ups in a way that hinders performance, then you have done too much. (The only exception would be that if you find you NEED To do that much warm-up for the sake of injury prevention, in which case it's a necessary evil.)

The question / issue of warm-ups is brought up regularly (here and on other boards). It's an individual thing - do what you need to do and if you're not sure what that is, then simple trial and error should help.

And I've mentioned this before: If you're not able to tune in during a warm-up, you may also be incapable of doing a good job of auto regulating, which is an important part of FT. I'll just leave it at that.

#2 muscle rounds. For those of us who do no cardio and are in poor cardiovascular shape, it can often hinder the work we can do. For example my legs could do a MR of squats with 250ish but due to my cardio performance I only do 225lbs. Would it be advisible to add in some conditioning work to the week so that eventually I can do the poundages possible or shall one just stay at the 225lb?

You'll adapt to the specific demands placed upon you. Cardio, HIIT, sled dragging or what have you will simply cut into recovery.

Exception would be if you're coming back from a lay off and are in horrible shape.

Lastly, free bar squats are not recommended for MR's. Part of your issue may be that you're expending too much energy racking and re-racking the bar. If you are doing free back back squats for MR's, I'd stop doing so - it's an injury that's found a place to happen.

-S

[Jason Newman]

I have swapped out the back squats for that reason mainly. Honestly the amount of times we fail in this program has me not anting to squat free bar. It just isnt a wise decision. More hacks, leg presses and such.

The warm ups order was more to save time as when I am in a pinch for time I have found the order of exercises to help a lot. Otherwise my stretches get cut out due to time.

I couldn't agree more that in order to auto regulate one needs to pyramid their weight up (which is their warm up essentially) very good point Scott!

[Scott Stevenson]

I have swapped out the back squats for that reason mainly. Honestly the amount of times we fail in this program has me not anting to squat free bar. It just isnt a wise decision. More hacks, leg presses and such.

The warm ups order was more to save time as when I am in a pinch for time I have found the order of exercises to help a lot. Otherwise my stretches get cut out due to time.

I couldn't agree more that in order to auto regulate one needs to pyramid their weight up (which is their warm up essentially) very good point Scott!

Jason,

You might re-read the sections in the book on how to do the different Set Types.

You really shouldn't be failing that often: Once / MR and perhaps even once for the loading sets (last set of your compound exercise, but with the option to fail on the isolation exercises).

You'd only take a set to failure when its safe to do so. Some might not feel safe doing DB flies to failure if they can't just dump the DBs, for instance.

Squats should be done in a power rack with safeties (or a mono lift with safety straps or what have you). You can do BB presses in a power rack, too - I almost never do OH BB presses unless in a power rack. SOOO much easier.

FYI, you can stretch between warm-ups for the next muscle groups, if this otherwise means you'd not fit the stretches in. E.g.

-Finish back

-Do first light warm-up for chest.

-Stretch back (perhaps even just one side, whichever is least developed or feels like it was not targeted as well during the training - you can check in on this very quickly)

-Next chest warm-up

-(Finish back stretching)

-Train chest

-S

[Altamir]

Scott,

Hope you can help me out with a little programming/progress issue I've run into. Not sure if you've seen this before, and I'm hoping you can maybe give me a clue what I might be doing wrong. (I've got my own theories which I'll share at the end).

So for two body parts, first back and now then legs. I've hit a weird (at least in my mind) sort of progression wall, where my loading sets have stalled, or moved forward VERY slowly. Very often I'll tie or pick up a rep on my first working set, and then progress slightly on my 2nd working set, after zig-zagging. However I am still seeing good progress on my Muscle Round sets (for legs this includes both thigh, and hamstring lifts), and saw my pump sets go very very well. So for both I'm obviously going to be swapping loading sets, to see if I can get progression moving forward again.

For back, I've stalled big twice now. Both resulting in changing the tempo I was doing my reps at. First was what I would call a controlled ballistic style, in response to stalling like that,I moved to a slow negative with a hold at the bottom. I saw progress again, but here I am stalled again. I know why I stalled at the ballistic style. I believe the slow negatives made it difficult to progress. I've recently changed it up to just a normal tempo, with a small focus on squeezing at the bottom and getting a good stretch at the top (or bottom depending on the direction of the back movement) and its too soon to tell exactly, but my back has not been this sore in a long time, so I think I may be on the right path. Not hugely concerned here. I bring it up more in the context of it falling into the same pattern of stalling on loading sets but nowhere else in the program.

Legs may be another issue. Never really had to worry about them, as I've always been able to easily make progress with them in one form or another my entire time training, since day one in the gym. I have a feeling in the back of my head that as I have progressed blast to blast, what used to work for me, no longer does and I may be working them a tier too high. I was going back through my log books and trying to look for clues. I go back to older blasts, and when I would hit tier 3, my 3rd zig-zag for my thigh movement I'd put up decent numbers. I only hit tier 3 once a blast, and in my more recent blasts, there is a trend where those 3rd thigh set numbers have slowly gotten worse. There seems to be a pattern of steady decline, even before hitting this current point of stalling. My quad and hamstring loading sets have still been progressing, maybe a rep or 2 per training session. Also been dealing with being somewhat unenthusiastic for lower MR days. I get into the gym, and get after it, don't get me wrong, but it's just not my favorite training day. (I bring this up, only as a possible clue.) During my last big growth push I certainly saw progress in my legs, so I'm not training in completely in vain. Just thinking I'm not firing at 100% here.

Everything else, chest, shoulders, calves, triceps, and biceps have all been progressing very well. I'm interested to hear your thoughts if something here jumps out at you. Thanks again for taking the time to read and respond, and share your knowledge and wisdom.

You're welcome, my man. Looking forward to seeing what the actually solution (or the first one!) is.

-S

Wasn't exactly sure which quote to reference that would make the most sense, so I figured why not start at the source.

Came back to update what changes I made that seems to have helped solved these issues. Thought it might also help a few other folks out if they run into these.

Back -
- For loading instead of changing the lifts I was doing, I swapped the order. I was starting with width and then thickness, now I am starting with thickness. This appeared to be enough novel stimulation to get things moving forward.
- Toned down my back pump sets a little bit. and by that I mean I stopped doing double 5's into the hole technical drop sets. I think I got caught up in my own zeal to make these things as difficult and taxing as humanly possible.
- Where possible, used my loading lifts as MRs the training day before using them as loading. Also went heavier on these MRs with about as strict as form as I could. Trying to hit in about the 3x4; x2 range.

Legs -
- Swapped two of my loading sets for machine based sets that I can use a substantial amount of weight for, allowing for smaller progress jumps. Also ones that lent themselves to MRs.
- Where possible, used my loading lifts as MRs the training day before using them as loading. Also went heavier on these MRs with about as strict as form as I could. Trying to hit in about the 3x4; x2 range.
- Dropped my legs down a tier. I used to run tier 1 for a week, then 2, for as long as I could, then 3 at the end. I'm currently doing 1 for 2 weeks and 2 for two weeks.

I also shortened by blasts from 6 weeks to 4. I am still playing with this a little bit and may slowly add length, but for right now this feels correct. I'm finding I am HORRIBLE at telling when I'm over reaching. and simply would just push forward, because I've got to make sure I'm over reached before my cruise.

I also feel that the 2 week cruise is perhaps a bit too long for me. When I used to power lift everyone else would deload and get stronger. I would deload exactly the same and come back feeling like crap. It was only when I started hitting semi-decent, but not difficult singles in on my deload would I actually come back stronger. I understand that FT takes this into consideration as you are training with good intensity on your cruises. But it always felt like I came back starting my blasts a little sluggish, and I rarely experienced the huge strength rebound and gains that Scott would speak of. Again, this may be me just over thinking, or making things up to defend my thought process. The future will show more.

Results -
Back was already sort of coming out of a rut, and this seemed to help kick in into moving forward quicker. I also found I REALLY like doing MRs for these heavy. Feels very very good.

Legs felt like a miracle. Within two weeks I felt extremely fresh and starting hitting good PRs. I've rolled into a cruise feeling extremely good and excited to train. I'm now excited to train on ALL of my training days. Mentally this appears to have put me in the right place. I've gone from going and trying to give my best, to chopping at the bit to get into the gym and tear it apart. Big difference.

I'll also add I did this ALL while at a caloric deficient. Goes to show you what the right programming can do.

Hope this helps someone else out in the future who may run into programming issues. Thanks once again for the bits of guidance and hand holding Scott. Hoping with what I've learned here I can keep this moving forward for a bit, and also adapt better when I hit a wall.

[Scott Stevenson]

GREAT Feedback, Altamir!!!

THANK YOU!

Some thoughts on cruising to add to what you've said:

Just in case - the Intensive Cruise duration is based on he length of the blast, i.e., would be about ⅓ the length of the blast, so 4 week blast would mean maybe an 8 - 10 day cruise, but a 6 week blast would require about a 2 week cruise.

Also, in your case, some tweaks to the cruise could help you out, too:
1.)Consider how you spread the training out in terms of the days off at the end of he cruise (~⅓ of cruise period). You might stretch your training days over something more like ¾ of the cruise period, so that you're not taking 4 days away from the gym entirely, for instance.

2.) If you're dieting down in caloric deficit, using the cruise period to INCREASE kcal and produce some weight gain can be very effective. I've dieted a lot of folks this way (long before FT): Diet for 3-4 weeks and then have a week with higher carb and kcal to re-set motivation, restore thyroid and gain a bit of muscle with an overreaching effect. This woudl fit really well with a 4 week blast set up, I think, esp. as you get leaner and need to be more careful about muscle loss.

-S

[Altamir]

GREAT Feedback, Altamir!!!

THANK YOU!

Some thoughts on cruising to add to what you've said:

Just in case - the Intensive Cruise duration is based on he length of the blast, i.e., would be about ⅓ the length of the blast, so 4 week blast would mean maybe an 8 - 10 day cruise, but a 6 week blast would require about a 2 week cruise.

Also, in your case, some tweaks to the cruise could help you out, too:
1.)Consider how you spread the training out in terms of the days off at the end of he cruise (~⅓ of cruise period). You might stretch your training days over something more like ¾ of the cruise period, so that you're not taking 4 days away from the gym entirely, for instance.

2.) If you're dieting down in caloric deficit, using the cruise period to INCREASE kcal and produce some weight gain can be very effective. I've dieted a lot of folks this way (long before FT): Diet for 3-4 weeks and then have a week with higher carb and kcal to re-set motivation, restore thyroid and gain a bit of muscle with an overreaching effect. This woudl fit really well with a 4 week blast set up, I think, esp. as you get leaner and need to be more careful about muscle loss.

-S

Thanks for the additional tid bits here. I'd actually really like to do what you've suggested in the first point, push the last training day of my cruise a bit out. I think I'll be hitting that Tuesday evening, and I'll be starting my next blast Saturday morning, so 3½ days. A few blasts ago I switched from Basic to Turbo and I'm finding that's helping A LOT as well. Normally it'd be a week or more between the last lower muscle round day on a cruise, and my first lower loading session, now its a little bit of additional leg work only 3½ days out.

I'm actually filling in calories and a bit of carbs through this cruise, and I'm hungrier than ever. It always goes like this for me. The climb back up always seems to be worse than cutting down. Not sure if that's typical or not. After awhile, I seem to just get numb to feeling of being hungry, but coming out my body sort of "wakes up" to the idea that there are additional calories out there.

I really appreciate the extra pearls of wisdom you've shared with me hear. Training has really taken off since making these adjustments, and I'm excited to continue that, and continue to learn.

[732mikee]

I was wondering if I can get enough variety (A,B,C) with loading sets for thighs with just hack squat sled, DB bulgarian split squats, DB lunges and leg press?

I'm asking because I had a disc issue / sciatica a while back, and would like to stay away from things that are going to load my spine like BB squats etc.

I just started my 4th week of a Tier 2 blast.

[Scott Stevenson]

I was wondering if I can get enough variety (A,B,C) with loading sets for thighs with just hack squat sled, DB bulgarian split squats, DB lunges and leg press?

I'm asking because I had a disc issue / sciatica a while back, and would like to stay away from things that are going to load my spine like BB squats etc.

I just started my 4th week of a Tier 2 blast.

Buy a hip squat belt from ironmind and you're good to go.

(Run a search on here and you'll see some other posts covering exercises you can do with this sucker. )

-S