Biceps, Benches, and STRONG Gym

In a stunning development, to coin a phrase, and a case of fantastic timing, my biceps are getting bigger as the warm weather approaches.  The secret has been dumbbell hammer curls, after happening upon the following explanation: beneath the bicep is the brachialis, ‘which has a larger cross sectional area than the bicep and therefore contributes more to upper arm thickness than any other muscle.’  The way to engage it is with dumbbell curls, the weight held vertically - which also does something for your brachioradialis, a forearm muscle.  

To my great surprise, this actually works on arms that have been impervious to straight bar curls.  I’m moving more weight with more muscle mass than before, and anyone who says they don’t want better looking arms is lying - or they don’t know how to get them.  

‘Guess what I just figured out,’ I sent in an e-mail to my old high school coach a week or two ago, going into the story about the floor press and learning to brace my upper body.  For all the talk about strained pecs or sore shoulders, I said, properly setting one’s shoulder blades does not seem to be offered as a solution.  

He pulled an example right out of memory.  ‘Well, it used to be.  Pat Casey described exactly that in STRENGTH AND HEALTH about 55 years ago.’  

Shoulder blades pinned together make for efficient motion in the shoulder joints. Pec muscles that are more involved - drawn like bowstrings as far back as possible - mean that more muscle is moving [hopefully] more weight.  So far, the floor presses are flying up, and in particular the first reps in bench sets are flying up, not with amazing weights but with better than I’ve done recently.  

Wow, if I can sport some bigger pipes and bench 315, that would make me . . . seriously cool.  

Programming will be the trick.  For the first time, I’ve dared to venture into Chapter 8 of Rippetoe and Baker’s PRACTICAL PROGRAMMING FOR STRENGTH TRAINING (Third Edition).  If I’m not an advanced lifter, then I’m as advanced as I’m going to be, and I have to find the most effective way possible to push my limits at this age and weight.  

Having run out the last dwindling reps of a long 8-5-2 progression, I first figured I’d reset the whole thing and back up for another charge.  However, it was in doing 5’s a week ago that I realized this would simply bring misery.  5’s with 370 were rough and slow, which would mean that three weeks later, 372.5 would be the same - and every rotation would be hideous as I tried to get up to 400 and beyond.  In fact, more than a year ago, I got up to 407.5 before I had to ditch 5’s.  In this latest cycle, I only got to 400.  Last time, I maxed 465, most recently, 445  - a few times in one workout, but I wasn’t going any further.  This probably means I was beating myself up with too many reps with very heavy weight.  

I did try something different about a year ago, Andy Baker’s Conjugate program, but I bailed out, fearing I was regressing.  I was doing all kinds of deadlifts: deficit, snatch grip, etc., and when it came time for a conventional pull, I struggled with 455, on a lift where I had hit 525.  To Hell with this, I thought.  

Did I quit too early?  Probably, but loss aversion is a powerful psychological reflex.  Strength is all about specificity, I figured, as in the neurological specificity of handling heavy weights, which meant my usual 3-2-1 progression bringing my dead back up to 527.5.  Conversely, my inclines, which became the focus as I guarded that shoulder in my benches, went from something I’d never done to a reasonable 250, by way of an 8-5-2.  

So what works, the blast furnace of intensity or a well calibrated series of adaptive steps?  

The way to delineate between novice, intermediate, and advanced lifters is by the rest intervals required between full-tilt training sessions.  A novice, especially in the example of a young high school athlete, can work through their best 5’s and be ready once again 48 hours later.  Really, this is an interaction between two other variables, the capacity for total tonnage versus the capacity for recovery.  As long as that teenager’s modest numbers do not overwhelm the growth empowering hormonal Perfect Storm inside his body, he can train hard three times a week.  

By the time this kid gets to college, he’s sporting a 200-300-400-500, but his rate of progress has slowed, which means that his 275-pound bench and 365-pound squat sets are heavy enough to demand significant recovery.  Now he needs a few days between workouts, and he’s an intermediate.  

Don’t be fooled by the term ‘Advanced.’  Flattering as it may be, those of us in the category are simply further along the curve of our strength potential.  We’re hardly superior to these other athletes.  In fact, even if our numbers are decent, we need a lot more time to recover after performing our magnificent feats.  

In Chapter 8, Rippetoe and Baker reason by analogy to explain Advanced programming.  ‘For the intermediate,’ they say, ‘the cycle is the week, while for the advanced lifter the cycle is the 8 [or 12] week period.’  They spell out different programs.

For example, in the intermediate Texas Method, the 5x5 rep scheme on a Monday is a volume workout to spur adaptation, which will then yield a 1x5 performance PR on Friday.  In between, on Wednesday, is a light ‘deload’ day.  Advanced level schemes are this same idea, just on a larger scale: a few weeks for each phase - ramping up, recovering, and then peaking.  If recovery takes more time, then so does adaptation.  

If those 5’s with 370 last week felt way worse than they should have, then the lesson for me is that I need more recovery - some right now and more in general.  However, since I hung in fairly well while facing blast furnace intensity, the template I’ve chosen for the next 12-plus weeks is the STRONG Gym program detailed on pp. 203 - 207.  Within its Accumulation, Transition, and Peaking phases are three week ascents, each followed by a deload week.  Other templates with more frequent deloads are available.  

In the meantime, I’ll take the hint on recovery, which means this already planned quarterly de-load week won’t even have one of those ‘neurological stim’ workouts.  (Talk about your loss aversion psychology.)

I should be in a hammock somewhere, sipping from drinks with little umbrellas in them, making grand plans for my bigger arms, stronger chest, and the numbers that drive progress.