Guest viewing is limited

DC, Blood & Guts, & Low Volume/High Intensity

sparks2012

Well-known member
After being on these boards for a couple months now, I'm seeing DC style training being brought up time and time again. I wasn't familiar with it, so I've researched it a little bit. It seems that Trudel's and Yates' views on training are closely linked as far as having only one "balls to the wall" working set, and hitting only one movement or so for each muscle group. I'm a huge fan of rest-pause techniques, and I use them often, but the only thing that concerns me with DC training is the fact that there's only 3 training days in a week, and lower volume than what I'm accustomed to. I've tried an outline of Blood & Guts before and I loved how quick my sessions were, in and out within 1 hour. I got bored with the program though because there wasn't a lot of variety, so I dropped it and just took the pieces that I liked. I'm curious to see what other members may think of DC/B&G style training, and maybe see if I was doing something wrong that caused me to lose interest in the program.
 
The thing with these type of programs is that even though there's only "one" true set, if you're doing it with the kind of intensity required, the rest will be absolutely critical. As much as the volume is low, these are BRUTAL on your cns. You simply can't maintain the type of intensity required to get the best results unless you're eating and resting plenty.
 
The thing with these type of programs is that even though there's only "one" true set, if you're doing it with the kind of intensity required, the rest will be absolutely critical. As much as the volume is low, these are BRUTAL on your cns. You simply can't maintain the type of intensity required to get the best results unless you're eating and resting plenty.

Thanks bro. Maybe I wasn't REALLY giving it my all on the working sets, I think some more research is needed before I commit to a program like this. I also think a training partner or a coach would be extremely beneficial for this type of training since you're pushing past failure.
 
Thanks bro. Maybe I wasn't REALLY giving it my all on the working sets, I think some more research is needed before I commit to a program like this. I also think a training partner or a coach would be extremely beneficial for this type of training since you're pushing past failure.

I would say these types are impossible to do solo. You simply can't mentally push the way you could with the confidence of a spot. Even safety bars and such just don't give that same comfort blanket.

I always train solo and think I do a pretty good job pushing the limits but I know I lift more anytime I meet up with someone that can push me.
 
I would say these types are impossible to do solo. You simply can't mentally push the way you could with the confidence of a spot. Even safety bars and such just don't give that same comfort blanket.

I always train solo and think I do a pretty good job pushing the limits but I know I lift more anytime I meet up with someone that can push me.

Yeah. I've been in the solo boat for some time. I've made more progress since then since I don't have any distractions, but on the same token I can't push as hard as would like to on some things.
 
Yeah. I've been in the solo boat for some time. I've made more progress since then since I don't have any distractions, but on the same token I can't push as hard as would like to on some things.

This is exactly my conundrum ha. I love being on my own schedule, pace, etc but not having a spot makes pushing the limits impossible on some lifts. Having someone to create competition also seems to drive me personally to higher levels. That's just something that can't be replicated internally
 
You simply can't mentally push the way you could with the confidence of a spot. Even safety bars and such just don't give that same comfort blanket.

Not to mention, help with forced reps and or negs. ie: see Mentzer "Heavy Duty" style HIT (since you talked about Yates) that help the trainee go past his regular positive failure.
This kind of training, as booneman says, is rather brutal, especially on the CNS. And given the choice, most people will opt to do more sets and use more frequency thru the week.
 
Not to mention, help with forced reps and or negs. ie: see Mentzer "Heavy Duty" style HIT (since you talked about Yates) that help the trainee go past his regular positive failure.
This kind of training, as booneman says, is rather brutal, especially on the CNS. And given the choice, most people will opt to do more sets and use more frequency thru the week.

Right, I'm not afraid of putting in the work. I'll go until I know the next rep won't make it back up, but even then the protocols in the aforementioned training methods require you to push past that. Without a partner, or at the very least, a reliable spotter it's damn near impossible. I use rest-pause sets frequently but I'm still not getting in those negatives past the point of failure. I'm fine with lower volume, as long as I know for a fact that I left everything and then some in the gym. Without those added intensity techniques though, I feel like I didn't do enough.
 
Right, I'm not afraid of putting in the work. I'll go until I know the next rep won't make it back up, but even then the protocols in the aforementioned training methods require you to push past that. Without a partner, or at the very least, a reliable spotter it's damn near impossible. I use rest-pause sets frequently but I'm still not getting in those negatives past the point of failure. I'm fine with lower volume, as long as I know for a fact that I left everything and then some in the gym. Without those added intensity techniques though, I feel like I didn't do enough.

and with this type of training the fact will be that you didn't ha.
 
As boone said it you need a really good training partner to get this done right. Watch dorians blood and guts video from back in the day, his partner knew him well and was able to know when to push him and how much. Thats the difference. Its close to impossible to do by yourself because you need that last little budge on that absolute last rep to get it all out. I think that if you execute the workouts how they are intended, you simply would not be able to train or even want to train the next day. Also in those programs, it is imperitive that the next time you train those same excersizes you increase the weights or the reps. This alone makes it very motivating and makes perfect sense as to how it produces the gains it does. Personally i have this type of training on my list for this winter. Once i am cleared to go into a surplus and health wise i am all set, i will be hitting it hard with A DC/ HIT program.
 
As boone said it you need a really good training partner to get this done right. Watch dorians blood and guts video from back in the day, his partner knew him well and was able to know when to push him and how much. Thats the difference. Its close to impossible to do by yourself because you need that last little budge on that absolute last rep to get it all out. I think that if you execute the workouts how they are intended, you simply would not be able to train or even want to train the next day. Also in those programs, it is imperitive that the next time you train those same excersizes you increase the weights or the reps. This alone makes it very motivating and makes perfect sense as to how it produces the gains it does. Personally i have this type of training on my list for this winter. Once i am cleared to go into a surplus and health wise i am all set, i will be hitting it hard with A DC/ HIT program.

Right, when I was using an outline of Dorian's program I was using the same exercises BUT the caveat to that was that I wasn't getting the most out each session that I could possibly get due to not being able to accomplish certain aspects of the program because I didn't have a partner. That led to stagnation, which led to loss of motivation, which led me to drop the program. I still have very high hopes for this style of programming and would jump at the chance of being able to run it, the right way.
 
Right, when I was using an outline of Dorian's program I was using the same exercises BUT the caveat to that was that I wasn't getting the most out each session that I could possibly get due to not being able to accomplish certain aspects of the program because I didn't have a partner. That led to stagnation, which led to loss of motivation, which led me to drop the program. I still have very high hopes for this style of programming and would jump at the chance of being able to run it, the right way.

where are you located? maybe we can find you a gym buddy around here haha
 
Haha, unlikely at the moment. I'm stationed in the UK, and I haven't seen many members from around this area, if any at all.

theres a few guys from the uk here. bdcc is prob the biggest name... he can prob tell you some of the others ha
 
Where in the UK are you? :)
 
Back
Top