The Maximus Pact

[Shadowblaze]

Day 103:

It was the first day back from the deload today and I felt great, I’m finally 180lbs. It was a great lift too, I went with my closest friend.

I was a bit weaker in some lifts but that’s expected after a deload.

The physique is looking absurd too, not crazy vascular anymore but bigggg.

 

[Dustin07]

how was the concert?! who opened for them?

 

[Shadowblaze]

how was the concert?! who opened for them?

It was great bro!

They had a band called “bad religion” opening for them. Have you heard of them?

The offspring had a few songs that they didn’t even sing, like hey Jude from the beetles and paranoid by black sabbath.

 

[Shadowblaze]

My shoulder peak is higher than my bicep peak lol

Back has always been my weak point though, it’s just hard to grow and I have very high inserting lats.

 

[Dustin07]

It was great bro!

They had a band called “bad religion” opening for them. Have you heard of them?

thats an awesome line up. around 15+ years ago I went down to ACL (Austin City Limits) which is sorta like a modern woodstock. I saw a ton of bands there but among the punk side was Social Distortion (bad religion reminds me of them). saw some totally unrelated bands that were also fantastic though like Gomez, Empire of the Sun, and Airborne Toxic Event, too.

 

[Shadowblaze]

This is my new squat ROM with a 35lb plate under my feet. Practically at parallel.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 104:

I had a great leg day today and did some abs too, I’m doing higher ROM on squat now. I’m a bit weaker since it’s my first lift after the deload week but that’s normal.

 

[Shadowblaze]

What do you guys think of Larry wheels? Do you guys know of the Larry wheels curse?

The main reason I ask is he’s really popular among younger lifters so I’m curious if you guys know him.

He’s always been a role model for me in terms of getting stronger. I believe he had potential to be the strongest person in history. He deadlifted 930x3 while being shredded lean at 260, probably could’ve done 1000x1 at the time. When he pulled 930x3 he was also on 400mg test and a low dose of tren (saw him talk about it on a podcast) I don’t know much about steroids but I do know that he’s taken a lot more in the past and that wasn’t a absurdly high dose for him. He also benched 700lbs on 200mg test and nothing else.
Imagine him at 350lbs, that could be the strongest person to ever grace the face of the earth if you ask me.

 

[Dustin07]

Larry Wheels has a fantastic physique, he looks like a built NFL Football player who kept building. the taper, pecs and arms are phenomenal. although I can only imagine him at 350lbs would be dead shortly thereafter.

This is my new squat ROM with a 35lb plate under my feet. Practically at parallel.

getting closer, how did it feel to push depth a little? It can take some practice. when I got into olympic lifting my flexibility and ROM developed much better and I finally started hitting good depth, and then eventually A2G, and then I learned the value of a strong lumbar and not allowing it to flex in the hole.

here's a pic I found in my log of my boy burrying a squat last March, he did hit parallel but the screen cap is on the way back up so IMO, he's still above parallel at this point even though the picture perspective isn't the best for catching that aspect of the ROM

But what I like about it, I think this was a 325lb rep for him at the time, is good strong back position, no butt wink, you can't tell here but his heels are firmly planted and his spine is largely in a neutral position even though his chin doesn't look tucked.

just my personal observations and opinions as a guy who's never squatted 405. someone like Hyde who is routinely hitting 500+ would have better feedback. either way, progress is progress and we're proud of you!

 

[Shadowblaze]

Larry Wheels has a fantastic physique, he looks like a built NFL Football player who kept building. the taper, pecs and arms are phenomenal. although I can only imagine him at 350lbs would be dead shortly thereafter.



getting closer, how did it feel to push depth a little? It can take some practice. when I got into olympic lifting my flexibility and ROM developed much better and I finally started hitting good depth, and then eventually A2G, and then I learned the value of a strong lumbar and not allowing it to flex in the hole.

View attachment 258260

here's a pic I found in my log of my boy burrying a squat last March, he did hit parallel but the screen cap is on the way back up so IMO, he's still above parallel at this point even though the picture perspective isn't the best for catching that aspect of the ROM

But what I like about it, I think this was a 325lb rep for him at the time, is good strong back position, no butt wink, you can't tell here but his heels are firmly planted and his spine is largely in a neutral position even though his chin doesn't look tucked.


View attachment 258261


just my personal observations and opinions as a guy who's never squatted 405. someone like Hyde who is routinely hitting 500+ would have better feedback. either way, progress is progress and we're proud of you!

Yeah at 350 he’d put his health at risk, I know that’s why he stepped back from powerlifting too.

Do you know Andrey Smaev?

The depth feels pretty good, with the powerlifting heeled shoes ill get an extra inch or a little less, so I’ll probably hit depth when those arrive.

Your boy is very strong.

Thanks for the encouragement too!

 

[Hyde]

This is my new squat ROM with a 35lb plate under my feet. Practically at parallel.

You need to stop listening to dumb AI. Given it’s had years to bake, I’m amazed ChatGPT can’t scrape images well yet apparently, but even Ray Charles can see your hip crease isn’t close to the top of your knee (the definition of parallel).

This is right out of the Powerlifting United rulebook to show what breaking parallel is. Note that a squat only to parallel would have the hip joint dot in line with top of knee joint (not the quad, which can stick up much higher):

This is my first rep from my set with 501 yesterday:

The important thing is you’re making safe progress on ROM here, but you also deserve to understand what is what. This is a big improvement from the last depth picture you posted, at least a couple inches more.

What do you guys think of Larry wheels? Do you guys know of the Larry wheels curse?

The main reason I ask is he’s really popular among younger lifters so I’m curious if you guys know him.

He’s always been a role model for me in terms of getting stronger. I believe he had potential to be the strongest person in history. He deadlifted 930x3 while being shredded lean at 260, probably could’ve done 1000x1 at the time. When he pulled 930x3 he was also on 400mg test and a low dose of tren (saw him talk about it on a podcast) I don’t know much about steroids but I do know that he’s taken a lot more in the past and that wasn’t a absurdly high dose for him. He also benched 700lbs on 200mg test and nothing else.
Imagine him at 350lbs, that could be the strongest person to ever grace the face of the earth if you ask me.

He’s a very gifted awesome lifter, one in a million. Like you said, what someone is taking at the moment isn’t indicative of what they did to get a previous foundation, but it’s also not really indicative of how other people will respond. Or that they would do much more taking a ton more - surviving large amounts of gear and also not getting injured with it can be tough to do. Same as the notion of him ever being able to get to 350. He had to kill himself with food to get to 300; there’s awesome memes of him struggling to eat.

 

[Dustin07]

The important thing is you’re making safe progress on ROM here, but you also deserve to understand what is what. This is a big improvement from the last depth picture you posted, at least a couple inches more.

He’s a very gifted awesome lifter, one in a million. Like you said, what someone is taking at the moment isn’t indicative of what they did to get a previous foundation, but it’s also not really indicative of how other people will respond. Or that they would do much more taking a ton more - surviving large amounts of gear and also not getting injured with it can be tough to do.

I think about Ronnie Coleman a lot these days.

 

[Shadowblaze]

You need to stop listening to dumb AI. Given it’s had years to bake, I’m amazed ChatGPT can’t scrape images well yet apparently, but even Ray Charles can see your hip crease isn’t close to the top of your knee (the definition of parallel).

This is right out of the Powerlifting United rulebook to show what breaking parallel is. Note that a squat only to parallel would have the hip joint dot in line with top of knee joint (not the quad, which can stick up much higher):

View attachment 258263

This is my first rep from my set with 501 yesterday:

View attachment 258264

The important thing is you’re making safe progress on ROM here, but you also deserve to understand what is what. This is a big improvement from the last depth picture you posted, at least a couple inches more.



He’s a very gifted awesome lifter, one in a million. Like you said, what someone is taking at the moment isn’t indicative of what they did to get a previous foundation, but it’s also not really indicative of how other people will respond. Or that they would do much more taking a ton more - surviving large amounts of gear and also not getting injured with it can be tough to do. Same as the notion of him ever being able to get to 350. He had to kill himself with food to get to 300; there’s awesome memes of him struggling to eat.

Yessir, I’m gonna try to move up to a 45lb plate under my feet next time and with the squat shoes giving me an extra height boost too I hope I’ll be at parallel soon.

ChatGPT bugs sometimes lmao, it gives phantom answers.

Do you know Sam Sulek and Andrey Smaev?

 

[Dustin07]

I know its humbling. In January I started out just trying to squat an empty barbell, then 95lbs for 10. But if you can airsquat with full ROM, can you hit depth with very light weight?

 

[Shadowblaze]

I know its humbling. In January I started out just trying to squat an empty barbell, then 95lbs for 10. But if you can airsquat with full ROM, can you hit depth with very light weight?

Yeah I can hit depth, I can go incredibly deep pretty easily without straining. The only reason I don’t is because I’m scared it will worsen my autoimmune, not because of the deep position itself.

 

[Hyde]

Yessir, I’m gonna try to move up to a 45lb plate under my feet next time and with the squat shoes giving me an extra height boost too I hope I’ll be at parallel soon.

ChatGPT bugs sometimes lmao, it gives phantom answers.

Do you know Sam Sulek and Andrey Smaev?

Yeah I’m familiar with both of them. Sam seems like a very nice guy, and I think most of the hate he gets boils down to some people being jealous that he’s doing what he wants and making progress that way. He just wants to bodybuild and share his journey.

Now Andrey is truly a freak, not just genetically but his single-minded focus on building what he wants to achieve. Doing multiple mini training sessions daily for things like forearms, 10-12,000 calorie diet of basically whatever is on sale to fuel his insane muscle, etc. I feel a bit bad for him in some ways, but admire just as much.

I know it’s humbling. In January I started out just trying to squat an empty barbell, then 95lbs for 10. But if you can airsquat with full ROM, can you hit depth with very light weight?

It took me a solid year after the first time I “squat 405” to be able to do it at proper depth once I learned what that was. You just have to slowly build up that bottom-end hole strength to catch up, which takes a minute.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 105:

I had an amazing upper day today. I hit 235x5 on incline and progressed hard on most lifts. My arms look insane while I’m doing pulling movements. They look inflated now that I’m on my supplement stack.

I’m 181lbs now.

My nose is so dry which is always the first symptom I get when I get sick, so I’m gonna take a ton of glutamine and vitamin d and get some good Z’s tonight.

 

[Dustin07]

I like to pound elderberry, vitamin C, pho, and a bourbon hot toddy instead of NyQuil at the early stages of a cold coming on.

How is your carb intake? I can always tell when my carbs are low cause my arms feel smol, lol

Ps: the pho has to be legit, a good quality bone broth from real Vietnamese recipes not fake like beef broth cube stuff

 

[Shadowblaze]

I like to pound elderberry, vitamin C, pho, and a bourbon hot toddy instead of NyQuil at the early stages of a cold coming on.

How is your carb intake? I can always tell when my carbs are low cause my arms feel smol, lol

Ps: the pho has to be legit, a good quality bone broth from real Vietnamese recipes not fake like beef broth cube stuff

I took my glutamine, 30k iu vitamin d and 1.5g of vitamin c. Since I lifted glutamine is important for immune recovery.

I don’t track my carb intake, I used to track everything but since I got my malabsorption condition there’s no point since I may be eating a certain amount of something but am not absorbing it.

I’ve heard the praises of bone broth for immune health a few times now. I think it may be worth a shot.

 

[Dustin07]

I don’t track my carb intake, I used to track everything but since I got my malabsorption condition there’s no point since I may be eating a certain amount of something but am not absorbing it.

how do you know if your body is absorbing it if you don't know if you gave it to your body?
anyways my point is when on a cut my carb intake is about half of normal, and probably 1/3 of a bulk or strength cycle and the difference is noticeable for me when lifting. much harder to secure a good pump.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 105:

I had an amazing upper day today. I hit 235x5 on incline and progressed hard on most lifts. My arms look insane while I’m doing pulling movements. They look inflated now that I’m on my supplement stack.

I’m 181lbs now.

My nose is so dry which is always the first symptom I get when I get sick, so I’m gonna take a ton of glutamine and vitamin d and get some good Z’s tonight.

Gaining a bit too much rn, roughly 2lbs of actual weight a week. I’m gonna tone down the bulk slightly. I wanna gain about 1-1.5lbs a week.

 

[Shadowblaze]

how do you know if your body is absorbing it if you don't know if you gave it to your body?
anyways my point is when on a cut my carb intake is about half of normal, and probably 1/3 of a bulk or strength cycle and the difference is noticeable for me when lifting. much harder to secure a good pump.

Yeah that makes sense. When I was tracking my food it just got too stressful after a while so I stopped. I’m fine without it personally, if I feel good I am good.

 

[Dustin07]

Yeah that makes sense. When I was tracking my food it just got too stressful after a while so I stopped. I’m fine without it personally, if I feel good I am good.

its a total pain in the ass. I do it off and on to get a reality check of where I am.
Like if I'm bulking and I know I want to slow bulk say 500 extra calories a day I'll probably track for 1-4 weeks and then I'll put it on cruise control. same with a cut, but after 20 years of this game I can pretty much look at a meal and tell you the macros/calories half the time within a reasonable margin of error.

like for instance if I were to come home and have a drink a night with my wife, I know right there I can easily remove 80-200 calories a day x 7 days = 560-1400 calories a week. I mean right there I'm half way to a lb a week on the top end.

and if I'm bulking I know that I can add a rice bowl every day preWO, thats 300 calories, 71g carbs, 2100 extra calories a week = 2/3 of the way to a lb a week. (although metabolism tends to ramp up with the calorie intake for the first few weeks).

its do as I say, not as I do. when people come to me at work and ask for advice on how to lose weight I always tell them to get a calorie tracker, track every single thing that touches their mouth for a month, then talk to me. If they won't do that then I'm not going to invest additional time into them, personally. after 6 months to a year most people can eyeball their food responsibly.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Day 106:

I’m not gonna post the photos from my tracking app today since I cut back on volume since my nose was dry and painful all day today. If I am coming down with something I shouldn’t train too hard.

Nevertheless I still progressed and applied myself, that’s what matters. I hit 385x5 on squat (heels elevated by 45s this time)

 

[Shadowblaze]

I’m sick again lol, it’s not severe but I will take a few days off the gym and work.

 

[Shadowblaze]

Squat shoes came in, they are very thick. But the grip is insane

 

[akboom87]

What is your vitamin c intake like? I have noticed the last 2 years have been pretty good sickness wise. The difference I add 100grams of pineapple to my morning shake and eat raw bell peppers everyday.

 

[Shadowblaze]

What is your vitamin c intake like? I have noticed the last 2 years have been pretty good sickness wise. The difference I add 100grams of pineapple to my morning shake and eat raw bell peppers everyday.

I’ve been taking 500mg to 1g per day recently. Is that not enough?

 

[akboom87]

I’ve been taking 500mg to 1g per day recently. Is that not enough?

Yes that should be good.

 

[gphagan1]

Elderberry is a good one to add in too. I never do the vaccines. During the Winter I take extra Vit C, D, Zinc, Garlic and Elderberry. Between that and Multi XT and all the other supplements I don’t get sick much, ha, even getting around our little Grandchildren.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I’m gonna start boxing when I’m not sick anymore. Not gonna be taking lessons or anything and not gonna try to pursue it at a high level but just training the physicality of it. I don’t do enough cardio anyway.

 

[akboom87]

I’m gonna start boxing when I’m not sick anymore. Not gonna be taking lessons or anything and not gonna try to pursue it at a high level but just training the physicality of it. I don’t do enough cardio anyway.

You are up in the north country right? Another super fun activity and great cardio is hockey/ice skating. Played for 17 years still love to go skating when I can.

Boxing is something I want to get into as well same deal just a bag to beat around and just the physicality of it.

 

[Shadowblaze]

You are up in the north country right? Another super fun activity and great cardio is hockey/ice skating. Played for 17 years still love to go skating when I can.

Boxing is something I want to get into as well same deal just a bag to beat around and just the physicality of it.

Yeah, ice hockey is our sport up here in the true north. I’ve never played hockey personally, I don’t have that kinda coordination.
One of the reasons I wanna get into boxing is because my gym has a free boxing gym inside of it.

Boxing is a heavily technique and reaction based sport so you actually need hands on fighting / sparring experience and hands on lessons to truly get great at it. I’m just trying to build the physicality foundation right now.

 

[Dustin07]

I’m sick again lol, it’s not severe but I will take a few days off the gym and work.

its crazy man I haven't seen so many people sick since before covid, seems like its everyone I know even on the internets, so it's not like its a regional thing or just one household.

 

[gphagan1]

its crazy man I haven't seen so many people sick since before covid, seems like its everyone I know even on the internets, so it's not like its a regional thing or just one household.

 

[Shadowblaze]

can I still work out with PIP?
Im going for my first injection in a week and was wondering If I can still do all my heavy lifting and sprinting If I have PIP (like belt squats and other compound exercises.)

 

[Hyde]

can I still work out with PIP?
Im going for my first injection in a week and was wondering If I can still do all my heavy lifting and sprinting If I have PIP (like belt squats and other compound exercises.)

Yes, but it can be harder from tighter muscle there unless you did the injection very recently prior. For example, I don’t inject my quads unless I’m about to go squat, or the days right after so they have time to recover before I use them again. But I won’t pin them the 2 days prior of squatting because then I’ve found they’ll be tighter. Doing it right before though, things don’t have time for PIP to set in, and the extra bloodflow from working the area seems to decrease total PIP later.

If you are going to train legsthe day or two after a quad shot, be willing to feel it out & pivot to a bit lower RPE work if necessary.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I hope to be back in the gym on Monday. Though the training next week may get a bit spotty, I have my first injection on Tuesday and then it’s my moms birthday on Wednesday so I may be celebrating with her.

I’m working tmrw but that’s just because they need me for a verification.

 

[Hyde]

I hope to be back in the gym on Monday. Though the training next week may get a bit spotty, I have my first injection on Tuesday and then it’s my moms birthday on Wednesday so I may be celebrating with her.

I’m working tmrw but that’s just because they need me for a verification.

Do what you can & enjoy that family time! Momma will always love seeing you for her bday.

 

[Shadowblaze]

still not feeling great, been throwing up. May have to take some more time off from lifting.

 

[gphagan1]

Yeah man, get you some rest this weekend and heal up. The lifting will be there when you feel better..

 

[Shadowblaze]

Im still a bit foggy and messed up with the flu so forgive me if my explanations may be poor on these.
I used to always train the way other people would tell me, whether that was from arnold, ronnie coleman, or older people in the gym. I did this for 5 years because I thought what others said was automatically true and I was new to lifting. After 4 years of doing this and the science based community blowing up and debunking so many old studies I decided to train how I wanted to and saw the best results.
Even the studies that are true arent true for everyone, I saw a fitness youtuber called Ryan Humiston actually examine the old studies on training heavy vs training lighter that showed that heavier sets increase strength more. He reached out to the people conducting the studies and got the actual powerpoint results of every single individual in the study and while yes, overall the heavier training group gained more strength, certain individuals in the lighter groups actually gained more strength
He also did this for studies examining training volume and what they found was that every single individual responded differently to volume, and while yes there was a trend between volume and growth which is what the study conclusion was based on, there was still highly individual results.

So over the 2 years of me coming to these realizations I started writing down my hot takes, that are true for me. (may not be for you) and I wanna know what you think of these.

#1
training heavy and training light increase your strength gains identically
- I have never noticed any improvement in training with 85% of my 1rm as compared to 60% of my 1rm when it comes to improving strength.
-modern studies (in trained individuals) do show heavier sets very slightly outperform light sets in terms of improving 1rm, but the difference isnt nearly as much as we previously thought.
which is why I came to the conclusion that sets of 3 reps and sets of 15 reps increase strength the same amount.

#2
ROM / the stretch has little effect on muscle growth in and of itself and mainly needlessly fatigues you
-the only time ROM has an effect on muscle growth is when it changes the muscles used. For example like Hyde was mentioning with my squat depth, the deeper you go the more glutes are involved, in that case more ROM increases glute growth. But the fact that the stretch is increased itself has no effect on muscle growth
-modern studies in trained individuals show that the stretch doesn't produce more gains.

#3
Deload weeks aren't typically necessary. But rest days are very necessary.
-When it comes to this is what I have noticed from personal experience. Rest days where you do absolutely nothing and just relax are very necessary for maximum performance, but taking a full week off is overkill and wont produce too much more. (granted I dont squat 650 like Hyde does so him taking deload weeks will definitely be more necessary than me taking deloads, but Ive found that as long as you take 2 rest days a week you can keep fatigue at bay.)
-Im gonna stop taking deload weeks and start taking rest days more.

#4
You can self diagnose muscular type injuries much better than standard physios. (not good, athletic based physios that work with pro athletes and are specialized)
- in my experience physios are a waste of money (not sports specific rehab specialists but standard physios)
they usually work on sedentary people and just cant rehab or diagnose well.
-The best thing you can do for a muscle strain is listen to your body and slowly build back the range of motion you cant do because of your injury, physios cant do that for you.

#5
The contraction is very important for hypertrophy and there’s no point in doing an exercise if you don’t feel the contraction.
-I've found that for training back the exercises I feel the best contraction in are the best ones by far.

#6
Salt is a powerful performance enhancer everyone should use.
-this one is pretty simple, and especially important in the summer when you sweat a lot. Ive gone as high as 1 tbsp of salt pre workout during the summer and saw great results from it for endurance and strength.

#7
Metabolic fatigue is your worst enemy for everything relating to the weightlifting.
-metabolic fatigue worsens your performance more than anything else I find. I always try to get all the metabolites out of whatever muscle im training by pumping up another muscle between my sets so I can push the muscle hard again the next set.
-this is why I believe upper / lower is the best split. Since you can jump back and forth between muscle groups. Jumping from chest exercise to chest exercise is bad for gains since you wont be able to push them hard since you have so much metabolic fatigue.

#8
Lat focused rows are far and away the best exercise for lats, far better than pulldowns could ever be
-this take is purely anecdotal based on my experience.
-Ive found that my body simply isnt built to do pulldowns, its so hard for me to progress on them. So I am only gonna do 4 sets a week from now on.

#9
Being sore is an amazing sign your gonna adapt but not the sole driver of results
-self explanatory

#10
The pump is anabolic
-also pretty self explanatory, I learned this after I researched why biking is so anabolic for legs and I came to this conclusion.

#11
slow eccentrics do nothing for hypertrophy and only fatigue you more
-this is the biggest thing that was preached to me. I find that there is next to no reason as a natural lifter to slow eccentrics (maybe if your enhanced, or arent flexible and havent warmed up at all then slowing eccentrics may meaningfully reduce injury risk)

#12
Everyone is very different, and you should always experiment with training, training splits and exercise variety based on what works for you and gives you the most joy.


Please, dont take offense to any of this. Its simply what I have learned from my time training and what Im starting to apply.
I dont preach any of this stuff to my friends or online since it may not be true for them.

 

[akboom87]

Im still a bit foggy and messed up with the flu so forgive me if my explanations may be poor on these.
I used to always train the way other people would tell me, whether that was from arnold, ronnie coleman, or older people in the gym. I did this for 5 years because I thought what others said was automatically true and I was new to lifting. After 4 years of doing this and the science based community blowing up and debunking so many old studies I decided to train how I wanted to and saw the best results.
Even the studies that are true arent true for everyone, I saw a fitness youtuber called Ryan Humiston actually examine the old studies on training heavy vs training lighter that showed that heavier sets increase strength more. He reached out to the people conducting the studies and got the actual powerpoint results of every single individual in the study and while yes, overall the heavier training group gained more strength, certain individuals in the lighter groups actually gained more strength
He also did this for studies examining training volume and what they found was that every single individual responded differently to volume, and while yes there was a trend between volume and growth which is what the study conclusion was based on, there was still highly individual results.

So over the 2 years of me coming to these realizations I started writing down my hot takes, that are true for me. (may not be for you) and I wanna know what you think of these.

#1
training heavy and training light increase your strength gains identically
- I have never noticed any improvement in training with 85% of my 1rm as compared to 60% of my 1rm when it comes to improving strength.
-modern studies (in trained individuals) do show heavier sets very slightly outperform light sets in terms of improving 1rm, but the difference isnt nearly as much as we previously thought.
which is why I came to the conclusion that sets of 3 reps and sets of 15 reps increase strength the same amount.

#2
ROM / the stretch has little effect on muscle growth in and of itself and mainly needlessly fatigues you
-the only time ROM has an effect on muscle growth is when it changes the muscles used. For example like Hyde was mentioning with my squat depth, the deeper you go the more glutes are involved, in that case more ROM increases glute growth. But the fact that the stretch is increased itself has no effect on muscle growth
-modern studies in trained individuals show that the stretch doesn't produce more gains.

#3
Deload weeks aren't typically necessary. But rest days are very necessary.
-When it comes to this is what I have noticed from personal experience. Rest days where you do absolutely nothing and just relax are very necessary for maximum performance, but taking a full week off is overkill and wont produce too much more. (granted I dont squat 650 like Hyde does so him taking deload weeks will definitely be more necessary than me taking deloads, but Ive found that as long as you take 2 rest days a week you can keep fatigue at bay.)
-Im gonna stop taking deload weeks and start taking rest days more.

#4
You can self diagnose muscular type injuries much better than standard physios. (not good, athletic based physios that work with pro athletes and are specialized)
- in my experience physios are a waste of money (not sports specific rehab specialists but standard physios)
they usually work on sedentary people and just cant rehab or diagnose well.
-The best thing you can do for a muscle strain is listen to your body and slowly build back the range of motion you cant do because of your injury, physios cant do that for you.

#5
The contraction is very important for hypertrophy and there’s no point in doing an exercise if you don’t feel the contraction.
-I've found that for training back the exercises I feel the best contraction in are the best ones by far.

#6
Salt is a powerful performance enhancer everyone should use.
-this one is pretty simple, and especially important in the summer when you sweat a lot. Ive gone as high as 1 tbsp of salt pre workout during the summer and saw great results from it for endurance and strength.

#7
Metabolic fatigue is your worst enemy for everything relating to the weightlifting.
-metabolic fatigue worsens your performance more than anything else I find. I always try to get all the metabolites out of whatever muscle im training by pumping up another muscle between my sets so I can push the muscle hard again the next set.
-this is why I believe upper / lower is the best split. Since you can jump back and forth between muscle groups. Jumping from chest exercise to chest exercise is bad for gains since you wont be able to push them hard since you have so much metabolic fatigue.

#8
Lat focused rows are far and away the best exercise for lats, far better than pulldowns could ever be
-this take is purely anecdotal based on my experience.
-Ive found that my body simply isnt built to do pulldowns, its so hard for me to progress on them. So I am only gonna do 4 sets a week from now on.

#9
Being sore is an amazing sign your gonna adapt but not the sole driver of results
-self explanatory

#10
The pump is anabolic
-also pretty self explanatory, I learned this after I researched why biking is so anabolic for legs and I came to this conclusion.

#11
slow eccentrics do nothing for hypertrophy and only fatigue you more
-this is the biggest thing that was preached to me. I find that there is next to no reason as a natural lifter to slow eccentrics (maybe if your enhanced, or arent flexible and havent warmed up at all then slowing eccentrics may meaningfully reduce injury risk)

#12
Everyone is very different, and you should always experiment with training, training splits and exercise variety based on what works for you and gives you the most joy.


Please, dont take offense to any of this. Its simply what I have learned from my time training and what Im starting to apply.
I dont preach any of this stuff to my friends or online since it may not be true for them.

No offense taken here. Some pretty good stuff and there is so many different ways to skin a cat.

Out of all the talking points number 12 is the key to it. What works for you and one that keeps you coming back and enjoy doing.

Hope you get to feeling better soon!

 

[Shadowblaze]

No offense taken here. Some pretty good stuff and there is so many different ways to skin a cat.

Out of all the talking points number 12 is the key to it. What works for you and one that keeps you coming back and enjoy doing.

Hope you get to feeling better soon!

Thanks man. How are you doing?

Yeah I have often over emphasized certain points in the gym or with fitness advice and some have taken offense to it so I thought I should preface that.

 

[akboom87]

Thanks man. How are you doing?

Yeah I have often over emphasized certain points in the gym or with fitness advice and some have taken offense to it so I thought I should preface that.

Doing good, ready for this coming week. Getting meal prep done up and enjoying warmer weather today with the kiddos

 

[Dustin07]

Im still a bit foggy and messed up with the flu so forgive me if my explanations may be poor on these.
I used to always train the way other people would tell me, whether that was from arnold, ronnie coleman, or older people in the gym. I did this for 5 years because I thought what others said was automatically true and I was new to lifting. After 4 years of doing this and the science based community blowing up and debunking so many old studies I decided to train how I wanted to and saw the best results.
Even the studies that are true arent true for everyone, I saw a fitness youtuber called Ryan Humiston actually examine the old studies on training heavy vs training lighter that showed that heavier sets increase strength more. He reached out to the people conducting the studies and got the actual powerpoint results of every single individual in the study and while yes, overall the heavier training group gained more strength, certain individuals in the lighter groups actually gained more strength
He also did this for studies examining training volume and what they found was that every single individual responded differently to volume, and while yes there was a trend between volume and growth which is what the study conclusion was based on, there was still highly individual results.

So over the 2 years of me coming to these realizations I started writing down my hot takes, that are true for me. (may not be for you) and I wanna know what you think of these.

#1
training heavy and training light increase your strength gains identically
- I have never noticed any improvement in training with 85% of my 1rm as compared to 60% of my 1rm when it comes to improving strength.
-modern studies (in trained individuals) do show heavier sets very slightly outperform light sets in terms of improving 1rm, but the difference isnt nearly as much as we previously thought.
which is why I came to the conclusion that sets of 3 reps and sets of 15 reps increase strength the same amount.

#2
ROM / the stretch has little effect on muscle growth in and of itself and mainly needlessly fatigues you
-the only time ROM has an effect on muscle growth is when it changes the muscles used. For example like Hyde was mentioning with my squat depth, the deeper you go the more glutes are involved, in that case more ROM increases glute growth. But the fact that the stretch is increased itself has no effect on muscle growth
-modern studies in trained individuals show that the stretch doesn't produce more gains.

#3
Deload weeks aren't typically necessary. But rest days are very necessary.
-When it comes to this is what I have noticed from personal experience. Rest days where you do absolutely nothing and just relax are very necessary for maximum performance, but taking a full week off is overkill and wont produce too much more. (granted I dont squat 650 like Hyde does so him taking deload weeks will definitely be more necessary than me taking deloads, but Ive found that as long as you take 2 rest days a week you can keep fatigue at bay.)
-Im gonna stop taking deload weeks and start taking rest days more.

#4
You can self diagnose muscular type injuries much better than standard physios. (not good, athletic based physios that work with pro athletes and are specialized)
- in my experience physios are a waste of money (not sports specific rehab specialists but standard physios)
they usually work on sedentary people and just cant rehab or diagnose well.
-The best thing you can do for a muscle strain is listen to your body and slowly build back the range of motion you cant do because of your injury, physios cant do that for you.

#5
The contraction is very important for hypertrophy and there’s no point in doing an exercise if you don’t feel the contraction.
-I've found that for training back the exercises I feel the best contraction in are the best ones by far.

#6
Salt is a powerful performance enhancer everyone should use.
-this one is pretty simple, and especially important in the summer when you sweat a lot. Ive gone as high as 1 tbsp of salt pre workout during the summer and saw great results from it for endurance and strength.

#7
Metabolic fatigue is your worst enemy for everything relating to the weightlifting.
-metabolic fatigue worsens your performance more than anything else I find. I always try to get all the metabolites out of whatever muscle im training by pumping up another muscle between my sets so I can push the muscle hard again the next set.
-this is why I believe upper / lower is the best split. Since you can jump back and forth between muscle groups. Jumping from chest exercise to chest exercise is bad for gains since you wont be able to push them hard since you have so much metabolic fatigue.

#8
Lat focused rows are far and away the best exercise for lats, far better than pulldowns could ever be
-this take is purely anecdotal based on my experience.
-Ive found that my body simply isnt built to do pulldowns, its so hard for me to progress on them. So I am only gonna do 4 sets a week from now on.

#9
Being sore is an amazing sign your gonna adapt but not the sole driver of results
-self explanatory

#10
The pump is anabolic
-also pretty self explanatory, I learned this after I researched why biking is so anabolic for legs and I came to this conclusion.

#11
slow eccentrics do nothing for hypertrophy and only fatigue you more
-this is the biggest thing that was preached to me. I find that there is next to no reason as a natural lifter to slow eccentrics (maybe if your enhanced, or arent flexible and havent warmed up at all then slowing eccentrics may meaningfully reduce injury risk)

#12
Everyone is very different, and you should always experiment with training, training splits and exercise variety based on what works for you and gives you the most joy.


Please, dont take offense to any of this. Its simply what I have learned from my time training and what Im starting to apply.
I dont preach any of this stuff to my friends or online since it may not be true for them.

They're all right and they're all wrong, IMO. the studies always come out and rather than teaching us some new way of doing something they end up accidentally validating what prior athletes had great success with, lol. I love to train dynamically myself, intuitively designing my plan each week or month based upon goals and weeknesses. From there I break down what I'm doing often by what those who came before me did. Strength and aesthetics are very different animals, I truly don't care how many similarities there are. If I want a big bench, I'm going to be looking at power lifters, their routines, their rest, their calories. if I want 8% bodyfat, I'm going to be looking at guys like Arnold, Jay, etc.

Dave Tate had what, a 610lb raw bench? Why would I try to reinvent the wheel rather than follow his programming advice? Jay Cutler is a 4 time Mr Olympia, if I'm lifting for physique, then gear aside, why wouldn't I run his programming? there are more nuances than all that but the things that built these amazing lifters and athletes over the past 100 years haven't changed in human biology and anatomy. we aren't really chemically different than Arnold and studies tend to validate old school approaches more than negate them IMO.

 

[Hyde]

I think that even though you believe these things to be true for yourself…that doesn’t even mean you are correct then. Especially in only a few years of lifting.

For example, just because you didn’t get stronger doing heavier sets than sets of 15, doesn’t mean you’re a snowflake that doesn’t adapt the way others do at all. It’s more likely there’s an error in your application or assessment. OR, did you mean get stronger in sets of 15? Because specificity is hugely important in optimizing strength gain at a task: if you need to be stronger at sets of 15, doing triples certainly will not serve you optimally. This is why lifters can raise their 1RM max on something, but maybe not their 10RM as well if they only do very low volume sets (even matching total accumulated volume across more sets).

There’s other qualities to consider as well regarding strength. If you do lots of singles, triples, and fives for your heavy work but fail to perform enough total volume over the session to maintain your base of hypertrophy, even though your nervous system is getting refined towards higher peak output you may lose strength if you also lost muscle. But just having muscle mass alone is not enough for maximal strength either. The biggest squatters are not cycling for quad development. I have literally squat bigger weights this past week than Tom Platz ever did, despite him setting a famous world record for reps on a lighter squat & prodigious bodybuilding development. Tom was a true G, but you get what you train for is my point. If you train more like Tom, you will get results more like his than Fred Hatfield’s (they both trained together at points, but ultimately one was a champion bodybuilder & the other powerlifter).

 

[Dustin07]

Because specificity is hugely important in optimizing strength gain at a task: if you need to be stronger at sets of 15, doing triples certainly will not serve you optimally. This is why lifters can raise their 1RM max on something, but maybe not their 10RM as well if they only do very low volume sets (even matching total accumulated volume across more sets).

There’s other qualities to consider as well regarding strength. If you do lots of singles, triples, and fives for your heavy work but fail to perform enough total volume over the session to maintain your base of hypertrophy, even though your nervous system is getting refined towards higher peak output you may lose strength if you also lost muscle. But just having muscle mass alone is not enough for maximal strength either. The biggest squatters are not cycling for quad development. I have literally squat bigger weights this past week than Tom Platz ever did, despite him setting a famous world record for reps on a lighter squat & prodigious bodybuilding development. Tom was a true G, but you get what you train for is my point. If you train more like Tom, you will get results more like his than Fred Hatfield’s (they both trained together at points, but ultimately one was a champion bodybuilder & the other powerlifter).

My boys and I talk about this a lot. especially with one of them now squatting 500, the other closing in on 400, and me so far topping out at 365 last year. We could all hit our relative maxes, with mine being very obviously the lowest by FAR, but if we dropped weight to 225lbs and did an AMRAP they'd be puking before they came close to my rep count lol. but like you said, specificity. I spent years training volume. gained good hypertrophy from it, but left a LOT on the table for strength.

 

[Shadowblaze]

I think that even though you believe these things to be true for yourself…that doesn’t even mean you are correct then. Especially in only a few years of lifting.

For example, just because you didn’t get stronger doing heavier sets than sets of 15, doesn’t mean you’re a snowflake that doesn’t adapt the way others do at all. It’s more likely there’s an error in your application or assessment. OR, did you mean get stronger in sets of 15? Because specificity is hugely important in optimizing strength gain at a task: if you need to be stronger at sets of 15, doing triples certainly will not serve you optimally. This is why lifters can raise their 1RM max on something, but maybe not their 10RM as well if they only do very low volume sets (even matching total accumulated volume across more sets).

There’s other qualities to consider as well regarding strength. If you do lots of singles, triples, and fives for your heavy work but fail to perform enough total volume over the session to maintain your base of hypertrophy, even though your nervous system is getting refined towards higher peak output you may lose strength if you also lost muscle. But just having muscle mass alone is not enough for maximal strength either. The biggest squatters are not cycling for quad development. I have literally squat bigger weights this past week than Tom Platz ever did, despite him setting a famous world record for reps on a lighter squat & prodigious bodybuilding development. Tom was a true G, but you get what you train for is my point. If you train more like Tom, you will get results more like his than Fred Hatfield’s (they both trained together at points, but ultimately one was a champion bodybuilder & the other powerlifter).

yeah, thats the first thing I preficed. The points I made are true for me and not for everyone.

As for the point of sets of 3 and 15. I was trying to say that doing both light sets of 15 and heavy sets of 3 will increase your 1rm the same amount. Ive seen this in me and all my friends so strongly I cant deny it. One of my biggest regrets when I was chasing 315 was not doing more work with 12+ reps, I mainly did 4-8 reps.

The only thing that I am practically 100% convinced is true for all experienced lifters is that the stretch adds nothing when looking at exclusively hypertrophy. I can link videos and studies if you wanna look over them that back up these points.

another point that I forgot to include is the newer research showing that bulking isnt nearly as effective as we thought when looking at exclusively muscle growth. Ive seen that in myself too.

 

[Dustin07]

As for the point of sets of 3 and 15. I was trying to say that doing both light sets of 15 and heavy sets of 3 will increase your 1rm the same amount. Ive seen this in me and all my friends so strongly I cant deny it. One of my biggest regrets when I was chasing 315 was not doing more work with 12+ reps, I mainly did 4-8 reps.

There is a lot more to it than that and in time I think you'll find that the specificity that Hyde mentioned is a requirement for reaching peak genetic performance in either capacity or strength. A person who trains high volume quite frankly lacks neuromuscular adaptation for heavy loads, but becomes a specialist in volume. It doesn't mean 1RM won't increase some initially, but it will plateau whereas the specialist training for the ability to lift the absolute most total poundage in a single rep will continue to adapt to such.

Its one of the reasons I have enjoyed the conjugate style. Even the cube formula I had used, which gave me better results for bench, did have the occasional AMRAP, but it was not a simple "5 x 15" type thing. it was "lets train this heavy weight with perfect form, then drop back to an AMRAP in perfect form" type thing.