New Program

In the midst of studying for finals, one needs study breaks. I figured now would be a good time to type up my program for the spring of this year. Mostly, upper body work is staying the same because it's been working really well. I'm making quite a few changes to my lower body programming, but keeping almost all the movements the same, just tweaking my set/rep schemes in ways that I think would be more beneficial. So pretty much the plan is: do maxes the week of christmas, then re-set all my 5/3/1 work probably about 2 cycles and just start setting some rep PR's. That should give me enough room to ride the progression for 6 full cycles, which will probably end with me doing 365 squat for reps, 235 bench for reps, and 185 overhead press for reps. If I can get 3-5 reps on each of those rep outs, that puts me in really great position to hit my 405 squat, 255 bench, and 295 strict press. Very excited.

Monday: Lower

-5/3/1 back squat.
-Speed deadlifts: Going to keep waving the weight every week and the deficit every 3 weeks. Still not decided whether to jump the weight up only 10 lbs, or the full 20. 20 has been working really well, but a few cycles lighter to really work speed might not be bad?
-Sumo deadlifts: I'm thinking I'm going to work up in 5 sets: first 3 weeks work up to a moderate 8/ heavy 8/ max 8. Then moderate 5 / heavy 5 / max 5, then 3's. Hopefully these will help build up my back, my strength off the floor, and my posterior chain.
-Core.

Tuesday: Upper

-5/3/1 bench
-Back off sets: Hit the second work weight for 3 sets of paused reps, and then the first work weight for a max set of paused reps. This has been working amazingly for me.
-Kroc Rows
-Strict Press: Pretty much going heavy and pressing all reps from a dead stop has been working really well. I will probably tend to work up to a heavy weight and try and hit it for 5-10 singles, but I will also let myself do some heavy doubles/triples, or back off sets if I want to.
-Pullups: I hate them, but I will do some variation of pullups or chinups here. At least 25 reps, whether it be one huge set of kipped pullups, 5 x 5, get to 25 in as few sets as possible, speed work, whatever.

Wednesday: Rest/Arms

Just try and get into the gym and move. Today is really low pressure, just stretch and do some fun arms work. If you need to skip every once in a while, no big. Or, if you want to go a little heavy on something like paused bench or close grip bench, that's okay too. Just mostly use it as a day to recover and get healing.

Thursday: Lower

-Squats: over a 9 week cycle, it will look like this: 5 x 10 moderate, 5 x 10 heavy, 5 x 8 moderate, 5 x 8 heavy, 5 x 6 m, 5 x 6 h, 5 x 4 m, 5 x 4 h, 5 x 2. The idea is that I will be able to increase the weight virtually every week, and almost "peak" for a heavy single on the 10th week. I am not going to set the weight for these. I'm just going to base it off how I feel for the day. Obviously I will try to push up heavy whenever I can, but I also want to keep myself open to taking a "lighter" week in the middle, if I mentally or physically could use it. Hopefully the first 5 weeks will really serve to build some serious muscle, and the last 4 weeks will help me get comfortable under heavy weight and really smash some heavy squats.
-Front squats: I'm going to do 5/3/1 progression with these, but change the reps to 3/2/1. 5 is just too many front squats to do, it hurts a lot and form gets shitty. I want to practice doing heavy front squats with great form, so I think dropping the number of reps will help me ride the progression longer. ALSO, instead of doing 3 heavy singles after, I will do 3 sets of whatever the top weight is for the day - so, for example, on 3 week I will do a 3 x 3 at 205, 2 week will be a 3 x 2 at 215, and 1 week will be 3 x 1 at 230. I miss too often on the heavy singles, and doing this "3 set" method will allow me to keep overall volume up, while 1) not missing any reps for a long time and 2) practicing perfect form by not doing so many reps that my form breaks down.
-Heavy deadlifts: I have really been liking going up to a heavy single deadlift without a belt at the end of thursdays. I think I will keep doing this - the goal will be to get 3 perfectly flat-backed singles at a given weight. If I can do that, I will take the weight up 10 lbs and try again next week. These past few months, I went from 315 to 355, and will attempt 365 next week. If I can go from 365 to 405 for 3 flat-backed singles with no belt after tons of squats, I think I will be in GREAT shape to hit my 455 dead under ideal conditions and with a belt.
-core

Friday: Upper

-Chaos and Pain bench: 10 x 3, 15 x 2, or 10 x 1 bench with the 5, 3, and 1 weight for that week. Probably with a paused rep-out on the final set.
-5/3/1 strict press, with back-off sets: After the rep out of the heavy weight, rep out the 2nd work weight with paused reps, and then the 1st work weight with paused reps.
-Horizontal row. Probably cable rows or upright cable rows, but keep pendelay and Kroc rows in mind. I just need to take these seriously, as I tend to slack at the end of these workouts and pulling is important.
-Any press: going to keep this slot open so I can have some fun, but again I want it to be taken seriously. I'm going to try and pick a movement in advance and work up to a heavy 6-10 reps, so that I'm working hard but it's not crazy heavy. Could do dumbell bench, dumbell incline, regular incline, regular close grip, push press, strict press, or even pushup variations, whatever.
-Pullups or chinups: get to 25 reps any way, whether it be in max sets, speed sets, one big kipped set, whatever. Maybe this strategy, twice a week, will finally get me better at pullups. We will see.

Saturday: Rest/Fun Heavy day

Again, an unimportant day meant to just keep me moving. Fine to skip or dick around on if I want to, but I can also go up heavy on a lower and an upper body movement if I want, preferably something less taxing than the big 3: Heavy strict press and heavy pause squat have been my go-to's, but maybe I will fool around with heavy front squat, snatch deads, weighted pullups, close-grip paused bench - I could even do some work with power cleans, IF I take it slow and don't injure myself.

Sunday: Full rest.

Really try not to even set foot in the gym on this day. Just recover and mentally relax.

SO that's the general plan. May still tweak it, but I think that it will really be an awesome program for me. No serious changes to upper body days, except the "25 reps" pullups thing, which will hopefully focus my pulling work a little more and help get me good. Lower body, there are some big changes, but I think they are definitely for the better, ESPECIALLY the huge change to thursday squat days. I have just always made the best progress on squat by doing a ton or reps and really pushing myself. Chaos and Pain squat helped me mentally and physically under heavy weight, but I just think that for the best gains in strength and muscle mass, this new progression is going to really work for me.

Really excited to get going on this new stuff. Just 3 weeks - two more of this program, and then a week to max. Then my journey continues. Lets keep at it.