"Hi Eric, I just wanted to let you know that your new strength manual is amazing. I am doing the program with two other guys. Before the program, one of them could not even back squat because his shoulders would be in too much pain holding the bar. After two weeks of foam rolling and the mobility work, he was amazed to see that he could back squat with zero pain. Also, I had shoulder pain from benching before starting the workout, and ever since then the pain is gone and we are all improving quite nicely on all our lifts. Just wanted to thank your for the great book. I recommend it to everyone; the dynamic warm-up alone is worth the price. THANKS!"
Daniel Pfohl
West Seneca, NY
To find out for yourself, check out Maximum Strength.
Q: What BASIC methodology did you use to get your deadlift up over 600? Did you deadlift heavy, do similar exercises like pulls from different heights, or use different exercises like good mornings and rows?
A: I have used a lot of different ones - and things changed as I got stronger and stronger.
Early on, like everyone, my deadlift went up no matter what I did. I actually laugh at some of the silly stuff that I used to get my pull up to the 300-350 range. I was training six days a week, doing sets of 20, 5x5 workouts, lots of leg curls, you name it. Not the brightest stuff in the world, but when you’re untrained, it all works.
Pushing things to 400 took a lot more dedicated work in lower rep ranges (3-5) – and without a bunch of goofy accessory work. This got me to a 430-ish deadlift by the time I got to graduate school in the fall of 2003.
In that first year of grad school, I played around with a ton of stuff – everything from clusters to wave-loading (which I don’t think did anything) to straight sets, to 8x3 type-stuff. I hit 484 in the gym around March of 2004, and in my first meet (June 2004), I pulled 510 on a fourth attempt at a body weight of 163. So, I guess you could say that in my first dedicated nine months of powerlifting, I put about 80 pounds on my deadlift. I flat-out blew the “conventional” strength-training induced gains from previous years out of the water at a time when progress was supposed to be slowing.
It was about this time that my buddy Steve turned me on more to the Westside school of thought – and I also made some great friends at the meets I did. The summer of 2004 – when I was on campus in Storrs just working with athletes, reading a ton, and training – was a great summer for information exchange and trial and error. Over the 2004-05 school year, I really started hitting max effort days and dynamic effort days. In July of 2005, I pulled 567.5 at a body weight of 161. So, there’s another 57.5 pounds in a year.
After graduate school, I started training at South Side Gym in Stratford, CT alongside some great lifters. Every session was a mix of crazy efforts and information exchange in an awesome environment. It’s when I really started pulling more frequently: twice a week, in most case. It was without a doubt the best training year of my life, and I detailed some of the training ideas I implemented in an article called Frequent Pulling for Faster Progress. Speed deadlifts made a huge difference for me not only because my bar speed off the floor increased, but also because they allowed me to practice technique without always pulling heavy and, in the process, breaking down. By the time I left South Side at the end of July 2006 (moved to Boston), I had hit a 628 deadlift. Now, I’ve pulled 650 (although it isn’t really the main focus anymore).
I really never did much good morning work until I was already pulling mid-to-high 400s. For me, the good morning wasn’t nearly as effective as deadlifting or squatting; I guess specificity holds true again, as I got really good at good mornings. That said, it likely has to do with my body type, as I’m a long-limbed, short-torso guy who already is very strong in the lower back relative to the legs. Guys who have more squat/bench-friendly builds (short limbs, long torsos) generally respond really well to good mornings.
I am a huge believer that lots of rows not only kept my shoulder healthy, but helped my deadlift along. Chest-supported rows seemed to have the best carryover, in my experience.
Yes, I have done my fair share of rack pulls. I don't think that they directly help the deadlift as much as people seem to think, but they are a fantastic way to make lifters comfortable with heavy weights. Here's a photo from back in 2005 of a 705x5 rack pull from just above the knees. It's certainly not for the beginners in the crowd, but pushing the envelope is necessary sometimes for getting to the next level. I wouldn't recommend this for the overwhelming majority of lifters and weekend warriors - so don't be stupid and try it at home.
They're also great for building up the upper back - particularly when performed with a snatch grip.
A lot of these experiences shaped the way that I wrote up the program in my new book, Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better. Effectively, I touch a bit on everything that took me from 350 to 650 over the course of the four phases in the program.
Hey Gang,
Last Friday, I was a guest on Pete Williams' "Fitness Buff Show." You can listen to the interview HERE.
We went into quite a bit of detail on the rhyme and reasons for my new Maximum Strength program.
Eric Cressey is a go-getter par excellence and his book Maximum Strength falls nothing short of the standard he has set for the industry. Throughout the text, Cressey details all of the necessary ingredients to getting stronger, improving mobility, enhancing stability, optimizing muscle balance, and improving body composition. He has been there and done it, and gives us his vast knowledge in both a motivational and enjoyable tone. I found myself enthusiastically turning page after page. If one is looking for a big bang for their buck - and getting the most out of their training time and effort - Cressey's Maximum Strength is the source!
Josh Renkens, DC, CSCS
Nashville, TN
For more information, check out Maximum Strength.
Hey Gang,
No transitional material this week; I'm a little scatterbrained.
1. Jeremy Frisch and company are running a great event for charity in Acton, MA on June 21. For more information, head HERE. Even if you can't make it, these charities could really use a donation.
2. Maximum Strength isn't just for men!
"Maximum Strength is the book where brain meets brawn in an all-inclusive guide to getting strong and in shape. Eric manages to take the sissy out of salad and add the steak. It's a must have for busy lifters who need to make the most of their time while still getting optimum results."
-Juliet Deane CSCS, RKC, USAW
Check it out for yourself HERE.
3. Assess, don't assume. Still, if you're in the strength and conditioning field and dealing with teams, it's important to understand trends in the sports with which you work so that you can program to avoid the most common injuries.
4. On a related note, yesterday, in the time it took me to write an email, we had a kid come in with a cast up to his upper arm for a wrist injury from diving, and another guy tell me that he's having hip surgery in July for a chronic problem. This just goes to show you that if you work with athletes - no matter how young - you need to understand injuries.
5. I'm heading to my first optometrist appointment in WAY too long this morning - and I'm kind of hoping that they find something wrong with me to justify me wearing an eye patch. At the very least, it'll scare some of our athletes into lifting heavy stuff. I'm working on my pirate accent right now.
6. Stretching the anterior capsule in baseball players is just a bad idea.
7. There are a lot of blog readers who might not realize that I also have a newsletter that goes into far more depth on various topics each week. If you aren't already subscribed, don't miss out! You can sign up with the subscription set-up to the right of this screen.
8. Cadaver grafts for ACL reconstructions seem to work well if you're older and have no aspirations of really doing anything too athletic - especially change-of-direction and jumping. If you're younger, though, the chance of re-rupture is a lot higher, in my experience. The patellar tendon graft is pretty nice simply because the limitations of the graft site work hand-in-hand with the limitations of the ACL from a rehabilitations standpoint.
9. Great win for the Celtics last night. Waaahooooo.
10. If you want to look at the hip and knee in a non-traditional, outside-the-box way, I highly recommend Gray Cook and Brett Jones' Secrets of the Hip and Knee DVD. It's fantastic.
Have a great weekend!
Hey Gang,
Just a heads-up on a free interview with me that you can download at Superhuman Radio. It's episode #168 - and we discussed Maximum Strength in detail.
Enjoy!
Q: I purchased your new book Maximum Strength, and am really enjoying it – and looking forward to the programs. One question, though: are there any general recommendations you would make if someone, due to schedule restrictions, needed to modify the lifting portion program (i.e. not the recommended energy system work) to fit into a 3x/week rather than 4x/week schedule? While I can change up the days of the week, including weekends, I find that my job and family responsibilities limit me to 3x/week at the gym. I realize that going to 3x/week means I'm no longer really on the program, but I would like to keep to its other parameters as much as possible.
A: As a general rule of thumb, I'd simply drop some assistance work from each day and then blend them as well as possible. For 3x/week, I prefer:
Monday: Heavy lower body movement (including a dynamic single-leg movement), assistance upper body
Wednesday: Heavy upper body movements, static unsupported single-leg movement (generally a one-leg squat to bench or one-leg Romanian deadlift).
Friday: Lower body speed or volume emphasis (such as speed deadlifts or front squats for 4x6), assistance upper body.
You should be able to pick and choose from each phase to get to where you want to be.
Eric Cressey
Get Your Strongest Body in 16 Weeks with the Ultimate Weight-Training Program
Q: I recently purchased your new book, Maximum Strength, and I've enjoyed reading it. My question is about pullups/chinups. If somebody is not capable of performing one, what do you recommend? Assisted pullups, negatives, pulldowns, or something like that? For that matter, if the reader can't do a chinup, are they ready for the program and might they be better off with a beginner's program until they're capable of doing chinups/pullups?
A: They could still be a good position to do the program; they just might be a bit heavy. If a guy is 250 and can squat 400, bench 300, and deadlift 400 - but not do a chin-up, it's tough to call him weak!
If this is the case, I would substitute either eccentric-only chin-ups or band-assisted chin-ups. For the former, you'd want to lower to a count of 4 or 5 on each rep. The latter of the two is pictured below. If you can't do it with a 1-inch band or thinner, definitely start with the eccentric-only version.
All that said, above all else, if you have a training partner, him helping you is the best option - as it most closely accommodates your strength level.
Actually, this post should have been entitled, “Why 5x5 Workouts Works for Some People, but Not for Others.” That title would have been long and not “black and white” enough to get your attention, though.
The 5x5 workout (or 4x6, for that matter) approach works relatively well for taking people from beginner to intermediate. When all you’ve been doing is 3x10-12 (because the bodybuilding magazines said that was the way to do things), lifting heavier weights for continued progress makes perfect sense.
I feel strongly that not working below five reps on the main strength movements in your program is a huge mistake for lifters who are intermediates (or more advanced) – whether the goal is size or strength.
You see, in an untrained individual, you get strength gains on as little as 40% of 1-rep max (1RM). As someone gets more trained, that number goes up to 70%. However, you need at least 85-90% of 1RM in intermediate and advanced lifters to elicit strength gains.
For the average intermediate, 85% of 1RM corresponds to about a 5-rep max. In other words, only your heaviest set of five would be sufficient to stimulate a strength improvement. Now, what happens if you do a 5x5 workout? You’ve done 25 reps – and maybe five of them (the first set) were actually performed at a high-enough intensity to elicit strength gains.
As I show in my new book, Show and Go: High Performance Training to Look, Feel, and Move Better, if you want to get stronger faster, you need to spend time below five reps – and above 85% of 1RM (and preferably 90%). This isn’t just physiological; it’s also psychological. You’ll get more comfortable handling heavier weights.
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Q: How long do you typically allow your athletes between sets?
A: Rest periods are subject to so many factors that - believe it or not - I never make recommendations. Big guys need longer than little guys, and metabolic conditioning factors play into it as well. In a broad sense, I recommend the following: on strength work (<6 reps), rest as long as you feel you need, and then add 30 seconds (trust me on that one; your CNS takes longer than the muscles to recovery). On higher rep stuff, rest as long as you feel you need or just knock 15 seconds off that figure.
Truthfully, a lot of what we "believe" about optimal (and strict) rest periods is based on the acute growth hormone response to exercise. In the grand scheme of things, though, a few extra seconds between sets isn't going to impact the acute growth hormone response so much that it markedly changes the efficacy of a program. In fact, in many cases, the extra bit of rest will allow for more loading, which in turns provides for a better chronic adaptation in terms of strength and hypertrophy.
So, if you're worrying about whether 63 seconds between sets is inferior to 60 seconds, you're probably studying for the wrong test.
