The Jimbo Slice memorial thread, feat Nate Dogg - The new Off Topic thread

I agree being 'in great shape' and 'being healthy' are not literally same, but in general terms if someone is carrying a lot of muscle mass and is still lean, and their performance in the gym or in sports is at a high level, I think it's fair to say they're usually very healthy by most markers?

Pro BBers obviously have the look and the performance, but yes I think they exemplify the distinction you're talking about, there's a health risk present.

But I do think that the point of diminishing returns, or where the shape you are in starts to negatively impact your health, is probably a point almost no one will reach unless they're either taking drugs like those guys, or they're playing a sport at a pro level that is going to disable them over time?

Benched 85% of my all time 1RM today, with a straight bar, with no pain at all. Then broadly similar numbers on overhead press.

A reasonably big deal, as for the past 2 years I've had enough shoulder pain I was using specialty bars and DBs and though my straight bar days were done. It wasn't getting any better during that period.

I've been doing Joe DeFranco programming for the last 3 months and although there are elements of it I don't enjoy or really understand, my shoulders feel like they have had a rebuild. Have to give him the sole credit as I didn't do anything else differently.

Remarkable, I have to resist the urge to just go back to what I was doing before, and try to retain at least some of his approach to keep this going.

The straight bar is now probably something I will cycle in and out rather than stick on, but I'm pretty happy if that's what it is going forward.

For anyone interested, the next few weeks of my programming from Joe DeFranco arrived today.

There's still a lot of work on shoulders and upper back but this is a hypertrophy block where he's obviously decided to really focus on eccentric training. For example, straight bar bench is the main lift on upper body day 1, and he's programmed a 6 second eccentric. Chin ups with a 6-10 second eccentric feature elsewhere.

A lot of the "free" content from DeFranco that he is still known for, like WS4SB and its spin-offs, going back to the T-Nation days, is still similar to what he programmes these days in terms of overall schemes and exercise selection, but his programming today has more of a longevity focus, there is a less "red meat" in terms of straightforward max effort or straight sets with a heavy weight.

There's always a few straight sets in a day's programming, but on quite a few lifts he'll have some kind of modifier in there that seems almost designed to limit the amount of weight you'd use. The long eccentric is an example, but he'll also throw in things like iso holds in various positions, in a superseth with a complementary movement, or he'll add band resistance to something like a lateral raise, or just programme very high reps with them. That's aside from obvious things like cycling in speciality bars versus straight bars, putting in a lot of prehab movements alongside lifts, and doing some limited ROM movements like floor presses and spoto presses to save shoulders.

I think it's fair to say that this isn't better for either top end strength or hypertrophy, however, and although DeFranco doesn't shout that from the rooftoops I would guess he trains younger lifters differently in his facility.

It feels incredibly hard when you're doing it, especially the higher rep sets and iso holds, but I think the science is pretty clear that for either top end strength or hypertrophy most people would be better off doing more moderate reps with heavy weights for straight sets, if they are able.

Here's a tweak on doing a rest pause set I picked up lately, works well.

A lot of people overshoot their goal reps with rest pause sets by going too light. Particularly as they are trying to push the intensity also.

You want to warm up with 1-2 sets and plan for your working weight to be one where you can JUST get 7 or so.

If on your work set you feel like, at rep 4-5 you are CLEARLY going to end up with more than 7 reps then stop, rest, increase the weight and try again.

Typically the rest pause sets should look like 7..rest 20 seconds... 4... rest 20 seconds... 3 etc.

Whereas a lot of people aim to do 15-20 total reps but if you first part of the set gets 10+ you're going to overshoot and have gone too light.

I've found the 7 rep guide for the first part of the set keeps me much more in the ballpark of a total of 15 or so total reps on the rest pause sets. If I get 15 or more then next time the weight goes up. If not, add reps.

I'm listening to Jordan Peters' "educational" series on YouTube.

(No, Jordan Peters the retired English bodybuilder, not Jordan Peterson the widely-hated writer and public intellectual...!)

Jordan Peters ( Trained by JP / TbJP is his business name) was an absolutely massive "mass monster" bodybuilder that quit the sport around last year. I think we was successful enough but I don't really know, all I can say is that if you look at his competition photos he was incredibly large and dense. Quite open about gear usage but now against it or in favour of minimal usage.

The reason I'm interested in him is that he is openly an acolyte of the Dorian Yates, Dante Trudel school of training. Fairly low volume, moderate frequency, and very high intensity.

Anyway, I've been reading Dante Trudel's posts and tried his DoggCrapp program in the past, but until now I never really engaged with Jordan Peters' take on a broadly similar approach to training.

They're interesting videos, he discusses how he sets up a fully body routine, an upper-lower and a push-pull-legs.

Quite LONG workouts, easily 60-90 minutes, which is a bit counter intuitive for high intensity training, but it comes down to him programming a high number of exercises even though he might have only 1-2 work sets for each.

Where he programmes two work sets, the first will be for low reps and the second will be a higher rep back off set.

All work sets to failure... No RIR here.

If you're into programming, worth a listen.

Jordan Peters' programs specifically involve quite long workouts. His full body routine would have you do 12 movements, warm ups plus one top set. Upper / lower is 9 movements on the upper and warm ups plus 2 work sets. It would take me 90 minutes sessions to do any of that and I would have be to be really on it.

I feel like moreso than it being a question of gear it's still more to individual recovery abilities and age. That would be the line most of these guys would take I think.

Dorian and Dante programmed less volume, shorter workouts.

TBH whether 1-2 really hard work sets are enough for a natural lifer, over months of beating the log book I think in theory yes. And with Peters, Dorian, Dante body parts do get hit a couple times a week too. But I think it has to be used by someone who is strong enough and experienced enough to really have the ability to do a crushing work set.

I tried DoggCrapp for about 5 months and my upper body responded really well, felt like the lower regressed.

I still never did John Meadows Warlock. I'd have concerns about recovery on that one too, again more down to duration.

I can see how volume, frequency and duration of the workout have to be a consideration for naturals.

Is the gulf so wide though, I guess I wouldn't know but aside from what Cilian linked to I know the likes of JP and Meadows claimed it wasn't, that it still came down to the individual situation.

Have to believe age and other stress is huge too, for anyone. To be 20-25 again.... What i wouldnt give... Just in training terms.

But I think some of the higher volume programmes out there with higher RPE work might be as hard or harder to recover from than the lower volume higher intensity style.

It could be argued both ways I guess.

I'm doing low to moderate volume these days. I feel like now I know in in my bones I am done after about an hour in the gym, I'm zonked at that point. The fewer sets on a movement the better I will execute. To me 3 plus sets has to have a clear reason these days.

I have the same experience right now Brian... Early 40s.. Cycling to work sometimes, do a bit of GAA coaching, train BJJ 1-2 times a week... That's not even getting into work, having young kids etc... What I have left in the tank for gym sessions I have to be very realistic about.

A few months ago I tried to do a 5 day bodypart split because I thought it might actually be easier to recover from, but I had to ditch it - not only was it not any easier, the high frequency was just a pain in the arse.

Right now I am lifting 3 days a week, 2 upper, 1 lower, and I think that is probably the most realistic for me from a scheduling point of view AND a recovery point of view. Full body would work too but I'm not doing my own programming and I just go with the flow.

In the past I have done 4 days for a considerable period, everything from conjugate upper/lower to Push/Pull/Legs/Full body, but at the moment 3 days feels more do-able, especially to fit in the BJJ. I think the only reason I was able to do 4 is just that I'm acclimatised to it from years, I'm used to only having a couple of rest days a week at most.

I've been doing an adductor movement once a week in my lower body day for a couple months now.

I started with copenhagen planks in my warm up, then longer copenhagen planks as part of a superset in the workout, then to copenhagen hip lifts for reps.

If you haven't been training them they're an eye opener.

If I had that machine I would use it, but the copenhagen progression also does feel like it works.

I've also tried using a cuff and a cable stack, leg adduction type movements, but.... in hindsight... whatever was working it was not the target area. I think the supporting leg was doing more work just keeping my standing in the right position and not being pulled away.

Been hitting my protein targets consistently for about three weeks now. I have just gone all in on making a concerted effort. This shouldn't be comment worthy but I've been very spotty about it for the last year or so at least I would say. Also a spoon of creatine once per day for health reasons.

I can't find any basis for this, but I've seen it cited that keeping your protein intake high can increase your enthusiasm for training sessions. Anecdotally this is the case with me, I haven't been feeling flat going into the gym since I started this. Or at least not as much as I was previously.

The only thing I've had to manage is when I take the whey if I don't want to ruin my appetite for ordinary meals.

Admittedly there are other things going on as well, I am probably training for no longer than 45 minutes max at the moment, and I really like that.

Dorian Yates is doing a seminar in Dublin and a seminar in Wexford ... 8th and 9th of April. Seems to be a hands on event where he goes through a push pull legs set up. And Q and A.

It's definitely to alter the resistance profile, in principle, although if it was slack through the whole movement then he didn't have it right.

I agree that it's not a technique that most people need to bother with, and I'd be surprised if people who built amazing physiques like Arnold and Dorian ever used bands to hack their machines' resistance profiles, but it's not probably not bunkum either.

Machines do challenge muscles in their lengthened or shortened positions in different ways depending on how they are designed, and people have spent a lot of time figuring out how to place bands, and on which peg etc, to adjust the resistance profile of how they challenge the muscles.

Someone might not want the hardest point in a hack squat to be the bottom (which it definitely is), they might want to create a more even resistance profile so that they feel like they're being challenged at the bottom but also in the mid range. So they might reverse band from the top of the machine to give them a slight assist at the bottom where their quads are lengthened and at their weakest.

You'd band it the opposite with a leg press. The leg press is hard to press out of the hole, but the end range towards lock out is not challenging, even with heavy weights, where the quads are shortened.

What I've found from looking at the training of pro bodybuilders who are doing this stuff is that usually they might do something like a reverse banded hack squat for a training cycle and then later in another cycle they'll do it unbanded, and so on. It's not something that's always in there. Another application is potentially to adjust the resistance profile if they feel there's an injury risk in a particular position.

It's not that different to the use of bands and chains in barbell training. Most people could lift their whole lives and never bother, but there is an application there for people who are advanced or want to try a different stimulus. I did conjugate programming for years and personally I never once used bands on a dynamic day, I just never felt like I had earned it.