I’m starting to think that I have some level of ADHD, cause man, lately I haven’t been able to stick to any kind of programming
Okay, I be never really been a guy who sticks to a program for a long time (I think my record is like six weeks on the same program)
But when I say I can’t stick to a program I don’t mean that I’m program hopping and changing everything up all the time, not at all. I make subtle changes every couple of weeks and it just so happens that in a few months my program looks completely different from what it used to look like.
Why do I do that?
Well, first of all, it keeps me interested in training, I would die inside if I was forced to do a spesific program with all the same movements for the rest of my life (or even the rest of the year, really)
Secondly, it allows me to focus on different aspects of training while maintaining the others, so I’m not always trying to do everything at once. (Say, I may do decline pressing and rows for upper body for a couple of weeks and then change it to overhead pressing and pull-ups) this is very useful now that I’m in the army and have a lot of other stuff to worry about - trying to do a full-on hardcore powerbuilding routine would be counterproductive.
Thirdly, it allows me to see what exercises carry over to each other; for example, I hit a behind the back deadlift PR lately, and soon after that I switched over to doing Jefferson deadlifts. During the first session with Jeffersons I tied my old PR and I broke it in the second session.
Now I’m going to keep doing Jefferson deadlifts until I stall with them and then I’ll switch them to snatch-grip deadlifts, which I’ll do until I stall again.
After that I’ll go back to behind the back deadlift and see if I can beat my old record.
If I do beat my old record, I’ll assume that Jefferson deadlift and snatch grip deadlift carry over quite well and I’ll use them again in the future (maybe try doing snatch grip first and Jefferson second to see how that works), if not I’ll try, say front box squats and zercher deadlifts.
For some reason I always gravitate towards Bulgarian-ish training if I don’t make long term plans with my training, but at the moment I don’t really care. I’ve been lifting every day with the same movements (rotating when I stall) for some time now and I feel great!
I’ve even been using more volume per sessions than before and it hasn’t caught up to me yet - mainly because the extra volume comes from band and isolation work.
To give you an example of my current training, I’ll write down today’s session;
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Weighted dips, working up to a 1RM in 10kg/22lbs jumps, afterwards one set with 20kg/44lbs added
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Weighted chin-ups, working up to a 1RM in 10kg/22lbs jumps, afterwards one set with 20kg/44lbs added
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Jefferson deadlift (I do it with both legs so I basically do two sets here), working up to a 1RM in 40kg/90 pound jumps, no backoff sets today
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Beltless highbar squat, working up to a smooth set of 8 in 20kg/44lbs (just getting back to squatting)
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Seated calf raise, 1 long set, semi-DC style
After all of those I did band work as follows: (for sets of 30-50 reps)
Leg curl
One arm low to high standing fly
One arm standing pullover
Pull-apart
Upright row
Tricep extension
Bicep curl
I do the band work so I can maintain mass in mythe areas of my body that I do not focus on at the moment and to keep my joints happy.
Overall, the session felt great. I broke records in Dips, Chinups and Jefferson deadlift and I got a great pump from the band work.
This type of training is far from optimal if size is what you’re after but at the moment I’m just trying to keep my strength levels where they are (or even improve a bit) and I’m trying to get my performance on the field up.
Overall, you should always train for what you need in your current situation - if you don’t need anything, train for what you want to achieve. And never forget that training should be enjoyable.
