Christian, with regards to the previous threads discussing periodization, I was wondering how you would recommend periodizing the assistance work, specifically for lats and biceps. Should HDL methods be cycled in the same manner as with the main lifts? Or do you have other ideas? Should clusters be used at any point?
[quote]Khaine wrote:
Christian, with regards to the previous threads discussing periodization, I was wondering how you would recommend periodizing the assistance work, specifically for lats and biceps. Should HDL methods be cycled in the same manner as with the main lifts? Or do you have other ideas? Should clusters be used at any point?[/quote]
Clusters should not be used for assistance work. Assistance work need not to interfere with the recovery from the main layer work, which means that the neural demand of the method(s) used should be fairly low. So I prefer pump methods or speed work for the assistance work.
It doesn’t really need to be periodized. I see assistance work pretty much the opposite of the main work. For the main work I like to stick to the same few exercises, but for assistance work I like to change them up… when using pump techniques, the neural compoment is small so neural adaptation is not really an issue, just greating a bigger pump to pull more nutrients into the muscles.
[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
[quote]Khaine wrote:
Christian, with regards to the previous threads discussing periodization, I was wondering how you would recommend periodizing the assistance work, specifically for lats and biceps. Should HDL methods be cycled in the same manner as with the main lifts? Or do you have other ideas? Should clusters be used at any point?[/quote]
Clusters should not be used for assistance work. Assistance work need not to interfere with the recovery from the main layer work, which means that the neural demand of the method(s) used should be fairly low. So I prefer pump methods or speed work for the assistance work.
It doesn’t really need to be periodized. I see assistance work pretty much the opposite of the main work. For the main work I like to stick to the same few exercises, but for assistance work I like to change them up… when using pump techniques, the neural compoment is small so neural adaptation is not really an issue, just greating a bigger pump to pull more nutrients into the muscles.[/quote]
Alright, so in practice, higher rep HDL work and maybe some max pump is sufficient, switch exercises frequently?
[quote]Khaine wrote:
[quote]Christian Thibaudeau wrote:
[quote]Khaine wrote:
Christian, with regards to the previous threads discussing periodization, I was wondering how you would recommend periodizing the assistance work, specifically for lats and biceps. Should HDL methods be cycled in the same manner as with the main lifts? Or do you have other ideas? Should clusters be used at any point?[/quote]
Clusters should not be used for assistance work. Assistance work need not to interfere with the recovery from the main layer work, which means that the neural demand of the method(s) used should be fairly low. So I prefer pump methods or speed work for the assistance work.
It doesn’t really need to be periodized. I see assistance work pretty much the opposite of the main work. For the main work I like to stick to the same few exercises, but for assistance work I like to change them up… when using pump techniques, the neural compoment is small so neural adaptation is not really an issue, just greating a bigger pump to pull more nutrients into the muscles.[/quote]
Alright, so in practice, higher rep HDL work and maybe some max pump is sufficient, switch exercises frequently?[/quote]
There is no need to use “advanced methods” all the time… I do straight sets of 4-6 or 6-8 most of the time. With an occasional day where I might use and HDL technique instead. Too much intense work = systemic fatigue = much slower progress