Teen Powerlifting and 5/3/1. Advice, Tips, Critique?

A little information about myself. I am 16 years old,soon to be 17. My current lifts are 375 low bar squat,245 paused bench and 455 conventional deadlift. I have been lifting for a little bit over a year now. Started out in december 2015,before that I just did some pushups,bodyweight squats and pullups at home and some other silly stuff (curled the shit out the 25 pound dumbbell my brother bought).Height is 5’9 and weight is 210 pounds at an unknown bodyfat percentage (I really should do my conditioning).

I am more or less on a permabulk since 2015 because I want to take advantage of my natural growth and make the best gains of my life. I eat around 3500-4000 relatively clean calories a day,but I am trying to increase that. My diet is quite stereotypical; eggs,whole milk,cheese,ground beef,icelandic yogurt,peanuts and peanut butter,lots of fruits and vegetables,potatoes,rice,chicken,turkey etc etc. But I also love myself some pizza,burgers,cake,muffins,cookies etc from time to time.

Sleep is where I have the most trouble. I sleep around 8-10 hours a night,but those are not quality hours of sleep…most of them are me just lying in bed or snoozing. It is purely psychological,but I won’t go into too much detail about that. It has been getting better over the years.

I started out using some shitty 3 day split,which was Push/Pull/Legs. Did that inconsistently for about 4-5 months before using stronglifts 5x5 for a month and then took a break for 2 months from training after that because of summer break. I did a lot of research in summer and decided to use the Texas Method as my first serious program,and I used the cookie cutter version of that for about 5 months,which got me to my current numbers. After christmas I catched some kind of fuckarounditis and have been researching training methods and programs,primarely GZCL and 5/3/1.

I decided to use 3/5/1 for powerlifting as my 5/3/1 template because I just like how it is set up and how I can hit singles/jokers after the top set in the 3 and 1 week and just to the required reps in the 5s week. After my main workout I am hitting FSL for 5x4/4x5/7x3 for the 3/5/1 weeks and the last set is an AMRAP. My remaining assistance work is chins,dips,CG-bench,DB shoulder press,flyes,curls,pushdowns,facepulls and lateral raises for the upper body and some light squats,deficit deads,hamstring curls,leg extensions,leg press,band good mornings and calf raises for the lower body.

Here’s my program:

Monday (Squat)
3/5/1 Low Bar Squat
FSL 5x4/4x5/7x3 Low Bar Squat
3x5 Deficit Deads @40-50%
3x10 Leg Extensions
superset
3x10 Leg Curls
5x20 Band Good Mornings
superset
5x20 Calf Raises

Tuesday (Bench)
3/5/1 Bench
FSL 5x4/4x5/7x3 Pause Bench
superset
5xAMRAP Chins

3xAMRAP CG-Bench
superset
3xAMRAP Chin-Ups

3x10 Hammer Curls
superset
3x10 Pushdowns

Thursday (Deads)
3x5 Light Pause Squats @40-50%
3/5/1 Conventional Deadlift
FSL 5x4/4x5/7x3 Conv. Deadlift
3x10 Barbell Rows
5x20 Band Good Mornings
superset
5x20 Calf Raises

Friday (Bodybuilding/Assistance Day) Took this from Brandon Lilly and his Cube Method,I really like the concept of hitting weak areas at the end of the week with some volume and recovering over the weekend.
3/5/1 OHP
FSL 5x4/4x5/7x3 OHP
superset
5xAMRAP Chins

3x10 High Bar Squats
3x10 Leg Press

3xAMRAP Incline DB bench
superset
3xAMRAP Lat pulldown

100 Total reps for biceps
100 Total reps for triceps
5x10 Flyes
superset
5x10 Lateral Raises
superset
5x10 Facepulls/Bent over laterals

Well,that’s pretty much it. Thanks in advance for your advice,tips,recommendations,critique,comments and answers.

This is my first post on T-Nation and I hope I did a semi-acceptable job at writing a lengthy post,since my first language is not english and I am not too familiar with forums.

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Which book or forum did you get this from?

From the “5/3/1 for Powerlifting” book and “Beyond 5/3/1”. The FSL rep schemes and the assistance were my own idea. I know that FSL is supposed to be 3-5 sets of 5-8 reps but really,as long as I am getting the reps and volume in,I don’t think that the schemes matter too much.

Dude, pick a template, run it as written.

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Sorry, never saw Greyskull in any of the templates.

Just pick one and trust in the program. Stop adding fluff and look what Jim does for the kids he trains.

Don’t reinvent the wheel, it’s was built and it works fine.

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You’re right,I just have to stick to the basic and follow the program. I actually love simple approaches when it comes to a lot of things,but when it comes to training,I always overcomplicate things. The Texas Method,as it was written,worked wonders for me and a lot of other people,so why would 5/3/1 not work for me? It’s the “special snowflake syndrome”,as some would call it.

What do you mean by “Greyskull”,btw? I know the Greyskull program,but how does it relate to this?

The strength/size/conditioning success of HS kids with the Krypteia program has been amazing. So much so that it has become overwhelming; and I’m not remotely exaggerating. If I told people the strength changes, no one would believe me. Part of it might be due to my coaching/my eye and my ability to coach the program and again, I’m hardly that good of a coach. There are many much better than me. The program is very simple; way more simple that what you have listed.

That is what I’d recommend.

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Sorry, Cube.

And what he said.

Thanks for the reply,Jim. I’ll of course follow your advice and try to cut down on some unnecessary stuff to make it even more simple. The Krypteia program you’re talking about is going to be included in your new book,right?

it is in the book, yes

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Yes, it’ll be in the book.

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