Westside/Strongman Help

so im starting westside in a week or two but i also have access to a strongman gym once a week so id like to have a routine with one day devoted to events mostly log press, atlas stones and other loading stuff so this is what i was thinking

day1: RE Upper
day2: ME Lower
day3: off
day4: Me Upper
day5: De Lower
day6: Strongman
day7: rest

for upperbody rotation im using closegrip/cg 1brd/cg 2 brd then restart
for lower body im using box squat/rack pulls with bands/pinsquat/deads off a platform

assistance for upper body will include neutral grip inclines/flat db’s miltary varaiations, plate raises, tricep extensions, pendaly rows, pullups, kroc rows
lower body assistance will be stiff legged deads, good mornings, glute bridges, split squats with foot on bench and possible lunges

how does this look?

o yeh the setup for ME upper would be
Max exercise, work up to single then three singles at 90% or more
tricep dominated pressing movement 4x6-12
plate raises 2x15-20

ab work

Me lower:
on squat weeks:
same as above
hamstring movement/lower back 4x8-12
quad movement 3x10-12
back movement4x6-8

Me lower if deadlift day
same as above: 3 singles blah
quad movement 5x6-10
lower back movement 3x10
back work 6x3-6
biceps
abs

RE Upper
close grip bench 4x10
dumbell press of some sort 4x6-8
shoulders (heavy)
back

i cut out a heavy shoulder ME upper so that im rested enough to do log presses etc…

also what should i do for de lower? should i alternate speed pulls and box squats? and the assistance will probably be focused on hamstrings/quads heavy but not to heavy so i have energy for strongman how does this look thanks guys

You know, over the past couple years I’ve seen all kinds of WSBB/strongman combos and none of them thrill me.

I guess the point where I get lost is that WSBB is a protocol set up to support three main movement patterns (bench press, squat and deadlift). Add in that no real conditioning is addressed, strongman events have skill levels closer to an olympic lift than a deadlift or bench press, and you just don’t really end up with a program that fits your goals.

That isn’t to say you won’t need to squat and deadlift (bench may be more debateable there… but you seem to have addressed that already), but that is pretty far away from any performance standard, in my opinion. If you find yourself limited to ONLY gym lifts several days a week, I would even say that cleans and snatches will have a more profound impact on your strongman performance since generating full body explosive power translates well to stones/tire/log cleans and push presses/axle.

Deadlifting during the week has proven to be practically unnecessary for me. Every weekend training session will involve farmers/stones/and possibly a deadlift variation anyway. Hitting that up a second time mid week is absolute death on my lower back and on my recovery in general. If you are adding in cleans and snatches, then you already have speed pulls built right into the program. Two birds with one stone, score!

Squats mid-week work well for me since I rarely replicate that movement pattern in strongman. Pressing mid-week almost always ends up being a braced strict press (bench press or seated military press) as my own overhead style tends towards jerking or push pressing. This braced pressing helps to hit my triceps and shoulders in a more direct fashion than my competition style pressing.

The main point here is that I try to pick work mid-week that isn’t duplicating my weekend workout. Basically my entire week of workouts falls into what WSBB might see as RE/DE work with the only exception being the squat.

Because strongman is a sport of conditioning, I also incorporate two days a week just for this purpose. Some running, some light weight farmers/yoke, some jump rope, some light stone loads or light log cleans for reps. These sessions are technique building as well as conditioning in nature.

If you can’t get your hands on implements through the week, even long walks with heavy dumbbells (using straps isn’t a bad idea to save your grip) or throwing some weight in a backpack and going for a hike… sled dragging… doesn’t matter, variety will never hurt you in strongman.

Take everything I said with a grain of salt. This is what works for me, but it will hopefully give you some ideas of the potential pitfalls of mixing WSBB and strongman. If nothing else it may give you some ideas on how to tweak what you have so that it fits your needs.

ok so reworking this:

day1: stick with what i ahd before
day2: ME Lower
Squat-hamstring/low back exericse, back arm work
day3 off
day4 stickw with what i had before
day5 cleans as a warmup to speed squats,ham string work
day 6: events, snatches

on ME lower if i do squat,ill simplify it to going all out on a hamstring assistance as i just worked my quads
if its a dl day ill go all out on a quad exercise since i worked my hamstrings hows this look? i think its simpler and will address more work, ill do sprints a few days a week as i do track so i need to keep my conditioning up, i have farmer implements so ill do thgat at my house

I train conjugate method and events. My training looks like this

day1: Maybe DE Upper but most likely just walk, stretch, hyper, maybe abs
day2: ME Lower
day3: walk, stretch, hyper, maybe abs
day4: Me Upper
day5: De Lower
day6: Be a Bum
day7: Events

Even with this sometimes events trash my cns enough that I suck on day2. Also I tend to base what I do day2 on what I have done day7. So if I pulled a lot on day7 I will stick with a max GM or Squat. Also I rarely bench as a main movement.

I am also trying to find away to incorporate events and gym work as well. I can only get to the gym three days a week but I have few implements at my home. I have a heavy tire not sure but in a minute I can only flip it about 8 times. I have a 50 in stone loading platform and I am about to make some stones this week end so hopefully I will have three different stones atleast. I also have a sled set up.

Can you help me set up a program I currently am trying to get all my gym lifts and events together but I feel working both of them in the same week would be to much or am I wrong. I was thinking of trying to modify a Wendler 5-3-1 and strong man events such as…

Workout 1- Power Clean and assistance
Workout 2- Over Head Press and assistance
Workout 3- Squat and assistance
Workout 4- Events(Tire Flip, Sled Drag, Medley Type, and hopefully some stone loading very soon.

I figure this way because after events my lower back will be shot and it is easier for me to Power Clean with a bit of a tender back than to Squat with one so, I will Squat a day or two before I do events.

How does this look Andrew.

also im mainly a powerlifter loooking to deadlift 500 before the end of the summer thats why i have a day dedicated to that

Well if you are mainly a powerlifter I wouldn’t worry about events that much. You can really only excel at one thing. If you want you could try to do both but I think that you would just end up being mediocre at both powerlifting and strongman. Although all of the strongman guys I train with pull 700+ so maybe events would help.

yeh, i mostly want to use the events to bring up my shoulders with log presses, and just to have fun so mostly the events day is just a fun training day. I recover pretty fast cuz i sleep 8-10 hours a night and i love training so i wanted to train 5 days a week also i might look into an amueture contest during the fall so just to have fun mostly while not screwing up powerlifting to much

For the sake of argument, here is my weekly setup:

M: Press assistance and core
T: Hips, upper pull and grip (hip dominant work can be GM’s, box squats… typical PL stuff)
W: Conditioning
Th: Power training and prehab (right now my power training is snatch work, but could easily be light stone loads to a high platform, low rep tire flipping, keg throws/etc. The focus is on full body extension and speed. I do a lot of shoulder flexability and prehab work since I have some rotator cuff issues that I need to baby)
F: Conditioning
Sat: Events… typically hit 4. press/moving/pull/weakness
Press events: log, axle, circus DB, maybe a medley of the three or two or who knows
Moving events: tire flip, Husafell walk, farmers, yoke, truck pull
Pull events: hand over hand pull, stones, 18" DL, axle DL, power stairs
Weakness events: whatever needs a little extra focus for an upcoming contest. This work is typically technique work and not heavy.

Sunday is the day of rest.

Through the week my workouts are short duration. Typically a main exercise (DE) a supporting exercise (RE) and any supplement work needed (core/grip/maybe tri/bi work). DE work is usually 2 warm up sets, 3 working sets of less than 3 reps. RE work is usually 1-3 warm up sets with 5-8 working sets of 5-15 reps. Supplement work can literally be anything, but usually takes me less than 5 minutes to complete all of the work.

Again, this works well for me, my workouts typically take less than 40 minutes through the week, Saturdays are typically 3 hours (lots of rest time in there).