Simplify Your Program, Amplify Your Results

How to Build Muscle, Strength & Conditioning

Like Lynyrd Skynyrd advised, I have always tried to be a simple man. Mainly because I have a simple brain and am left with no other choice. But I have always believed that the more you can simplify things, the happier and more productive you will be.

On any given day there’s a good chance that I’ll sell all of my material possessions and move into the wild. Or at least I dream I will. I imagine a life with no TV, no internet and no cell phones, where I am eternally happy and stress free. I know that the internet makes our lives easier and helps many of us, including myself, make money. It’s just that it also complicates things and takes up too much of your time, if you let it. We live in a society where everyone always needs to be plugged in. I, for one, just want to be unplugged more often.

A couple years ago I got rid of email on my phone and then downgraded to something more basic without all the bells and whistles. On most days, now, I don’t even turn my cell phone on until somewhere between noon and four in the afternoon. I can’t really explain why, except for the fact that maybe I miss the eighties and early nineties, when people couldn’t get a hold of you at anytime, no matter where you were. That and the fact that it helps me be more productive due to far fewer interruptions.

When it comes to checking regular email these days, forget about it. I can barely bring myself to login to my account, never mind read dozens of emails and respond to them.

And that’s exactly how I feel about complicated training programs. When I let my guard down and check out some other training sites on occasion, my head often starts to spin when I read some of the recommendations that are being made. Bill Starr was the first strength coach to work at both the collegiate and professional level. He was the strength coach for the Baltimore Colts when they won Super Bowl V. No matter what the guru’s may tell you about slide boards, balance training, kettlebell swings, Bosu balls, tempo training, eccentrics and simultaneously working one arm with the opposite leg, the fact of the matter is that not much has changed in the last forty years when it comes to effective strength training. As Bill said himself, “the more simple a program, the more it will achieve the desired results, which is greater functional strength.”

An effective strength training program doesn’t need more than thee to five total exercises per workout. If you write a program with more exercises than that it’s usually for entertainment value, not for results. People should concentrate on quality not quantity and strive to do fewer things better.

If you are an athlete that usually means you will only be training for three to six months out of the year. The rest of your time will be spent playing or practicing. For three to four of those months you should be squatting. Back squats reign supreme, but you could also do front squats for variety and overhead squats to improve your mobility and build functional strength and stability in a completely different manner.

I love deadlifts, but the reality is that most athletes would be better served doing some sort of Olympic pull. A snatch or clean variation, and preferably both, should be part of the program. There’s less risk and more benefit.

If you are also running and jumping, which every athlete should be doing, there is very little need for anything else in the weight room aside for mobility work such as hurdle step overs, duck unders, some joint prep work and some isometric bridging exercises. All of this should be part of the warm up and does not constitute the strength portion of the program.

If an athlete is very inflexible it would probably benefit him to do some split squats or Cossack squats and hold the stretch position at the bottom for a few seconds. Romanian dead lifts or single leg RDL’s could help as well. Loaded stretching that you turn into an exercise seems to be more effective than regular stretching; which bores most athletes to tears. Some extra tight guys will need both. But, there is nothing inherently more “functional” or “sport specific” about single leg exercises, as some coaches suggest. They can be used in certain cases but they aren’t necessary when an athlete only has 12-16 weeks to train. If you have six months to train, I would recommend starting with unilateral work at the beginning, for the first couple of months. For everyone else with limited time, you need to get the most bang for you buck, which means you need to head to the squat rack.

For the upper body athletes need to press vertically and horizontally. Bench presses, inclines and military presses are at the top of the list; especially for football players who will most likely get tested on one or two of these. Personally I prefer to use weighted pushup variations or dumbbells most of the time but when guys are getting tested you are left with no option. These exercises are great assistance movements, however.

Chin ups and rows should also be included to balance out the upper body training and keep the shoulder region healthy. A wide variety of chins should be included to help avoid any possible tendon issues that can arise from using the same grip too often.

If you pick one of each of these exercises and use the proper set and rep scheme you have as effective a strength program as you can find. If, in one workout you were to snatch, squat, press and chin what more would you possibly need? That’s a program that will get you strong. When you start adding in rear delts, concentration curls, Cuban presses, right leg/ left hand step up and military press, fancy tempo schemes and all that nonsense you take away from the effectiveness of the program; not add to it. People need to understand that every single muscle group does not need individual attention and isolation. When you do snatches and overhead presses you eliminate the need for direct external rotation, shrugs, rear delt and rhomboid work. That’s bang for your buck right there…

Athletes play their sport. That is how they get conditioned optimally. They run, jump, cut and do agility drills. That is how they develop the ability to do these things better; not by doing weight vest multi-planar lunges on the slide board. You need to build strength in the weight room and play or practice your sport frequently so that the strength transfers over. Most “sport specific exercises” and all that clown nonsense do very little.

Interestingly enough, the guy who DOES need all that extra stuff in the weight room is the thirty or forty year old guy who’s just training because he loves it, but isn’t competing in a sport. For him, the workout IS his sport. If all he does is powerlifting or Olympic lifting he will most likely be pretty banged up in a few years and getting one step closer to a shoulder or knee surgery on a daily basis. Guys like this, who train year round, should only squat and deadlift for blocks of 12-16 weeks, once or twice a year, if at all. It really depends on their injury history and goals. If all he does is bodybuilding, he might look good but will possess no functional strength or the athleticism to compete in a pick up beach volleyball game. One spike attempt and he may tear an abdominal muscle, lat or rotator cuff. So this guy actually needs so called “sport specific training” more than the athlete does. Weird but true. Plus, anyone who trains year round definitely needs more variety than the athlete who only trains for a few months. But, only after you have been training for a few years and have mastered the basics. This is another article for another day but I will address this in full detail very soon with specific case studies.

An athlete, training for only 12-16 weeks, however, should pick big, basic exercises that get the job done fastest. These are usually simple, old school barbell exercises. Sometimes dumbbells or bodyweight exercises can work just as well, but you have to remember that many athletes will be getting tested on a barbell lift (or three) at camp so they need to train on them during the off season. That and the fact that it is so ingrained in our heads that strength (especially for football) is measured by the numbers you clean, squat and bench press.

The point of all this is that if you want to get better results from your training you need to simplify. Complicated routines lead to lackluster results. Like Bruce Lee said, “simplicity is the key to brilliance.” It also helps you get bigger and stronger a whole lot faster.

Simplify your program to amplify your results.

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