Finally making it to the house from an incredible with Faith Rx’D camps in Cincinnati, Ohio. Expect a summary of that camp and the incredible work the Lord did over this past weekend.
On another note, I want to take a second and give you a vision for the next three months or so on our competition and weightlifting blogs. Many of you you have taken a glance at the programming coming out this week and recognize it looks a little different than the workouts have in the past. For those of you on the competition side, you’re probably wondering why in the world we are snatching and clean and jerking on the same day in what seems like a day filled with the barbell. Especially when my comment was that we would be moving away from some of the volume in the lifting world. Don’t worry I will explain that fully. For those of you on the weightlifting side, I can imagine your thoughts and questions when tomorrow’s workout showed up and you were snatching and clean and jerking and front squatting and back squatting on the same day. My reasoning for that will also be explained in this blog.
On the competition in, we are using the East Coast Championships Online Qualifier as a litmus test for some of our conditioning and as preseason prep for the Open. What that means is we will be stepping out of the barbell world a bit to “get in shape.” What that means is there will be days when you don’t snatch or clean and jerk. I know that sounds like blasphemy coming from a weightlifter but in an effort to increase our conditioning, we have to be able to devote a little more attention, time, and energy to some of those efforts. That means backing off the barbell a bit. However, I plan to combat this necessity by doing big barbell days. Tomorrow is a great example of that. Most of our lifting days and lifting sessions that will combine both snatch and clean and jerk together in an effort to maintain some of the gains and strength we’ve accumulated in the off-season. Basically I’m allowing you to put a lot of focus and effort on those days knowing that on some of the other days your focus and effort will be on the conditioning. Furthermore, that lifting will almost always have some sort of prescribed rest period and built in interval work moving forward. You can also expect now to see the barbell in workouts. Make sure that every technical flaw you have worked on over the last 18 weeks you are utilizing inside of those conditioning pieces. Our goal in the off-season was to perfect our movement in high-level skills including the barbell so that those refined skills translate over to conditioning pieces. I think over the course of this week you will get a much better feel for how this new format will allow you to focus and excel in your conditioning workouts. The results I think will show up in the Open. Enjoy…
On the weightlifting side, if you have managed to qualify for the American Open, which we don’t necessarily know yet, then I would like to put you on something a little different in order to prep for that meet. Contact me directly if you have qualified for that and are interested. For the rest of you, this cycle is a 14 week cycle with intentional focus on consistency of made lifts from the floor. We are going to spend a lot of time moving weight from the floor in an attempt to get really consistent at the classic lifts. This week will be a bit of a preparatory/rest week for those of you following the blog. Take this week as such. If you need to take a day off then take a day off. If you look at the work out and you don’t really feel motivated to do it, then do something else. Take this week to mentally and physically relax and prepare for the next 13 weeks. With that in mind make sure to take a look at the format of the sessions this week in order to prepare yourself for the time and effort needed each day during the cycle. The format is very simple. On Mondays Tuesdays and Fridays we will be doing both snatch and clean and jerk (for the most part) from the floor at moderately heavy to heavy loads in order to gain consistency in the classic lifts. On Wednesday and Saturday we will focus on the jerk as I fully believe that is still probably our weakest point and weakest technical lift. We will still be about two days to grow and work on that skill. On Monday and Wednesday we will squat. That squat will be a front squat and back squat together on the same day. You will complete all of your sets in one style of squat before you complete all of your sets and another style a squat. Which style goes first will depend on the day. This format is in order to develop the entire leg at once and not just focus on the quad or the hamstring and glute during your squatting sessions. For any of you who are familiar with this idea, you know that it comes from the legendary Gayle Hatch. He always talks about developing the entire leg in one session. Recently I’ve been impressed by that idea and believe it will be fruitful for us to follow 14 weeks with that goal in mind. Lastly, on Tuesday and Saturday I will add some bodybuilding work in order to protect your joints and ligaments and help your body to absorb the load safely and prevent injury. Also, it never hurts to get a jumpstart on beach season. Enjoy the cycle, I have always believed that the more you complete the classic lifts from the ground the better the results will be. This has been true of every discipline in every sport across the globe. The more you complete the movement as it is performed in competition the better you are prepared for competition. This theory holds true for the Olympic lifts as well.
Please feel free to ask any questions or shoot me an email if you have any ideas or thoughts on the program. Embrace the next three months or so, it should be a fun ride. Thanks for following.