Middle Aged Muscles

Tag: Westside Barbell

  • Changing Programs for Short Periods: Why and How

    I mentioned in a previous post that when coming back from vacation I was temporarily moving from my conjugate style of training into something completely different. This is not a permanent change and is only scheduled for 6 weeks. While it seems odd to do, I have my reasons and I’m going to walk you…

  • Frequency vs Intensity vs Volume

    Go online and start looking at different programs, you’ll notice some have you benching 2x a week, some once, some 4 times, others may have you squatting 2, deadlifting 1 etc… Things would be easier if there was some sort of written rule that just said “squatting twice a week is best” but it doesn’t…

  • “Extra Workouts”: Who, What, When and Why

    “Extra Workouts”: Who, What, When and Why

    Ok, there really isn’t a who involved in this, I guess the who is you the reader, but the other “W’s” are relevant to this discussion and are frequently asked questions on the topic so they will be the focus of today’s post. What is an “Extra” workout? An extra workout is any workout at…

  • What do you do if something isn’t working?

    My last post revolved around a small mistake I made in my programming and what I was doing to fix it. To refresh, I did very little low bar squatting and that which I did, was almost exclusively to a box. When I went to test my low bar squat without a box it didn’t…

  • Changing Weeks / Blocks: How and Why I Use Them

    In past post I’ve outlined the framework for how I write my programs and how I work out. My version of the conjugate method works for me and would likely work for a lot of you (there is no perfect program that works for everyone) but I don’t run it every single week of the…

  • Picking Your Secondary Variations

    If you’re lifting for strength, your main movers are easy to identify. You’ll never find a person who has a good squat, deadlift, bench and overhead press, yet isn’t strong. While some powerlifting programs will keep you doing nothing but the comp lifts, I’ve always been an advocate of using variations within your programming. Before…

  • Conjugate, How I Westside on the East Coast: DE Upper

    I saved this one for last for one really good reason: I find DE Upper Day extraordinarily boring… Boring or not, there is still a valid reason to do a DE (Dynamic Effort) Upper day and it makes a large impact for some people, myself included. In previous posts I talked about the value of…

  • Training Recap/Progress Update

    Going back two weeks I missed two sessions due to vacation and came back somewhat rested to start a new block. The block started a week ago Saturday with ME Lower day so currently I’m on the second week of it, so no comments on some of the little tweaks I’ve made just yet. What…

  • Conjugate: How I Westside on the East Coast, DE Lower

    Starting with the same disclaimer from my previous posts in this series. I do not compete as a powerlifter, I have competed as a strongman in the past and MAY do a powerlifting competition in the future. Still, I use my version of Westside template as I enjoy it and I think it is easy…

  • Time Off and Breaks

    Haven’t posted in a while and there’s a good reason for that, I went on a short vacation. 4 total days spent in Vegas with my wife, I mixed it up between time at the pool, site seeing and some nice dinners. I didn’t lose a ton of money either, so I’ll call the trip…