Base Building Manual

Getting near completion on it.

Throwing out an excerpt since I'm busy with it.......



I’m here to tell you that there is no “one way” to train forever. It doesn’t matter if you are a bodybuilder, strongman, powerlifter, fitness competitor, etc.

Each time you reach a new plateau or come to point of stagnation, you either have to evolve and understand what you need to change to improve, or you just succumb to the stagnation.

Just from a high level overview kind of standpoint…..

Your "offseason" should be spent with lots of work in the 8 rep range, or more. The entire purpose of it should be to create a larger foundation of muscle mass. You are not trying to build limit strength in the offseason.

I see FAR too much of this from guys these days and it's a big reason why they get stuck for so long, at certain plateaus.

You have to create a bigger YOU. This means lots of rep work, doing bodybuilding style training. Why are you spending the offseason, months away from a meet doing singles, doubles, and triples? It makes no sense. You need to plan your training in stages so that one phase sets you up for success in the next phase.

Well if you've been hammering away a limit strength for months on end, you aren't going to be growing. No matter what anyone tells you, no one gets big off of singles, doubles, and triples. You grow via reps and time under tension.




After such a phase, if it was successful, you transition into base building work. This is to spend time in sub max intensities and working technique over and over again via volume.

One of the big mistakes I see guys doing now is training too fucking heavy with high volume work. I don't care if someone has one person who did well with it, the majority of people can't train high volume AND heavy. Once the intensities start rising, the volume has to be backed down. You shouldn't be doing a bunch of volume in the 85+% range. It should be below 80%, where speed is fast and technique is hammered down.

After such a phase, then you taper into a peaking phase for competition where the intensity rises, and the volume comes down. This is the natural ebb and flow of a good training macro-cycle with micro-cycles incorporated into it. This is how you would set up training in phases for year round progress, so that you avoid plateaus and stagnation.



So here are, in my opinion, the different phases that will eventually need to be rotated through your training “life” in order to move you up to a new level. You’re going to have to be cognizant enough in your training life to know when it’s time to take one of these approaches for awhile in order to improve.