HOW AM I SUPOSED TO FEEL?

[matty19]

Ok! I want to ask something about my hst routine and its concepts that are buggin me! it probably gets asked all the time. Ive finished my 15-10 and 5 rep maxes and am about to begin my second lot of 5rms instead of negatives. What I want to know is HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO FEEL AFTER EACH SET FOR EACH DAY. By this, say if I was in the second week of my 10rm cycle, like so:

Monday:
2 sets of 20 kg x10 reps

Wed:
2 sets of 25kg x 10 reps

Then did my final day, Friday, which would be my 10rm:

2 sets 0f 30kg x10 reps

When doing my 10rm workout on the Friday like above, I know that it becomes very tough, to the point of lifting to failure, however, on the Monday and Wednesday, are the weights supposed to be very, very challenging, say around 2 reps from failure, or between medium and challenging? Because after say the mon and wed workouts, they feel challenging, but I could probably bust out a good 3-5 more reps! Coming from previous routines that tell u to go to falure all the time, the HST concepts are hard for me to get my head around

Because some of my weights are pretty lite, for example my bb curls. My 10rm for them is like 25kg. so my 2 week of 10rms look like this:

Week 1 of 10’s:

MON:20
WED: 20
FRI:22

Week 2 of 10’s:

MON: 25
WED: 25
FRI: 27 (add a couple of kilos to my rm)

As u can see i have to repeat some weights Otherwise it becomes to lite. Is this ok? Im I working out at the right effort and volume? Sorry for the long post and hope it makes some sought of sense!.

 

[Fausto]

Welcome matty19

<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">When doing my 10rm workout on the Friday like above, I know that it becomes very tough, to the point of lifting to failure, however, on the Monday and Wednesday, are the weights supposed to be very, very challenging, say around 2 reps from failure, or between medium and challenging? Because after say the mon and wed workouts, they feel challenging, but I could probably bust out a good 3-5 more reps! Coming from previous routines that tell u to go to falure all the time, the HST concepts are hard for me to get my head around</div>

The above means your true RM is reached on the friday, sometimes guys reach this day and still feel they could do an extra rep or two, but it does not happen with everyone.

By the way, you can reach failure on the last day of each two week mesocycle, but really on the last rep, then it is the correct way of practicing HST!

<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">As u can see i have to repeat some weights Otherwise it becomes to lite. Is this ok?</div>

Perfectly fine to repeat some of the weights.

 

[Lol]

<div>
(matty19 @ Feb. 22 2007,05:54)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">Ive finished my 15-10 and 5 rep maxes and am about to begin my second lot of 5rms instead of negatives.</div>
OK. This is when you can make your best gains if you get your eating right and IF you haven't already trashed your CNS by hitting failure too often during the cycle up to this point.

Volume will play a part too. Look at how much work you were doing during the 10s (check this for your 10RM workout) and then make sure you aren't doing less during the 5s and post-5s. Preferably work done should go up a bit too. So, for example, say for your 10RM you were squatting with 200lbs for 2 sets of 10 reps, then you effectively shifted 4000 lbs. During post-5s you would want to shift at least as much as that but preferably more. If you do the math you will see that by doing only 3 sets of 5 you would need to shift 266lbs each rep just to get to the same total weight shifted. That's a 33% jump from 10s which is probably more than most could do (my loads for 5s go up about 12% over 10s).

Keeping with the same example, say your 5RM for squats was 225lbs then you would need to do 18 reps with that load to do a bit more than you were doing with your 10RM! Now, that isn't going to be easy at all. My solution is to do at least 10 reps with your 5RM (may need to cluster reps after the first set) and then add in a set of 10 reps with your 15RM (say 175lbs). That will mean you are shifting at least 4000lbs for all reps and sets.

Hope that makes sense?

 

[matty19]

so ur saying id actually do 2 sets of 10reps in my 5rm cycle? isnt that going against the principles of HST, or is it ok to tweak it like this?

 

[matty19]

actually, what if i did this:

on my 15rm day:

35kg x 15 reps x 1 set=total of 525 kg in total

On my 10rm day:

40 kg x 10 reps x 2 sets= 800kg in total

Then instead of having a 5rm day, have a 6 rm day. that way the total volume will be greater than the 10rm. for example. if i were to just do a normal 5rm day:

50kg x 5 repsx 3 sets= it would add to just 750.
But if i were to do 6 reps, it would add up as such:

50kgx 6 reps x 3 sets=900 total kg.

Would this be the way to do it to keep increasing volume?

 

[Lol]

<div>
(matty19 @ Feb. 23 2007,00:00)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">so ur saying id actually do 2 sets of 10reps in my 5rm cycle? isnt that going against the principles of HST, or is it ok to tweak it like this?</div>
No, what I am saying is that you get your heavy sets done first and then (and ONLY then) add in some extra work to ensure you are at least maintaining work done (you don't want it to be dropping off too much). I choose to progress work done if I can.

If you can do enough reps with your 5RM to ensure total work done is enough then that's great and you can stop there. However, using the example from my previous post, it might take a lot of singles to accomplish your required total reps once you are at your 5RM and beyond (ie. you might have to do 5,3,2,2,1,1,1,1,1,1). So instead of doing that you could do 5,3,2 with your 5RM and then add in a set of 10 with your 15RM. This is to ensure you have a) done enough heavy work to induce signalling and b) done enough total work. It's a bit of a time saver over the clustering. I really feel that 10 reps with your 5RM is probably enough for most folks in their big lifts so the addition of the lighter set is a great way to get enough work done.

Using your 15RM load means that the weight is still pretty heavy and getting an extra 10 reps with it will not be easy after you have done 10 reps with your 5RM load.

This is so much simpler to do than to explain!

Look at how Dan Moore's Max Stim cycles are set up: the load progresses throughout the cycle but the total rep count stays the same (15-20). This ensures that while the loads are progressing, the work done is too.

 

[Lol]

<div>
(matty19 @ Feb. 23 2007,00:11)</div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">actually, what if i did this:

on my 15rm day:

35kg x 15 reps x 1 set=total of 525 kg in total

On my 10rm day:

40 kg x 10 reps x 2 sets= 800kg in total

Then instead of having a 5rm day, have a 6 rm day. that way the total volume will be greater than the 10rm. for example. if i were to just do a normal 5rm day:

50kg x 5 repsx 3 sets= it would add to just 750.
But if i were to do 6 reps, it would add up as such:

50kgx 6 reps x 3 sets=900 total kg.

Would this be the way to do it to keep increasing volume?</div>
Yeah, that would work but I think you would run into the same problem. Just getting 3 sets of 6 reps with your 6RM will be very hard. So to avoid fatigue you would need to cluster reps.

Also, you want to be able to progress the loads for as long as possible. Eventually, you will find that getting even 10 total reps with your heaviest loads will be a big challenge.