other way to cause progressive overload

[jantjestoer]

would it be possible to cause progressive overload like this:

it stays in 2 week-blocks. but instead o rep-blocks, they are weight blocks.
and you do 6 workouts for 1 block, just like normal HST

your reps would look like this: 5-7-9-11-13-15

the only RM you need to know is your 15 RM.
you use your 15RM for the 3rd and last 2 week-block
for the seconds block, you take your 15RM and divide it by 3
and for the first block, you take your weight from the 2nd block, divided by 3.

so a whole cycle would look something like this if you 15RM is 180 pounds

Block 1:
5 x 20lbs = 100
7 x 20lbs = 140
9 x 20lbs = 180
11 x 20lbs = 220
13 x 20lbs = 260
15 x 20lbs = 300

Block 2:
5 x 60lbs = 300
7 x 60lbs = 420
9 x 60lbs = 540
11 x 60lbs = 660
13 x 60lbs = 780
15 x 60lbs = 900

Block 3:
5 x 180lbs = 900
7 x 180lbs = 1260
9 x 180lbs = 1620
11 x 180lbs = 1980
13 x 180lbs = 2340
15 x 180lbs = 2700

 

[jvroig]

As long as the weight increases overtime, it is progressive overload. That is what it means, after all.

However, the way you lay it out, your first 2 weeks are too light since it starts at ~11% of your 15RM (which, itself, is light).

It is not very likely that your workouts during the first 2 blocks will be useful at all. In fact, 15RM is not the best weight to cause hypertrophy, so it is also not likely to be beneficial hypertrophy-wise if your regimen was as you laid it out to be.

So to answer your question using your example, yes it shows progressive overload since you staretd with 20, then went to 60, then went to 180. It is just not useful at all for growth.

 

[jvroig]

I realized I made a terminology discrepancy.

Technically, you would be practicing "progressive loading" from the idea you laid out.

However, it would not be "progressive overload", because you are nowhere near overloading your muscles with such light loads (11% and 33% of 15RM is not going to be useful, unless you do them for the entire half of the day or something impractical like that)

In the end, the conclusion is inescapable: that way is not useful for hypertrophy due to the extreme light loads being used, not unless you plan to be in the gym the whole day doing sets upon sets of them (which reminds me of brick layers and their arm development - it works, sure, but it's not a model to build a practical weight lifting routine upon).