starting weight

[brisbanemick]

Hi, Mick from Brisbane here.

After some consideration, I have decided to start my HST in a 9 days time. The exercises I have chosen are,

squats
barbell bench
dumbell flys
lat pulldowns
bent over rows
single arm preacher curls
tricep pushdowns
side cable pulleys

one warm up set, two work sets.

My question is, during weeks one and two @ 15 reps as I'm working my way up to my 15 rep max at the end of week 2, should I just be content with working to the 15 reps, or push out to failure straight from the beginning?

For example, my 15 rep max at the end of week two will be 160kg.
My starting weight from week 1 will be 120kg, this will be an easy mark, so should I keep pushing to failure, or use these lighter weights in the first two weeks as the "primer"?

Thanks.

 

[colby2152]

Quote[/b] (brisbanemick @ July 24 2005,8:03)]My starting weight from week 1 will be 120kg, this will be an easy mark, so should I keep pushing to failure, or use these lighter weights in the first two weeks as the "primer"?
Thanks.

You shouldn't push to failure.. you want a nice burn in your muscles as you'll see in the FAQ. As you said, the lighter weights will act as a primer, but do them slow with only one minute rest between sets and you'll feel the burn!
-Colby

 

[Rovi]

Yep, aim for the 15 mark and the burn, not failure.
Like colby said, this means adjusting tempo and rest time.

 

[brisbanemick]

Thank you.

I might even incorporate 3 sets per exercise while the going is easy, even though that will only be for the first 5 training sessions.

The increments I have calculated for the entire cycle has been @ 5%, and looking at the progression, it doesn't seem to be un achievable when I hit the 5's.

To reduce the zig zag I have decided to use the following approach in the table structure below.

15's:50 60 70 80 90 100
10's 100 100 110 110 120 120

Took my ages to complete my workout log, but as I said, it appears quite achievable.

My start to fininsh progression will look like this;

end of week 2 @ 15 reps max

squats: 160kg
bench 130kg
d/b flys 30kg
lat p.down 100kg
bent over row 80kg
single arm preacher curls 22.5kg
tricep pushdowns 45kg
side cable pulleys 15kg

end of week 6 @ 5 reps max

squats 192
bench 154
flys 38
pulldowns 120
rows 100
s/a preachers 27.5
tri puhdowns 53kg
side pulls 22kg
During weeks 7 and 8 I have decided to use drop sets, and the last drop weight will be my 15 rep max weight.

It all looks good on paper, but Im figuring that if pulldowns and rows might be a challenge, I can complete the volume in smaller sets to maintain the workload. I'm figuring it will maybe be only a couple of reps at most.