Strength Gains with HST ?

C

choco

New Member
Guys what was your strength gain experiences with HST ?
For my last two cycles i can say mass gains were very good and lean and i have eaten more than before. But strength gains were not so good.

what are your experiences?
 
HST is not a strength training program. Of course as you lift and get bigger there will be some gains in strength, but you should look into 5x5's or something if strength is you main concern.
 
I disagree, I had significant increases in overall body strentgh with HST.
In other words, I am alot stronger after my first HST and a little heavier.
I have increased my strength.
 
i think what spyke was saying that hst isnt aimed at building strength per say but strength is a side effect of lifting all be it a good one,ive had good strength gains since i added a week of pushing single rep maxs after the 5s.and i think i may extend that another week.
 
I'd say I've gained strength so far, just three weeks into my first cycle... but I'm really a newbie to weight lifting, and any program would probably be giving me strength gains. My guess is that the closer you get to your potential, the slower the gains are. Kind of like the law of diminishing returns.
 
I think etothepii is right. Over my first two cycles I made pretty substantial strength gains. If I could keep that up I'd be lifting rediculous weights in a few years so I am expecting my progress to slow. I only trained for a few months prior to starting HST - having had a 20 year layoff!

My squats have gone from 235lb to 300lb for my 5RM (and I am on target to get 315 by the end of the post 5s). So that's an 80lb increase in 3 cycles if I make it to 315lbs.

My deads went up from 300lb to 355lb for 5RM in two cycles. I have yet to find out how they will go this cycle as I only do deads for post-5s but I'm aiming for at least 365lb.

My short term goal is to be able to add 10lb or more to each of my main compound lifts each cycle. Eventually, (after a few good years) I'll reach my long-term goal of 8 plates for squats. So far so good and I'm enjoying the ride.
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In about a year my deadlift went from about 300x1 to 500x1. While I did not have the same results in every exercise, the strength gains were pretty good across the board.
 
Hey liegelord, that is stunning! I think I might try lifting 500lb from the shrug rack just to see what it feels like but I think my arms might come off like the TRex in Toy Story if I do! I tried a partial squat with 405lb yesterday just to get a feel for it and amazingly I didn't go crashing to the floor when I unlocked my knees. Now I know it's possible and I will get the sucker!
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Latinblast: I am not expecting my progress to continue at the same rate. I think that would be unrealistic but I am expecting some progress. I reckon 10lbs on each main compound lift is a good goal for a good while yet.
 
dont get carried away with the weight guys, last thing you want is an injury that will put you back a couple of months,the weight will get heavier just dont try to hard..dont let your ego get the better
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I have finished 2 cycles.   I started HST after working out consistantly for 4 months on a split.  Here are some of the gains i got from 2 rounds with HST.  I am most impressed with the shoulder press.   I didn't do BB flat bench in my second cycle and i still went up in strength.  (i did BB incline and DB bench)

Squat 5RM   170,  240 (+70)
Bench 5RM   155,  195 (+40)
OH press 5RM  85,   125 (+40)WOW>....


I am actually going to take a 2 month break from HST and do The intermediate bill star 5X5 workout.  I love the 5's too much.   They don't seem to give the same mass gains as the 10's but strength gains is what i am after over the next 2 months.   Then i'll come back stronger than ever and give HST another go in July.
 
for me the "15/10/5" thing wasnt that amazing for strength gains.
But i have clustered some exercises and that was amazing for strength gains (and mass too).

i`m going to look forward and will try a cluster cycle the next time. i dont know if the cluster thing is known here on the board.
you make 3-4 compound exercises and train 4-6 x per week.
every exercise you start with 30 repetitions and at the end of your cycle you end with 50 or 60 repetitions for every single exercise.
all goes with the hst principles. and:
"hst is not about sets and reps....."

so for example when you have to do 40 reps for bench press, never go to failure like hst says. set theses reps up like you want, the thing is only not go to failure!
for example:
10/10/10/10 if you cant then
10/10/5/5/5/3/2 or
10/5/5/4/4/4/4/2/2 reps

so you reach what you want: 40 reps without going to failure.

so i have heard from many many people who have trained the classic hst thing and now training the cluster thing that the cluster thing is waaaaay better for there mass and strength-gains.

so please tell me if you guys know this theory of cluster training and which of you guys has treid it or is doing it and tell about your experiences between the cluster thing and the classic hst thing.

greets
 
If I'm not doing negs in the post 5s I always cluster to some extent as I try to continue to increase the weight. So I might do 5, 4, 3, 3 instead of 5, 5, 5 to get my 15 reps.
 
Faz: Yeah, I take your point. I am going to keep pushing for new goals but not at the expense of using my noddle. I don't want to push for an extra 5lbs unnecessarily as it may be the straw that breaks the camel's back, or in this case, my back! I reckon an extra 10lbs a cycle is reasonable on the big lifts and any more will only be attempted if the current weight is lifted for 3 x 5 reps.
 
I've made agreeable strength gains doing HST. Last cycle I ended with 285 for squats (for a real 5rm), just yesterday I squatted 270 9 times, so I should surpass 285. I also tested my 5rm for bench at 255, and I did 240 10 times yesterday also.
 
Yes, choco.... that is sort of what I do, I try to keep the number of reps constant throughout the cycle as I increase the weight ... this way "work" or effort will increase all the time..... I try to stick to 15reps or 10 reps or 5 reps per set, therefore I need to increase the number of sets and cluster only when I see that by doing 15, 10 or 5 in 1 set I may go to failure, so I abort the set to make sure the muscle doesn't fail, wait for 15 seconds and complete the number of reps..... man, I am surprised at the results.... I had done  1 HST cycle the normal way before, increasing only weight and doing only 15 reps or 10reps or 5 reps with the same number of sets all the time(therefore the number of reps diminished).... and at least for my body it is superior increasing the number of sets... I am sore all the time now and my body is practically changing with each workout, surprisingly I feel far away from feeling overtrained, now I really look forward to each workout.......perhaps for most of the guys the normal way is better..... using the "work" approach makes you increase the number of sets like crazy per exercise.... in my 5's I'll do 6 or 4 sets per muscle in order to keep the number of reps more or less constant....
 
latinblast, yes it works great i will make this after my second week of 5reps too. normally i do 3x5 reps per set. so i reach 15 reps. after the second week of 5`s i will higher the load and when i can only make 3 reps im going to cluster these. so that i reach my 15reps.

(in my first hst cycle i have clusterd dips from week 1 i made 20 reps and in week 8 from my cycle i was making 50reps. it was VERY great for strength in this exercise. but it has bored me very much. in the last weeks of my cycle it was only boring to cluster so much little reps. it has not made fun.)

i definetely will stay with the "classic" hst thing. and some clustering at the end of my cycles like i described. and eventually sometimes a 5x5 program.
for me thats the way to go !
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greets
 
oh, on the top of the topic i said :
"my strengthgains were not so good with classic hst."

the following was my strength gains:
squat and deadlift after my 8 week cycle went up 10lb (5kg)
 
<div></div><div id="QUOTEHEAD">QUOTE</div><div id="QUOTE">am I the sissy here in the group ??</div>

No, I am...

My deadlift and squat is weak as hell and lord only knows what my bench press is. I am trying 5 x 5 for the 1st time in August... until then I am cutting. I just switched my form of squats to parallel, so the weight is lower (130x10,110x15,90x15)

Deadlifts, ehh.... (100x15,120x10,150x5) SLDL style. I feel I am either having growing pains or just lower back / upper leg pain which effects me on some days (today for example I quit the SLDL's)
 
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