UB: Strong - Review

I've now completed the 6-week strength cycle from Paul Carter's "Ultimate Beastom - How to get 'What Constitutes Strong.'"   This was a 5X5 program, and here are the results for the four main lifts:

Press:      No 5 Rep PRs, one 2 Rep PR (5 lbs.), no projected increase to 1RM
Deadlift:  Three 5 Rep PRs (10, 20, 30 lbs.), projected increase to 1RM (24 lbs.), best results of program
Bench*:   No 5 Rep PRs, one 4 Rep PR (5 lbs.), projected increase to 1RM (1lb.)
Squat:      Two 5 Rep PRs (5, 25 lbs.), projected increase to 1RM (6 lbs.)

*switched to close-grip for last session; results probably skewed

I also want to high-light some progress on other lifts:

Chin-ups:       Went from BW of 205X9 to BW 212X10
Dips:               Went from BW of 208X11 to BW 208 + 25 lbs.X8
Front Squats:  Went from 115X12 (projected 1RM=161) to 135X8 (1RM=171)

My general impression of the program is that it is successful, and I think the results clearly speak to that.  The two keys would seem to be primarily making sure your targets are realistic, and additionally trying to choose assistance work that will contribute to the main lift.

For the Press, I feel fairly confident that not having OH triceps work in the program resulted in my failure to meet my goal.  This is good though, because this failure provided the evidence that led me to look at my log and see that my press went up when I was doing OH extensions, and dropped off when I was only doing Dips for triceps work.  That is potentially valuable if it proves to be true.  Also, I thought a 10 lb. 5 Rep PR was a modest goal.  If I had to do it again, I would have only shot for 5, and I believe I would have gotten it.

For the Pull, this lift continues to shine for me.  Just more evidence that I am better at this than any other lift.  The thing to keep in mind from that should probably not be that I can do anything on the pull.  That sounds like a good way to fuck myself up.  Rather the take-away should probably be that I don't need to focus on it as much.  I can probably let it take a back-seat while I devote more fuel and effort to other lifts.  Also, I developed a nagging mid-back strain on this program, and I now believe it was from deadlifting, and points to the need to have more rowing in my programs to keep up that area.  Like the OH triceps work for the Press, if this is an accurate assessment, then it was worth it to have this information going forward.

For the Bench, I decided prior to the final sessions to go ahead and switch to close-grip.  That had been my intention for a while, and Paul Carter convinced me to just go ahead and make the change.  I was starting to have some nagging shoulder pain, so that seemed like a good idea.  I still set a Rep PR, and projected 1RM increase.  That suggests the work I did wide-grip was certainly successful.  I suspect the Dips contibuted to the success of the close-grip bench a bit more than the DB benching.  I did feel like I got some good work in once I switched to flat DB bench, after discovering how hard it is to do incline the day after heavy shrugging.  More lessons learned.

For Squats, I did set some PRs.  I also made progress on Front Squats, and also reacquainted myself with RDL's (on which I set several PR's, but didn't include above because it had been so long since I had done them that PR's were likely).  I think my primary take-away with squats is that I need help on form.  I just continually feel that my form is neither correct, nor consistent, and I would like to be both.  The guy that owns and operates my gym is a former champion powerlifter, and I'm going to see how much he wants to charge to form-doctor the 3 big lifts to make sure they're all in good shape.

The main thing I didn't like about his program, particularly in contrast with 531, is that without the constant opportunity to set PR's in a variety of rep ranges, it's not quite as fun.  At any point on 531, I set around 20 PRs in different rep ranges in the same amount of time I only set 7 with this one.  It's not that the programming is more effective, it's just set up differently and you don't have that opportunity.  As I continue to age in "lifting years," I expect that sort of PR progress even on 531 would become less frequent, however it just seems to be set up to allow for that, and that's fun.  Louie Simmons often talks about the benefits of his conjugate system being that his lifter are setting PR's in some lift variation every week, and that allows them to set PRs whenever they want.  This isn't the same as that, but it offers that same level of encouragement.  When I finally discovered progression models for lifting, that was when a switch flipped in my head, and I found myself really able to get into lifting on a regular basis.

That being said, one thing that was really great about this program was starting it.  I'd been on a 2-day split because of my rehearsal schedule, and those workouts were slightly long, and very intense because they each had two of the big lifts with heavy weights, followed by lots of super-setting of assistance work to keep the time down, then core work, and then finishing with some kind of conditioning.  When I started this, and it was lighter weights on the big lifts, and 3 assistance movements of 2-3 sets with medium to high reps, and out, it felt like I had gone on vacation.  It was just awesome to go in and have a short and easy session.  And it was like this for 2-3 weeks instead of the 1 heavy-ish deload week on 531.  This could be crucial in the future for down-shifting and getting back into it, the key would be recognizing the need, rather than lucking out and scheduling a program shift that just happens to correspond witht the need.

All in all, I'm very satisfied with these results.  I reached some great goals, and even the goals I failed to reach taught me a lot that I can build on.  I'm taking 5 days off, and then I'm going to start the conditioning phase.  Looking forward to it!