Blog
Review: 5/3/1 2nd edition
Just read it and it’s an improvement for sure over the 1st edition. This is the lifting protocol I’m currently using and I love it.
Here’s the full contents:
http://www.jimwendler.com/2011/12/531-2 … -for-sale/
The new stuff that I saw was:
• Training Fashion – 19
• How to Have Stronger Abs – 45
• The Great Debate – 45
• Programming Your Assistance Work: Simplest Strength Template – 52
• Rest Pause Training – 58
• 5/3/1 Full Body Training – 79
• 5/3/1 and Crossfit – 85
• 5/3/1 for Beginners – 90
• Eating for Size and Strength – 94
• 10 Training Rules to be Awesome – 118
• 5/3/1 Percentage Charts – 119
• 5/3/1 Training Log – 123
• Meal Plan Tracker – 131
• About the Author – 132
This edition has a lot more variation than the first one. He went into heavy detail on the assistance work right down to suggested %s for each lift each week. Tapering down as you approach the third week is made obvious this time and that’s smart. I didn’t think of that.
The Doggcrapp section isn’t full-blown DC training (I’m not an expert in this, just going by what I’ve read) but a way to incorporate rest-pause into 5/3/1. He gave lot of examples to avoid confusion.
Another section gave a nod to Broz and the rest of the “train everyday” folks with a squat 5x a week program. Looked brutal.
The CF section will be discussed a lot I think but it’s pretty basic. Wendler lists the many things he thinks is wrong with CF and then suggests doing a main 5/3/1 lift, an assistance lift, then a circuit of 3-5 movements x3 or so. It’s basically a way to mix the assistance lifts with whole body moves in circuit fashion for a conditioning effect.
The 5/3/1 for beginners section was interesting and I couldn’t help but think it looked a lot like the Greyskull workout. It’s a full body workout 3x a week but stressing one lift more than the other three and keeping assistance out of it or to a minimum. Still I don’t think I’d use it with a beginner because they can ride a straight LP for quite a while and don’t really need to work with %s IMO. But it looks interesting.
The diet stuff was simple but very common-sensical. Learn to love the whey, I guess.
The big question will be whether or not people should upgrade and I can’t answer that. The first edition laid out the basics really well. Thing is, with this edition you seem to have a one-stop resource for almost every thing you could do with the system (5/3/1 for powerlifting not included) making it a good deal IMO.
From beginner to intermediate?
99% of the fitness industry is stuck in a beginner fat loss stage. How to lose fat is a topic of nearly endless discussion largely because the process is simple, but not easy. One question most folks never ask is what happens if you do lose the weight? What then?
It’s an important question because many people at some point in their fat loss attempts might actually lose weight. But the chances of them regaining it at huge. In fact, the overwhelming majority of people that lose weight will simply gain it back and that’s a shame. But then the fitness industry doesn’t exactly prepare us for what comes next.
So what does come next? Performance.
If you’ve been training smart in your fat loss, you were training like a beginning level athlete and not doing something stupid like riding an exercise bike three hours a day while trying to eat 1000 a day. In other words, if you did what nearly everyone else on earth did and cardioed yourself to death while also killing off any muscle you might have had in the process, then you just set yourself up for serious failure. Because what are you going to do now? Keep cardioing yourself to death? Good luck with that. And come see me when your lack of any muscle causes you to slip a disk. I train many clients like that.
If you trained like a basic athlete because you’re smarter than the average bear then you’ve prepared your body to do more interesting training. At this point, you won’t get winded near as much as you did when you started. The weight is way down, your lungs and heart are strong, and you can push yourself. You can start chasing performance goals like bringing your running times down, lifting more weights, hitting certain rep goals in kettlebell lifts, or even join an adult or masters sports league. Yes, you could compete again (or for the first time) as an adult.
Powerlifting, amateur bodybuilding, racing, church league softball, adult Brazilian jiu-jitsu classes, etc. are all options once the weight comes off and your fitness improves.
If none of that floats your boat or you don’t have time, then your workouts need to change to being faster and stronger than you were before. And here’s a MAJOR difference: how many calories you burn is NOT the major concern of the workout. That’s no longer the goal. This is maintenance level. We are now looking at doing something long term, not killing it every time you go to the gym.
Be VERY careful with this! This requires a major shift in mindset for some people. When your only experience with exercise has been about burning calories then moving to an intermediate/performance level can really shake you up. But it’s also a more fun level where you no longer really worry about calories. Remember, athletes focus on winning, not burning calories. So go enjoy being an athlete!
THUMP Boxing training now available at Formosa Fitness
We’re pleased to announce that our trainer Abram recently completed his level 3 certification in THUMP boxing! Boxing training is now available in private sessions scheduled at your convenience. Come try it out!
Why is coaching important?
Listen to Scott Abel (one of the smartest guys in the industry) on this:
I want them to know that coaching is essential to optimal results. Information does not equal expertise. There is an incredible amount of information about training and diet available online these days, yet there are more trainers and coaches than ever.
If optimizing physical results was as easy as reading about it online, coaches and trainers would be out of jobs. Coaching is oversight; it is knowing what an individual needs when they need it. Like I always say in my seminars, I can have the most fuel efficient and best maintained car on the road, but if my destination is Florida and I head North then it doesn’t matter what the vehicle’s potential is, I will never reach my destination (goal).
Too many trainees think they are heading in the right direction, but aren’t. If they only understood the value of applied expertise, they could save themselves a lot of time and money with respect to reaching their physical goals.
How to USE workout videos
You can actually do many of the workouts you see posted on Youtube!
For example, here’s a video I did for the STX:
If you want to do this workout, take a pen and paper (or better yet, a notebook you use to write down ALL your workouts), and write down what I’m doing as I do it. I even put the reps in there so you don’t have to count. Sometimes you will depending on the person who put up the video.
Then you take the workout you’ve written down with you to the gym or place you workout and do the workout as done in the video. I actually filmed the one above so you could download it to your mobile phone and have the video with you at all times.
As a studio owner and fitness equipment seller, one of the most frustrating comments I get is “I don’t know what to do with it” or “I don’t know what to do today.” To answer these types of questions, I often post sample workouts but people don’t seem to realize they can actually do the workout I post.
I don’t post as many workouts as other trainers because I don’t think you need to do something completely different every single day. I would recommend a set of workouts (hint, hint: STX upper body, STX lower body, STX core for example) that are done seriously and often to get the best results.
Take a little initiative and get going!