theturgid asks

Justin, how do you deal with persistent stalling/failing on TM? (All lifts, but mostly squat) The ebook mentions manipulating VD but that isn’t working for me. The options I see are:

1) Reset ID back 10% like in SS
2) Take a deload or week off?
3) Just deal with the slowed progress and accept a failure every 2nd or 3rd week?
4) Something I haven’t thought of?

After I asked what his Volume Day and Intensity Day numbers were:
my squat VD is 264# and ID is at 341 – I only got 3 reps last week, was going for 5, hopefully will get the 5 this friday

Dear theturgid,

Typically I see numbers higher than yours in a TM set up, but it doesn’t mean it’s impossible. You are 6’2″ and weigh about 210 lbs (he said this in another comment), which isn’t that large for the height. You also said you don’t think your diet is the issue or what your goals are, but I have to assume you aren’t eating enough properly. Are you eating a MINIMUM of 250g of high quality protein? I like the 77 pound discrepancy between the VD and ID (although your VD rep scheme wasn’t specified), but you may require an increase in volume, especially since 264 is not a significant amount of stress for a 210 lb guy.

Under the assumption that you are doing everything in training, life, and recovery correctly (which is highly unlikely for most readers of this site), there are some more advanced techniques that will be out very soon in Part II of the Texas Method E-book. Sorry for the cliff hanger, but reevaluate the ancillary stuff and increase your volume slightly and see what happens.

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I can’t say this any better than Mauro G. Di Pasquale, who is becoming a hero of mine.

However, for those athletes involved in strength events such as the Olympic field and sprint events, those in football or hockey, or weightlifters, powerlifters, and bodybuilders, I recommend between 1.2 and 1.6 g of high-quality protein per pound of total body weight. That means that if you weigh 200 lb and want to put on a maximum amount of muscle mass, then you will have to take in as much as 320g of protein daily. There are several competitive weightlifters, powerlifters, and bodybuilders that I know who take in 2-3 g of high-quality protein per pound of body weight.

If you are trying to lose weight or body fat it is important to keep your dietary protein levels high. That is because the body oxidizes more protein on a calorie-deficient diet than it would in a diet that has adequate calories. The larger the body muscle mass, the more transamination of amino acids occurs to fulfill energy needs. Thus for those wishing to lose weight but maintain or even increase lean body mass in specific skeletal muscles, I recommend at least 1.5g of high-quality protein per pound of body weight. The reduction in claories needed to lose weight should be at the expense of the fats and carbohydrates, not protein (345).

Dr. Di Pasquale in his powerlifting days

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Running, burpees, turkish get ups, kettlebell swings, and…pain. That’s what Johnny Pain’s new e-book, “50 More Greyskull Approved Conditioning Workouts for the Modern Viking“, consists of. The model for all of the workouts is the infamous Bony, who apparently is a glutton for punishment.

This e-book is pretty straight forward: it consists of 50 conditioning workouts that will make a man out of you. When I program conditioning for someone who is training for something, I primarily the entire workout to consist of efficient, large-scale movements that utilize a lot of muscle to use up as much energy as possible to induce the stress. In FIT I also talk about how to properly program the conditioning in accordance with your strength training. If you combine these elements with this e-book by JP, you have a repertoire of workouts to plug into your program.

There are a few workouts that use some slower movements, like floor whipers, lunges, and leg raises (interspersed with chin-ups), yet there is something to be said for getting through grueling sets of exercises. It does a few things: it provides a mental challenge without superfluous chipper-type workouts, it gets lots of muscular contraction which can assist in developing the look of muscles (see Arnold’s Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding if you’re confused), and they still provide a much higher relative stress compared to just straight lifting. In other words, the slower, arduous movements may not get maximum levels of stress, but for most people they won’t need those high levels of stress and can receive a benefit to conditioning and musculature with these other movements. Besides, a movement like the backwards crab walk — influenced by JP’s Airborne infantry background — is a good way to work on agility, mobility, and pissing blood.

Workout #14 is very similar to something that I have used once a week for a while: burpees alternated with kettlebell swings (this workout alternates them in 30 second increments). JP uses creative exercise and rest period combinations that I’m sure will give you plenty of ideas for your own training. The best part of it all is that the workouts are all short and intense; you get a lot of bang for your buck so that you can bang when you fuck. God damn, I should copyright that. InventHelp Invention Company is who I will call for copyrighting and patenting. Do you need professional assistance with idea development and professional submissions? This resource provides opportunity for inventors.

Purchase it HERE.

Chris is a big, bad dude. One time, Mike, Chris, and I were leaving a bar and Chris was worried about the group of people his girlfriend was hanging out with. I don’t remember why he was mad, but I was convinced that I would have to go with him as he kicked these people’s door in and pick them up by the neck and bash their heads together like King Kong.

Chris and his rig

Chris has a pretty full schedule. He’s in his second year of grad school (getting his Master’s), teaches classes for his grad assistantship, and also has a part-time job. It doesn’t leave a lot of time and energy for training, but he gets it done nonetheless.

Chris squatting 610×3 on Saturday. Skip to :30.

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Learning How To Fail

There will be a point in a girl’s training when something will go wrong. This isn’t unique to females, but it’s more significant to them when it happens. When a guy fails a weight or busts his ass squatting, he’s embarrassed and ashamed, but typically more pissed off. He’ll mutter, “God damn it,” scrape himself off the floor, re-rack the weight, and try it again. He’s pissed, yet has a hint of competitiveness. This could be from playing sports in high school or a heightened relative aggression due to an evolutionary development that results in at least ten times the amount of testosterone. Either way, when girls who are new to training fail, they can get upset and will even cry.

It doesn’t always have to occur after an embarrassing ass-busting that results in everyone in the gym staring. Instead, it can occur with experienced girls who miss a much desired PR. Sorry if you’re a tough-guy girl who feels the need to respond to every discrepancy that isn’t aimed at you, but most girls will cry at least once in the gym.

This can be awkward or difficult, because most guys won’t know what to do (and will often just want to go make a sandwich). Yet it’s relevant, because focusing on “today” is erroneous when training is actually a process. Anybody who broods excessively over a shitty workout just ends up being a pain in the ass. You’re allowed to brood if you bomb out at a meet, but not if you miss a rep off of your work set. Failing is supposed to be a part of training. It needs to happen. If it didn’t, we wouldn’t get any better.

Even Pudgy Stockton failed at some point, though not in this photo