ExRx.net

So I've decided to try 531. Naturally, I'm pouring over a lot of old threads, and it seems popular around here. But I still have some big questions I was hoping someone could answer.

First, how closely can I have training sessions? Wendler recommends not to train 2 days in a row, but then goes on to give a 4 day schedule with 2 days in a row. Worse, he has a schedule in his book which feature 2 sessions a week, each of which has two major exercises; e.g., Press/Deadlift one day, and the Bench/Squat another. Is it possible or even a good idea to vary the time between exercises. So, for example, if I press tuesday, and deadlift thursday, can I then bench and squat on Sunday? If I do do this, do I do both major movements before doing any assistance exercises?

When I do assistance exercises related to a specific major movement, should I do it on the same day or a different day? In other words, should I do my tricept curls on the same day I press, or wait for deadlift day?

Now the big question: how do I choose what assistance exercises to do?

And finally: are DB rows better than barbell rows? I get that impression from Wendler's book.

It's very flexible. The split you mention would work. Just separate your deadlifts from squats and your press from the bench by 3-4 days. If you want to do bench and squat the same days or adjacent day, that would work. Unless you have an 8 day week, it's hard not to make some compromise. Do your warmup first, then your major movements then accessory after.

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Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~Hippocrates
Strength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley
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Thanks TimD

I would do it monday bench/tuesday deadlift/thursday press/friday squat

so your assistance on the day of the exercise, so chest accessory stuff on bench day etc

as for assistance, no one can answer that for you. Assess your individual needs and plan accordingly

imo, it's important to asses why you are going to 531

Squating and Benching once a week is slower progression than you might be able to best benfit from.
IIR, you have not exhausted your newbie gains.

One hurdle to consider when scheduling is whether or not there are specific days of the week you need to (or cannot) train, or not. If not, heck, 7 days doesnt matter. Ex: Mon / Wed / Fri / Sun / Tue / Thu / Sat / Mon is two cycles. Benefit of this is that if you take an extra day off, just jump back on to the next day. Or if you are splitting Upper and Lower then dont rest between everyday Sun / Mon / Wed / Thur / Sat / Sun / Tues / Wed is a pretty quick 2 cyles, but just put in another rest day as needd, if needed. Rather than being fixed on "Do X exercises on day Monday".
I have no answrs for you, just ideas to open your mind.

DB Row isless stress on your Lower Back, but accordingly, works less lower body muscles (stabilizers). Given I do Deadlifts, Back Squats, and Good Mornings, personally, I stick with DB Rows. I"m likely to rotate back to Barbell soon though. Bottom line, both great exercises, consider how they fit into the program

You can do assistance lifts that are "related" to a major lift on the same day or on a different day. When I was doing 5/3/1, for much of the time I did volume bench on press day and vice versa, and volume squat on DL day and GM (my DL "accessory") on squat day. On my volume bench day I could lift a bit heavier than I could have if I had done BBB with the accessory on the same day as the major lift.

All the things you ask are discussed in the book, and are all questions that you will have to answer for yourself.

One criticism I'd have of 5/3/1 is that it attempts to place equal priority on all 4 major lifts. I think it would be better for most people to make one or maybe 2 lifts "priority lifts".

Of all the published workouts, 5/3/1 is the best because it is the most flexible, the most easily tailored to individual needs and situations. Don't destroy that by asking us to tell you what to do. Think, try, change, repeat.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

I don't really agree with this. Squatting and deadlifting work pretty much all the same muscles, and the same can be said for benching and overhead pressing.

You'll be doing two upper and two lower body workouts a week. That's plenty and'll provide loads of benefit.

If you really want to you could do 5x10 squats on deadlift day, and 5x10 deads on squat day if you're desperate to do the movements twice in a week

Why?
Under what conditions?
And how does that manifest itself in programming?

thanks!




You go from saying 2 Upper & 2 Lower per week is "Plenty" to then "suggesting" "add 50 reps if you are desperate". Quite a range. Seems tongue in cheek and counter productive. Not everyone needs the same protocol, though.
84 hours between lower body work imo, is too mcuh for most beginners, esp young ones. OP should find out for himself or let us know why he is moving away from a more linear progression program, imo. If he goes to 531 and follows the slow progression, he may leave gains on the table. Obviously, I'm only one rather inexperienced person spouting off here.

Agree to Disagree?

I've found this to be the case, too. It's quite rare once passed newbie gains that all 4 big lifts will progress at the same time. I don't really know "why", if i'm being honest. It must be a recovery thing i.e. to progress you need to get stronger and to get stronger you must recover. To trigger the need to recover you need to add stress. Maybe it's too much stress all at once to recover properly from all of it. As I said, I don't really know why but I have found it to be the case.

Sometimes, I think we focus too much on the trees and miss the forest because it has also been my experience that when your DL moves up your squat moves up and vice versa. Not all the time but most of the time. More so, an improvement in the squat seems to give carryover to the deadlift but not as common to see the opposite. This is however where it's completely individual and emphasises the need to experiment for yourself because, if your posterior chain strength is holding back your squat, then it's going to be tough to increase the squat from just squatting, regardless of sets/reps/progression that are used. However, if you're hammering the DL, too, and therefore, your PC strength, then guess what happens to your squat after you have "cemented" some new DL gains....

So, if your DL is staying put but your squat is progressing, then maybe it's not the case that you can't improve on both but, you need to improve your squat a certain amount to then get your DL moving.... -Thinking out loud-... So whilst one lift seems stagnant, actually it's indirectly moving up.

I also see it with pressing and row strength quite a lot. Presses won't move but rows are progressing nicely. It's as if they just get to a certain point and something "clicks" with the presses and they start moving. Almost like some lifts give "juice" to others.

From a programming stand point, to me it's very similar to my argument for beginners focusing almost solely on compounds. Hit everything and see what moves up and what doesn't then re-evaluate. If, for example, your DL is moving but your squat isn't, then you don't want to stop training something that's improving so you'll keep DL as a priority. In terms of squatting, I would then program it in a way that exploited other weaknesses. For example, if you have a tendency to round your upper back when squatting, then i'd program front squats. Slow out of the hole, box squats, maybe speed work, possibly both. I would essentially program your squatting to force you into uncomfortable movements, to force you to take control and groove the bar and become more "skilled" at that lift (and not just re-grooving bad habits). Meanwhile your PC strength is on the up from your DL day. However, without first focusing on all the lifts at once and experiencing which ones will stall and which ones will move, you won't know which way you need to go. To finish off the analogy, my argument against loads of isolation for beginners is that you don't know which muscles will be stubborn and which one's will grow with little direct work until you experience if for yourself - no successful body builder has ever had all muscles grow evenly throughout their lifting career, just like no power lifter will see all lifts move up at the same rate throughout their lifting career. If you're a BB'er you need to accept you'll have lagging body parts throughout your training and as a lifter you need to accept that certain lifts will stall throughout your training. It's how you get over the hurdle that matters, in my opinion, and it's much easier to get over a hurdle if you can see it coming in advance.

KPj

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Thanks TimD

having your deadlift accessory on squat day and vice versa is a great way to train, means you get both movement patterns twice a week which is all you need. 84 hours between sessions is fine. I would not recommend ONLY doing the squat and deadlift per session, I don't think that is "plenty". You need some volume in there.

And 5x10 is a fairly standard recommendation for assistance work, Wendler himself recommends it.



agree you haven't read the book?

hehe

A program I used to do but stopped a while ago was something like this:

Workout A	B	C	D	E	F
						
Squat	H	L		M	L	
						
Dead	M	L		H	L	
						
Bench		H	L		M	L
						
Press		M	L		H	L
						
Row	L		H	L		M
						
Pullup	L		M	L		H

I normally spread it over 2 weeks by doing it every second day. With the 5-3-1 protocol layered on top, it would take 8 weeks to complete a cycle. Younger guys could probably do it in as fewer. It's just an idea and ties in with Robert Scott's idea. "H" would be the 5-3-1, "M" would be the 5x10 accesory days, and "L" would be active recovery to get the blood circulating and help the healing process.

_________________
Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~Hippocrates
Strength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley
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Thanks TimD

my main point is we do not know why SumYung is leaving linear progression, or has ever done it (I havent searched, but thought I recall him asking for programming begnner advce recently). What applies to some for 531, and "focusing on one lift" may not for OP.




I observe this phenomena.

Yes. All of that. Plus, a big part of recovery is managing fatigue. As a beginner, you can increase all your lifts fairly rapidly at first. But after a while, if you really put maximal effort into every lift, you can just tire out. By working harder on one or two lifts, and not so hard on the others, you allow yourself time to recover from the fatigue. Not that my experience is universal, but the way I'm lifting now, the first workout of my "week" is my priority lift. I make sure that I have at least 2 days of rest before attempting this workout. By the evening after, I'm exhausted, and don't want to do much other than sleep. The rest of the workouts through the "week" become progressively less demanding. If I were lifting the other lifts with the same intensity (the general meaning, not the technical meaning of "intensity") I'd fall apart in a couple of weeks.

The priority of a given lift will influence where you place it in your weekly cycle, where you place it within a particular workout, the set-rep scheme you apply to it, and how you progress it. The lifts can't all be treated equally, not even 4 of them.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Im pretty sure OP is a beginner, though

There's a two day, a three day and a four day a week template. You pick the one that is most convenient for you. As for assistance, i suggest you buy the book, it's all covered in there.

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What if the Hokey Cokey really IS what it's all about?

I have the book (well, 1st edition). I'm not quite a beginner...I started Stronglifts last April, and I've been stalling for the past few weeks. I'm actually not that strong, yet, but I am so completely unable to make progress, and I need a change.