Dynamic Efforts, and Accomodating resistance

[Kent Newland]

I've read most of the way through Louie Simmon's Westside Barbell book. I was apparently confused, as I did not realize that you are supposed to use accommodating resistance in addition to a smaller percentage of 1RM.

My 1RM for Front Squats is 305. I loaded ~50% on the bar, 150 pounds. I then added the chains that we have in our gym, which added about 70 pounds total. I felt like I couldn't generate velocity in the bar, that I was moving too slowly. I'm not sure if this is because the bar was too heavy, or my form was just off. I took the chains off for the last two sets, and I felt I was able to move a little bit faster.

On bench and squat, if I feel like I'm not moving the bar fast enough, should I just reduce the load, and keep the accommodating resistance the same, or what? Trying to sort out all the Westside Method stuff, and I'm still coming across bits and pieces that I missed, or misinterpreted.

Kent

[Robert Fabsik]

The reigning advice is that speed is king.

For squats (front, box, safety bar) use a 3 week wave of 50/55/60% of your 1RM of that particular lift. To that add around 25% accomodating resistance that would be 25% at the top. You should do 10-12 sets of 2.

So for your 305 Front squat:
Week 1: 152.5lbs bar weight + ~76 pounds of chain at the top of the lift
Week 2: 167.5lbs bar weight + ~76 pounds of chain at the top of the lift
Week 3: 183lbs bar weight +~76 pounds of chain at the top

After this do a new wave either with a differnt type of squat or change the type of accomodating resistance--bands, maybe keep the bar weight constant but add chains each week etc.

For bands, a good starting point for your front squat would be the light bands and then try the average bands.

Don't get overly fixed on making the weights perfectly match the percentages. Your 70lbs of chain is fine--as long as at least 1/2 if not more deloads completely at the bottom of your lift.

For the bench press it is very similar. Just do usually 9 sets of 3 (sometimes more, sometimes less--especially if you are using bands). Louie wrote an article for the final issue of Powerlifting USA and he reviewed their raw benching routine. Now the guys are using as low as 40% bar weight. But if you are new to it and need practice generating high levels of force with low bar weight, you are probably better off starting like the squats with 50-60% plus accomodating resistance.

If you plan on doing speed pulls, think 6-10 sets of singles or doubles with 50-70% plus accomodating resistance.

If you feel 50-60% is too high, either lower the accoomdating resistance or go to lower percentages for a while and once you can rock those move up the percentages over a couple of cycles.

[Paulo Santos]

The Speed Days really help with the speed. As far as percentages, I don't worry too much about the recommended percentages because it will all depend on your equipment and how you set it up. The key is speed.

[David Meverden]

My question has always been "how fast is fast enough?"

BENCH: Rick Scarpulla gave me an awesome and exact way to tell if DE bench is too slow: he said use a stopwatch and time from first rep touching the chest to last rep being locked out. Those reps should take 2.5 to 2.8 seconds, and if they don't the weight is off. And he said always use mini-bands: heavier bands are too much for people like us on DE bench. Don't know how much you would use in chains.

SQUAT: This is the one I really don't know about and hope you guys can help. How do you know if you are going fast enough? Louie talks about 0.7-0.9 m/s which is completely unhelpful. I've also heard that you if you don't accelerate to the end it's too heavy, but that doesn't seem very definite either. I would love to have something concrete like the rule above for bench, though I know that because the time on the box will vary a stopwatch method like that might now work. Anyone have a tip?

[Robert Fabsik]

Another suggested rule of thumb is that your full Dynamic Set should take as long as a typical Max Effort Single. Not a deathly grinder, but a tough single 90% of 1RM or above. If the set takes you longer then that you are moving too slow. So next time you hit some heavy singles, have someone time you then compare to your DE set.

[Chris Mason]

Originally Posted by Kent Newland

I've read most of the way through Louie Simmon's Westside Barbell book. I was apparently confused, as I did not realize that you are supposed to use accommodating resistance in addition to a smaller percentage of 1RM.

My 1RM for Front Squats is 305. I loaded ~50% on the bar, 150 pounds. I then added the chains that we have in our gym, which added about 70 pounds total. I felt like I couldn't generate velocity in the bar, that I was moving too slowly. I'm not sure if this is because the bar was too heavy, or my form was just off. I took the chains off for the last two sets, and I felt I was able to move a little bit faster.

On bench and squat, if I feel like I'm not moving the bar fast enough, should I just reduce the load, and keep the accommodating resistance the same, or what? Trying to sort out all the Westside Method stuff, and I'm still coming across bits and pieces that I missed, or misinterpreted.

Kent

If your speed is too slow the load is too heavy. Period. Lighten the bar load and then work your way back up via the waves over time.

[David Meverden]

Originally Posted by Chris Mason

If your speed is too slow the load is too heavy. Period. Lighten the bar load and then work your way back up via the waves over time.

But how slow is too slow? How does one tell?

Originally Posted by Robert Fabsik

Another suggested rule of thumb is that your full Dynamic Set should take as long as a typical Max Effort Single. Not a deathly grinder, but a tough single 90% of 1RM or above. If the set takes you longer then that you are moving too slow. So next time you hit some heavy singles, have someone time you then compare to your DE set.

So the time to go down, up, down, up on DE day should be the same as the time to go down and then up on ME day?

[Robert Fabsik]

Originally Posted by David Meverden

So the time to go down, up, down, up on DE day should be the same as the time to go down and then up on ME day?

Roughly. I read somewhere that is why they chose the rep ranges for the squat and bench on DE day.

[Chris Mason]

Originally Posted by David Meverden

But how slow is too slow? How does one tell?



So the time to go down, up, down, up on DE day should be the same as the time to go down and then up on ME day?

.7-.8 m/s is the goal. That translates to a pretty fast speed of movement. I will take a video of our next speed session and post it.

[David Meverden]

I talked to coach Scarpulla again and what he emphasized is time under tension. The two reps in the DE squat session should take about as long as 1 max effort squat which he said should take 2.5-2.8 seconds. So, time from butt being on box to locking out 2nd rep is 2.5-2.8 seconds with no pause at all at the top. This will be a little trickier than bench since the box squat you don't bounce out of the bottom, so the time on the box could vary, but this still gives me something concrete to go off of (assuming you have someone who can time your squats).

More videos would be helpful too, though, Chris. I watched the CFJ one about DE and I guess if I took a video and compared it to those I could see relative speed.