Precision Powerlifting Systems

When we train in person we train as a group with no phones. We do the same program and push each other. We will have some type of challenge where the winner picks the accessories. On this day we did an amrap on the last set of dynamic squats.

This is why I fell in love with powerlifting and I feel the majority of lifters in the sport have never experienced this. Instead everyone does the same comp specific lifts, in their own racks, headphones in, taking 3 hours to do 5 sets.

We live in a time where lifters are not developed anymore. Everyone does this hyper specific program and you either have it or you don’t.

This is the training environment necessary to develop lifters as it pushes effort and increases gpp. It is more fun too

Sunday training . wanted to try a bench shirt so naturally and couldn’t let him do it alone.

Nick got a touch on day 1 in the shirt. It doesn’t feel like a loose shirt, but it is. Start with something manageable, get technical in it, and get stronger.

We put Dan in a much tighter shirt and he put some runs across the chest plate and Max is just working on being more consistent in the shirt.

We did this after some speed bench, then hit some accessories, ending on single arm farmer’s carries. All in under 90 minutes.

My coaching philosophy is on slide 2. That literally guides all of my decisions with athletes. Greatness is a journey, and the pyramid is a map to discovering it.

What greatness is will be different for each individual. They are each the center of their own journey and they are accountable for the results they get as well as the path they choose.

I teach the methods. They learn how to mold them to fit their needs with where they are at.

We do not outsource this to an algorithm. A conjugate program fits perfectly with this philosophy as it requires you to be present, learn, and learn how to flow throughout the training.

I help the lifters with making those decisions and this does take time to learn. It also requires more time than just the time that you spend in the gym, but if you are serious about getting better, this is a requirement

Good thing won her weight class so I have a pic to go with this post. More than half of the PPS team has been on the team for over 3 years, with training ages that are much much higher.

Jess has been on PPS for a little over 4 years. We have added over 100lbs to her total, but did not hit any PRs today.

The longer you stick with this sport, the more difficult it becomes to add to your total. Things you have gotten away with in the past you won’t get away with anymore.

People think coaching is writing programs, but when people are beyond those beginner gains, it becomes more about mentoring.

These last few weeks, Jess and I have had quite a few conversations about what it takes to be better and what people don’t see are the changes she made in the last few weeks.

We decided to treat this as a training day, talk about things to work on, and start stacking those things we need to do to lead to better progress.

I don’t give a f**k about this meet. I care about how Jess has showed up on time, phone down, and trained hard the last month with the group. We are going to build on this starting immediately since recovery from the lighter lifts at the meet shouldn’t be too bad.

Its not about hitting PRs, but becoming a different person. At some point you can’t separate those two things. You need to believe you are capable of bigger things before you can do bigger things.

Smiling and screaming after PRs is all good and great and will get likes and make you happy for a day or two, but if thats what you are here for it will be short lived and you won’t ever reach your full potential.

We tend to only see the highlight reels and the stars on IG, but never the real s**t. The real s**t builds character and it will build the total. You will see that from Jess the next time out. No doubt

In a continued effort to not inundate the internet with the same bulls**t over and over, I am attempting to keep these articles more personal.

Sports offers an opportunity for us to identify who we want to be as a person through identifying our personal values. From there we can use sports to help us become that person.

Of course this takes self-awareness which is extremely lacking these days in a sport where we outsource our effort and even just paying attention, but that is a whole other rant.

I had a situation arise a few weeks ago that really rattled who I thought I was as a person and how I identified my strengths.

Using the same philosophy I use to coach, I focused on those values and put them to the test last week where I ended up having one of my best training weeks in a very long time.

Click the link in the story to read more

THINGS I FU**ED UP:DYNAMIC EFFORT

A common complaint about a conjugate program is in the dynamic effort work. The argument is it is too light for raw lifters and bands are too different from the comp squat to carryover, which really doesn’t make a lot of sense, but it is an argument.

Weights at 85% and under have a deceleration sub phase during the concentric portion of the movement. Most rep work volume will be found in that 70-85% range. This is why 85% and above seems to be good for max effort work as deceleration is almost non-existent. This includes your RPE 8 singles.

Due to the deceleration sub phase, you can’t improve explosive power very well with straight weight. S&C coaches use the olympic lifts and plyos here for that reason.

By placing bands on the bar at around 25% of 1RM and getting the rest of the weight from bar weight, we can increase mechanical output and explosive power because we decrease the deceleration of the lighter weights.

Yes, force output drops. We know this from the force/velocity curve. This is why we do max effort work. Force output is maximal on those days as velocity is slow and force is high.

I made the mistake of giving more comp lifts before this upcoming competition. She was hesitating into the hole, and slow coming out.

To improve this, we needed more dynamic effort work between that .7 to .9 m/s to improve her ability to generate force more quickly. At some point you just miss a lift because you run out of time.

Force output is trained with max effort, ability to generate force quickly and compensatory acceleration is trained with dynamic effort (but it requires bands or chains), and volume is built through our accessories that allow us to push our work capacity, work on weaknesses, and still recover. Maintaining the same force/posture curve by doing the same exercises over and over is very limited to all of that.

MY COACHING PHILOSOPHY

Every coach needs to have a coaching philosophy. This is a blueprint that drives decision making.

My philosophy is about building this pyramid from the foundation up. An example of me using this is when I met with groups in person I realized effort was not where it needed to be so that became a focal point in the training since.

We often perform exercises to identify our personal values (integrity), learning is a critical component with our team meetings and 1-1 calls (student), we need to be resilient and learn how to deal with adversity, and this all centers around self-awareness (mindfulness).

You do those foundational things well and I will guarantee you that you will get a lot out of this sport.

From those foundational pieces we get the next layer. We take our values and turn that into intent, our effort into work capacity, our learning and awareness into technique and focus.

From there we develop a training skill, confidence follows, and we can be distracted and encounter the unexpected and refocus our attention.

Then we become authentic in every setting (poise under pressure), we become leaders to newer lifters and the community, and from there we become great.

The program is about developing these traits within each and every lifter. Its more than sets and reps and leaving comments about technique

This is an example of the force-time curve. I like how it includes each strength quality as each is its own gear as we build larger horsepower through max effort work.

Powerlifting is drag racing. 0-60 seconds matters. This is why it is important to include dynamic work in your training.

We want to reach max force more quickly, have a higher peak for max force, and complete the task in less time. This expands the area under the curve and above the weight of the exercise.

It is often misunderstood that conjugate only utilizes light and heavy loads when in reality all strength qualities are trained.

Dynamic work is still between 70-90% of 1RM, load is just manipulated with band tension to move those loads at greater velocities.

Also, the primary accessory of training days is often multiple sets of 5 reps around 70% of a goodmorning, pull or squat variation, or bench variation.

This targets those middle ranges. Most high frequency comp lift programs only spend time in those middle ranges. This is inadequate because you need to train first and second gear to get to 5th. 5th gear helps first and second be more powerful.

This is why a conjugate program is the best program out there. It covers all bases while allowing for adaptability between each individual.

By assessing and attacking weaknesses we can keep increasing performance over time. There is a caveat though, knowledge needs to increase as well so that we can correctly identify and strategize

TOXIC STRESS

Have you ever heard about toxic stress? This is the term they give the stress that those of us with childhood trauma experienced. They call it this because it has adverse health effects for those children as they become adults.

The pandemic had an impact on all of us, but for some, like myself, it was/is a trigger to those past traumas.

Under those circumstances it becomes extremely difficult to hit PRs. The work needed to do this goes unnoticed, just like the wounds those of us walk around with.

What is even better is that people will make fun of my total to discredit me as a coach. It took me 2.5 years to hit a PR. My best lifts came before covid for a reason.

For me, that is a triggering event. That PR most won’t be able to comprehend how much work it took to get there. If I broke my leg and came back and hit it people would applaud.

But because they can’t see my wounds, I just don’t know what I am doing as a coach.

I know there are many people out there that can benefit from hearing this. Link in my story

SCHEMES OF PERFECTING MOVEMENT

New videos up on Strength School. In this 2 part video series I cover why and how we train the force/time curve utilizing conjugate principles.

This is a fundamental element of ALL strength training, not just powerlifting. There is hours of educational footage available now as well as training programs.

Visit the link in my bio or click the link in the corresponding story to learn more.

“WE HAVE A SYSTEM THAT WILL TEACH YOU TO TEACH YOURSELF”

This right here is how I attempt to model . This has been a transformation in the works (and still is) since we were forced out of gyms together during the pandemic.

I feel the powerlifting world is getting further and further from this piece. We now have apps where you put in a few metrics and it pumps out your daily training. This creates robots that just follow some program.

Every elite athlete in every sport understands that sport at a very high level. Some people are just good at powerlifting and get elite totals very quickly. They then create the apps, but its your money.

Louie always wrote about the importance of knowledge. Sheiko calls his lifters students.

Student is at the base if our pyramid of greatness because it is a foundational component for most to be elite. Being a member of our team is as much, if not more, about education.

You should be invested enough in yourself to want to learn. The majority will not do well just following a program.

I have multiple degrees in this field and 17 years coaching. It is an advantage of mine as well.

I study every single day and still do. Reading and re-reading texts so that I can develop expertise at a greater level to teach it to our lifters.

This is a very different experience than what is offered almost everywhere else. Everything we do is well understood and researched to the highest levels. People may disagree, and that is fine, but I will guarantee you our decisions are as well thought out, if not more so, than everyone else. It is why I am so confident at times going against the grain, its not just a whim.

If you want to invest in yourself and your knowledge of strength training. PPS is the team for you

I had the pleasure of chatting with a couple of weeks ago. and spoke very highly of him, and I now can see why.

Travis and I had a great discussion about training and having a community. He has a pretty motivating story too that will definitely fire people up.

The dude runs a charity for underprivileged kids and even had the judges overturn a good deadlift that they gave him because he holds himself to a particular standard.

Travis is an elite lifter and human being, hopefully everyone enjoys the conversation as much I did