I have to admit it, I hate assistance. For decades I have told myself I'd train like a bodybuilder for some increased hypertrophy. I can never stick with it. I really just like doing the big lifts. That's how I trained as an athlete and it's how I like to train today.
That said, I do believe assistance work is necessary. However, in my opinion there's a caveat, assistance is more important earlier in one's training career than it is later on. You have to have built up a base. Regardless of all of this, you need volume whether you get it from main lifts or assistance.
There's a 5/3/1 program called Borning, but Strong. With it you perform your main lift of squat, bench, or deadlift, for your 3 working sets of 5/3/1. Then after that, you take a percentage for 10 sets of 5. I'm working those at about the 65% range. This gives you plenty of volume.
After my main lift I am tapped. I really just don't want to dig down deep and do any kind of heavy assistance work. So I have come up with a compromise for myself. Because I don't have an overhead day like most with 5/3/1 I am using that as an assistance day. I will be doing weighted dips, single arm landmine presses, one arm rows, curls, Bulgarian split squats, and single leg deadlifts. I chose all of these because it hits my whole body, plus there are a lot of unilateral movements. I have found these key in getting and keeping my body in proper working order. That's definitely advice I'd give to every lifter. Do unilateral work!
On my squat, deadlift, and bench days I'll do assistance if I feel like it. However, it will only be bodyweight work. This will definitely keep me from overdoing things. I have been experimenting with this a little over the past few weeks. Last week I put the whole plan in action and I really like it. I'll roll this into the NOV meet with Rhodes and Wendler.
So all in all this was a great week. I'm now into week 11 of pain free training. Each day I feel better and better. It was also nice that this is my light (5's percentage) week. I also want to share that I'm really not doing any foam rolling presently. I only do a little extra stretching on most days that probably adds up to a total of two minutes. It's a horizontal row I do with a band where I lean way forward and pull back into a row. It stretches out my shoulders as well as my upper and mid back. Other than that I do some leg swings when I'm just standing around. Those seem to be taking care of my thoracic and hip issues. Miraculously, my forever nagging shoulder/biceps tendon issue is gone and is not requiring any maintenance work.
I think my overall well being has a lot to do with eating really well, getting good sleep, and performing my full dynamic warm up before training. I never, EVER, skimp on my warm ups. Those have all been the ticket, so I'm trying not to change anything. Yeah, I know it sounds easy, but it's not. We are all our own worst enemies. Me more than most.
I did do some extra conditioning this week with sprints and a few tabatas. It was my light week and I'm still pushing to get my bodyweight down further so I figured why not. A month out I will definitely cut all that out. Well, most likely. I can't always control myself. If it wasn't for Wendler in my ear I'd be doing way too much extra work.
Last and probably least, on those extra volume sets for bench I did the last two sets together for a 10 and for the squat I did the last three together for a 15. It's a sadistically fun way to work a little harder, plus you get to finish that way faster. Keep this stuff fun kids and I mean fun in a masochistic way.
MONDAY
Full body warm up
-Dips 45 1x1, 55 4x5
-One arm landmine press 50 2x5, 75 1x5, 85 1x5, 100 1x5
-Meadows row 50 1x5, 75 1x5, 100 3x5
-Ez curl 60 1x5, 110 3x5
-Dbl single leg dl 20 5x5
-Dbl Bulgarian split squat 20 5x5
TUESDAY
-Treadmill 50 minutes
-Thruster tabata
WEDNESDAY
Full body warm up
-Hex bar dl 295x5, 335x5, 375x5, 295 10x5
Superset:
-Pullups 5x5
-Swiss ball rev hyper 5x10
THURSDAY
-Treadmill 20 minutes
-20 sprints
-Jump rope tabata
FRIDAY
Full body warm up
-Bench 270x5, 310x5, 345x5
-Close grip shoulder saver with legs up 275 8x5, 1x10
Superset:
-Inverted rows 4x10
-Triangle pushups 4x10
SATURDAY
Full body warm up
-SSB box squat 280x5, 320x5, 360x5, 280 7x5, 1x15
Superset
-Back raises 5x10
-Ab wheel rollouts 5x10
SUNDAY
-Treadmill 65 minutes
-Jump rope tabata
Faizen ali, I will do a log post soon with a list and or video when I get the time. A lot of people have asked for it. Stay tuned. Thanks for reading.