For me, everything comes back to Wendler. If you’ve never met me, I’ll be the first to tell you that 5/3/1 is probably the greatest success of training philosophy I have ever seen. Having said that, up until recently, I have more or less co-opted 5/3/1 principles in my own training to hit my goals. After a year dedicated to learning the art of weightlifting (Snatch and Clean & Jerk), I finally came to a point where I said, “Fuck it, I want to squat 405” and ran a dedicated Smolov routine.

Not the watered down version, Smolov Jr., the full 16 week program with the Intro phase, base mesocycle, switching phase, heavy mesocycle, and finally, peak. And it worked, with a total of 70 lbs gained. (I started with a training max (Oh shit, Wendler – Parenthesis in parenthesis, Is this meta? – again!) for Smolov) Having finally done the most infamous program in history, and compared it to how I have always trained, I have since observed some fantastic growth in my own training along with some massive shifts in focus. I think this is as good a time as any to share them.

1: Weight PRs are NOT as important as rep PRs are.

When people talk about 5/3/1 the biggest thing I hear from people is that “It’s too light” “It’s not enough reps under load” or my favorite “I should be able to hit my maxes consistently, I don’t need a Training Max”

If those are your critiques you should probably buy the book and give it an actual read.

I will admit that I came to the program with this trepidation at first as well, because the noob in me said that, if I’m ALWAYS doing sets of 5 or 3 or 1 and way lighter than I need, then only the final week of the program is where I’ll really work hard, because the first 2 weeks will be too light.

And then I set PR after PR. Not necessarily pushing my 1RM max mind you, sometimes my training maxes didn’t even go up at all. However, it is incredibly motivating to move 95% for a grinding single one cycle, put up that same weight for 3 solid reps the next time around, and a third time around for 8.

I’m not going to pretend to understand it, but Jim is some sort of alchemist when it comes to training, and the way he structures the programs work in such a way that you get stronger.  It seems all that time spent grinding away on the sets of 5 over a few cycles sets you up for some big results when you actually go to push for PRs.  In fact, I’m STILL reaping the benefits of this set-up, and despite being some amount of time away from a specialized program, I am smashing PRs in the press every time I train it.  The non-PR sets are where strength is built, and the PR sets are where it is realized.

2: You can train the same muscle groups many times in a row

I was stuck in the mentality that, after you train a muscle group, you have to let it rest for 48ish hours, because of reasons.  This mentality forced my training to be pretty restrictive, and many times my schedule would get chaotic.  However, with 5/3/1’s approach to assistance work being that the full body gets worked every time you train, I found out that it was totally possible to recover training the same muscle groups back to back to back, so long as volume and recovery were accounted for.  Yeah; if you do a full on hour workout just for your shoulders, you shouldn’t touch them again for a few days, but if all you did was 50-100 reps of some raises, you can come back the next day and so some presses and be fine.  And in the end, your total volume for the week will be about the same as if you hammered them for an hour on one day; it’s just a different approach.  This opens up a lot more options for training flexibility and more creative approaches to assistance work.

3: You can’t push assistance work and main work hard at the same time

This was the big revelation coming out of Smolov and back in to Wendlers approach to training. This was something I never wanted to admit to, but was the absolute truth.  The main work in the program tends to be those lifts we are specifically focusing on:

• Squat
• Deadlift
• Press
• Bench
• Snatch
• Clean and Jerk

I wanted to push those lifts hard whenever I was trying to improve those specific lifts, but when that happens, it meant that the assistance lifts, the ones that actually build those 6, need to throttle back.  Volume or intensity needs to be reduced in order to accommodate for how hard we’re pushing the top stuff.  So what did I learn? Throttle back on the main work.

Don’t get me wrong, you still need to pump that iron hard and heavy, but, in a way that gets you stronger without compromising technique, because the focus will always be on the foundation that gets you there. So when the time comes to push the weight PRs, the hypothetical floor you’re pushing off from is higher.

4: Rest is overrated. Recovery is not.

In life, if you’re truly in a life or death situation, it’s not going to stop and wait with you for the recommended 3 to 5 minutes between each physical exertion. Tell me if any of these sound familiar?

• Only lift 3 days a week
• Only use a Push/Pull/Legs format for lifting
• Rest 3 to 5 minutes between work sets for optimal lifting.
• Don’t do cardio

It’s all bullshit. I’m not saying you have to go full CrossFit to lift well, but I am saying that you have way more capacity than you have probably ever given yourself credit for. Wendlers “Building the Monolith” (and some good lifting bros) got me back into the idea of viable full body training, and Jim’s approach to assistance work has you train the entire body every day, even if the focus is on just one movement.  In turn, frequency of muscle group training is high, as is total volume, yet it works in a fashion that is completely recoverable.

For example, my training file for 6.21.18 saw me doing supersets of heavy Deadlifts and Bench Press, you know why? Because it’s an asinine thought that two movements that have almost nothing to do with each other would somehow be competitive inhibitors. If they fit together, lift them together. Take only enough time to rest as it takes to change weights or up to a minute, whichever comes first. You will be surprised with what you’re capable of.

As a final note this approach allows me to still get in adequate volume and frequency in lifting, without needing to make skills for CrossFit (which I am dabbling in more these days) an afterthought.

At the end of the day I’m just a bro

And this is what works for me.