Pop quiz, hotshot. You need to add some plates to the bar and pack some meat on your bones. You've got precious few weeks to accomplish both, but only have four days per week to train. What do you do? What do you do?
I've asked this question to myself countless times and only recently have I come up with what I believe is the most effective method. Forget total-body training. Forget upper and lower splits. The trick is to, well...I'll get to that in a minute.
I just have to say that before I was ready to unleash this program to T NATION, I had to try it out on my guinea pigs, er...minor-league baseball players and other athletes here at Cressey Performance to see if it truly worked.
And I've got to say the results have been pretty damn impressive.
But why does their success bode well for your success? Well, you've probably got more in common with a typical minor-league baseball player than you might think. As a little frame of reference, here's an excerpt from an email I got from a minor league guy I work with in the off-season:
Yesterday might have been the roughest day of my career. It started by getting back from our game Sunday night at 11:30PM. I couldn't fall asleep until at least 12:30AM, and then we had a 3:30AM wake up call to catch a bus to the airport for our flight at 6:15AM. We had a layover for an hour and a half, then got to the next city at 11AM. We drove to our hotel and I got to my stinky room at the Sleep Inn and tried to catch some sleep - except we had to be at the field at 4PM.
Days like this are not uncommon at all during the professional baseball season: late nights, early wake-up calls, red-eye flights, long bus rides – all of which compromise good sleeping habits. And, it shouldn't come as any surprise that their diets on the road and in the clubhouse are generally atrocious – both in terms of quality and amount. And, let's just say that the typical pro ballplayer consumes far too much alcohol.
What does that have to do with you?
Exhaustive exercise, poor sleep, less-than-perfect nutrition, and more than the occasional brewskie. Starting to sound like anyone you know, skinny?
Anyway, it's pretty clear that these guys need to try to make up for this season of crappy living by getting the absolute most out of their 16-23 week off-season, which is pretty much where I've built my name in the baseball world: quick results in a short amount of time.
While you may not necessarily have an off-season (taking a few weeks off from playing Wii tennis doesn't count), it's probably time for you to clean up your eating, don your war helmet, and hit the gym with authority.
So with little time to work but big results needed, we've come up with a system that has put 20 pounds of muscle or more on damn near every athlete whose followed the program in their off-season.
Guys like Chad Waterbury and Alwyn Cosgrove have raved about the benefits of full-body training sessions, and I agree with them 100%.
However, as a powerlifter and a guy who has lifted alongside some of the best powerlifters and strength and conditioning coaches in the world, I've come to appreciate that the twice-upper, twice-lower weekly schedule is the best there is for building strength.
So, what to do if you want muscle and strength?
Both.
Here's how it works:
This set-up actually has some hidden benefits. First, I've often used it as a subtle lower body specialization program. Second, you can also use it in the exact opposite way simply by rearranging the volume to be more upper-body focused than it is lower-body focused. Simply stated, it's a versatile template.
Another thing I love about four-day set-ups as compared to three-day set-ups is that the four-day option forces trainees to go through their foam rolling and warm-ups an extra day per week. Over the course of the years, that's 52 extra flexibility/tissue quality exposures. And consistency like that adds up in terms of keeping people healthy.
Before I get to the program, I just humbly request that:
And, as I mentioned, they're throwing the medicine balls, sprinting, and doing all sorts of flexibility stuff on the side.
If you want, you can throw in some direct arm work here.
If you want, you can toss in some direct calf work here.
When it really comes down to it, there aren't any fancy set/rep schemes, elaborate exercises, or other bells and whistles. Instead, it all comes down to good timing, adequate frequency, sufficient calories and, of course, hard work.
Give it a shot; you've got nothing to lose, and plenty to gain.
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