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| Display Name | Post: 12 months + “Easy Strength” Guinea Pig | |
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CelticStrength Haven't posted much Posts 13 |
11-02-22 04:36 PM - Post#922988
Starting a 12 month plan, I’d welcome and encourage any advice and/or any requested changes to my plan that might help Dan with his own research/work. My goals are to be consistent in my training, remove any overthinking, gain strength and lose fat. This plan is as much about mental health as it is a physical health journey. It’s about keeping it simple and making progress. Current status - 33yo, 75kg, 169cm, 18-20% body fat. Current 1RM - 75kg BP, 55kg MP, 120kg SQ & 130kg DL PR - 92.5kg BP, 70kg MP, 130kg SQ & 145kg DL Training - on and off between strength training and running/cycling/swimming. Plan - I’m going to run 6 cycles of easy strength for fat loss / easy strength with a 1 week deload every 9th week (54 weeks total). I’m starting with ESFFL and will continue with this until my bf is at a level I’m happy with. I’ll tell you what that is when I see it. I’ll then move to easy strength. Physical Training - ESFFL - Weeks 1, 2, 5 & 6: Ab wheel DB Press WPU Deadlift Swings Walk the dog Weeks 3, 4, 7 & 8: Ab wheel OHP Chin Ups Trap Bar Deadlift Swings Walk the dog Even Easier Strength - Weeks 1, 2, 5 & 6: Overhead Press Trap Bar Deadlift Swings (if I have time) Back Squat Loaded carry (walk the dog with weight vest or some type of farmers walk in the back garden) Weeks 3, 4, 7 & 8: Flat Bench Press Deadlift Swings (if I have time) Zercher Squat Loaded carry (walk the dog with weight vest or some type of farmers walk in the back garden) Mental Training: • Meditation morning and evening following the Mindfulness book by Mark Williams (highly recommended for anyone with a cluttered mind, dealing with anxiety, stress etc) Nutrition: • Intermittent fasting (12-16 hours but won’t always be training fasted for various reasons) • Protein and veggies with meals • Plenty water and black coffee • Two “Gut Biome Breaks” • Daily supplements - Cod liver oil, multivitamin, magnesium/zinc, pro biotic, ashwaghanda and L-glutamine. • Cheat meals - 3 x per week (I like a bit of take away, 3 is realistic no point lying) • Alcohol - I’m 8 weeks into being teetotal, long may it continue! |
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Matt_T At home here Posts 379 |
11-02-22 05:19 PM - Post#922989
I'd check the Outside the Gym thread for better advice than I can give. I merrily set off on a 'let's do 12 months of easy strength' mission last March, and having followed it (largely) to a T for six months or so, feel battered. It's written in the manual, the volume adds up...especially when the movements are different, but the same. The 'easy' bit is a little insidious (well to trainees like me anyway) - feeling a bit shitty/under the weather? I'll just knock 5kg off today...Struggling to find the time? I'll just break up the training between doing jobs and squeeze it in... Knees/elbows playing up? I'll just change out the movements and keep going etc etc. All with a dollop of 'this is working great' on the top, which it undoubtedly does, for a while. In no way am I knocking Easy Strength in any of its guises, I mean I merrily set off to do a year of it I love it so much. It's a philosophy though not a programme. Long story short - plan for a good break now and then... |
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Jordan D Old hand here on IOL Posts 771 
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11-02-22 05:37 PM - Post#922990
I'd check the Outside the Gym thread for better advice than I can give. I merrily set off on a 'let's do 12 months of easy strength' mission last March, and having followed it (largely) to a T for six months or so, feel battered. It's written in the manual, the volume adds up...especially when the movements are different, but the same. The 'easy' bit is a little insidious (well to trainees like me anyway) - feeling a bit shitty/under the weather? I'll just knock 5kg off today...Struggling to find the time? I'll just break up the training between doing jobs and squeeze it in... Knees/elbows playing up? I'll just change out the movements and keep going etc etc. All with a dollop of 'this is working great' on the top, which it undoubtedly does, for a while. In no way am I knocking Easy Strength in any of its guises, I mean I merrily set off to do a year of it I love it so much. It's a philosophy though not a programme. Long story short - plan for a good break now and then... I can second this. I did a year of ES in, I think, 2018-2019. It was great. It really was. Worked like gangbusters for my power clean and opened up a whole new invisible dimension with pullups. But, trying to make it work for back squats, for months on end, did eventually beat me up. I was doing tons of OS and walking 35-60 minutes a day, but I never figured out how to make it a never ending park bench program. That said, I DO wish you tons of luck, OP. If you can make it work, I’d love to learn how so I can copy you. (I suspect the deload weeks might be the secret sauce.) |
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Brian Hassler IOL rocks! Posts 616 |
11-02-22 06:50 PM - Post#922994
I found pretty good success by doing "same but same" rather than "same but different". Once I started tinkering, things got a bit out of hand*. I kind of had a mess of a summer from a lifting standpoint, and now am back to the basic ES protocol with only one change (replacing one day a week with a barbell complex instead of pullup/press/deadlift). I am trying to be mindful of my enthusiasm. YMMV. *As an aside, it turns out that just reading Dan John for years does not actually make me as smart as Dan John when it comes to building programs for myself. Please don't tell anyone, as I fear the internet will burn and civilization will collapse. |
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iPood Grand Pooh-Bah Posts 2360 |
11-03-22 02:19 AM - Post#923007
My own experience following low fatigue templates showed me the importance of diversifying. Coming from a bus bench background, Easy Strength seems like a never ending program. It’s not. You just slow burn at a much, much, much nicer pace. Changing the movements usually helps but, eventually, fatigue creeps up on you. The only solution I have found is as old as the hills: change the focus of your training every few months. Lazy periodization Block One: strength focus. Easy Strength. Crawls and carries. Extremely easy walking. Block Two: locomotion focus. MAF running/walking/hiking. DMPM. Original Strength random movement snax. Block Three: feel good focus. Original Strength “mountain of” interspersed with resets. Swings and carries. Learn a new ability: swimmimg, climbing, Judo, mountain bike riding, skating… it doesn’t matter what as long as you are having fun big time. Rinse and repeat. Every block works independently from each other: you may find that you want/need to spend months doing something and just taking a break of a few weeks doing the next thing. That’s the closest I’ve been to come up with a year-round low fatigue program. Caveat: this is not the way to chase any performance goal. This is strictly an explore and play type of thing. An augmented DMPM if you will.
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Dan John Carpal tunnel from posting! Posts 12292 
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11-03-22 08:00 AM - Post#923012
Usually, I think two rounds of the template are more than enough...80 days, so to speak. If you go longer, toss in something else for at least three weeks after every two month ES. I have obviously done much longer than three week stuff. ES is,like someone noted, more of a lifestyle, the idea is to get strong then do either your sport or walk. For athletes, it really works. For fat loss, it worked for me really well. So... Try this and finish it. Something valuable will happen. Feel free to edit as you move along, of course.
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CelticStrength Haven't posted much Posts 13 |
11-03-22 04:26 PM - Post#923025
Thank you all for the sage advice. I will go with my plan as outlined but with a few tweaks. If I look at the template as 80 days instead of 40 days, I’ll do a 1 week deload at the end of 40 days. At the end of 80 days, I’ll do a 3 weeks + of something different. I’m hoping this keeps me fresh but I’ll review after the 2nd block. Remaining with the same logic of 3 blocks as mentioned by iPood, I would essentially have a 20 week block so I’ll look at doing 3 blocks of this. I’ve never read any of the original strength stuff, would this be a good option for the 1-3 week “deloads”? If so, which book is recommended? |
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Steve Rogers Carpal tunnel from posting! Posts 6158 
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11-03-22 10:29 PM - Post#923032
I've read several of Tim's books and I think any of them would be good for you. Pressing Reset: Original Strength Reloaded might be the best to start with.
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CelticStrength Haven't posted much Posts 13 |
11-05-22 01:55 PM - Post#923072
Thanks, I’ve just bought pressing reset. |
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Dan John Carpal tunnel from posting! Posts 12292
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11-07-22 06:03 PM - Post#923100
It's free on DJU also...
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Mark Fenner Settling in pretty good Posts 60 |
11-11-22 08:59 PM - Post#923200
Original Strength “mountain of” interspersed with resets. Great post, iPood. I love it. Thanks! Could you flesh out what you mean by "mountain of" .... is that just "a lot" or something else? Best, Mark |
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iPood Grand Pooh-Bah Posts 2360 |
11-12-22 04:15 AM - Post#923208
Original Strength “mountain of” interspersed with resets. Great post, iPood. I love it. Thanks! Could you flesh out what you mean by "mountain of" .... is that just "a lot" or something else? Best, Mark “Mountain of” is a term coined by the Original Strength staff. It’s a fancy way to refer to the good, old pyramid up and down rep scheme. It goes like this: We are going to "Climb a Mountain" with three movements: Bodyweight Squats, Pushups, and Rocking. To climb a mountain, we are going to perform one rep of each exercise, then two reps, then three... "Climb" all the way up to 10 reps of each movement. This may take you up to ten minutes. If you want to stop here and go about your day, have a great day! You've done a good job. If you want to continue on, after you reach 10 of each rep, "climb" down. Perform nine reps of each exercise, then eight reps, then seven... Work your way all the way down to 1 rep of each. Say you are doing a mountain of bulgarian goat bag swings (my favorite DJ movement… by far) and goblet squats. It would look like this: One BGBS, one goblet squat, put the bell down, take a long breath, get on the floor and do one rocking push up (or whatever OS reset you prefer). Brief rest. Two BGBSs, two GSs, put the bell down, take two long breaths, get on the floor and do two rocking push ups… Hope you find it interesting.
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Justin Jordan Old hand here on IOL Posts 854 
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11-12-22 07:06 AM - Post#923210
Incidentally, 1 to 10 to 1 is 100 total reps. |
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Matt_T At home here Posts 379 |
11-12-22 09:47 AM - Post#923213
Feels like a lot more, trust |
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Jordan D Old hand here on IOL Posts 771
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11-12-22 12:46 PM - Post#923216
Oh man. I did that OS mountain once on Day 1 of a program. Something like body weight deadlifts (just empty hinges) for 100 reps. It gave me nearly a week of some of the most excruciating soreness I’ve ever experienced. |
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iPood Grand Pooh-Bah Posts 2360 |
11-12-22 02:17 PM - Post#923219
Oh man. I did that OS mountain once on Day 1 of a program. Something like body weight deadlifts (just empty hinges) for 100 reps. It gave me nearly a week of some of the most excruciating soreness I’ve ever experienced. In my experience, 1->5->1 (25 reps total) is repeatable and sustainable for quite a long time. Not a mountain, maybe, but a hill is good enough for most. 
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Mark Fenner Settling in pretty good Posts 60 |
11-21-22 10:19 AM - Post#923362
Original Strength “mountain of” interspersed with resets. Great post, iPood. I love it. Thanks! Could you flesh out what you mean by "mountain of" .... is that just "a lot" or something else? Best, Mark “Mountain of” is a term coined by the Original Strength staff. It’s a fancy way to refer to the good, old pyramid up and down rep scheme. ... Hope you find it interesting. iPood, That's great. Thank you. I definitely wouldn't have thought of it as a descriptor for a rep scheme! I've found myself in the deepest possible (non-productive) rut and your approach may just be a ticket (or inspiration) for me. Best, Mark |
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iPood Grand Pooh-Bah Posts 2360 |
11-21-22 12:33 PM - Post#923366
Original Strength “mountain of” interspersed with resets. Great post, iPood. I love it. Thanks! Could you flesh out what you mean by "mountain of" .... is that just "a lot" or something else? Best, Mark “Mountain of” is a term coined by the Original Strength staff. It’s a fancy way to refer to the good, old pyramid up and down rep scheme. ... Hope you find it interesting. iPood, That's great. Thank you. I definitely wouldn't have thought of it as a descriptor for a rep scheme! I've found myself in the deepest possible (non-productive) rut and your approach may just be a ticket (or inspiration) for me. Best, Mark Glad to be of service.
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