Program_Triphase Training

In my opinion, consistently adding weight to the bar—lifting heavier weights
and/or completing more reps—is the most effective way to add muscle and grow and
should be your primary concern. The number of exercises, sets, rep ranges, etc. you use
should be secondary to progressing with the loads you lift. With that said, it is impossible
to add weight to the bar EVERY workout. If it were, everyone would be benching 800
pounds and squatting over 1,000. Therefore one must adjust their workouts in order to
keep progressing.

weight training routine

When designing a weight training routine there are three main variables that can
be altered in order to change the type of growth stimuli you get from the routine. These
variables are volume, intensity, and frequency.
• Volume = sets * reps
     o The more sets and reps the greater the volume of a given workout
• Intensity = percentage of your 1-RM max
     o If your max bench is 315 then lifting 295 is more intense than 225 because it is a greater  percentage of your 1-RM
• Frequency = number of times you work a muscle in a given time span
     o Most people use 1 week as the time span

training density

These variables must be balanced in order to keep you progressing. If you do too
much you will not be able to recover sufficiently and then you strength and muscle gains
will slow. I am also going to throw another term out there—training density. The density
of a workout is the sets * reps * load. You should strive to increase the density of each
workout by increasing the load lifted, which should be done for every phase of training.

3-phase mass program

It is helpful to break your training up into phases, which is called periodization.
One phase might focus on increasing the volume of your routine while the next phase
might focus on increasing the frequency of your routine. The idea is to stimulate your
muscular system in a different way with each phase in order to promote more growth. As
I said in the beginning of this section, no matter what variable you are focusing on during
a given training phase, your primary focus should be progressing each and every workout
by lifting a greater load. If you deadlifted 315 for 8 reps for your last workout you want
to beat that the next workout. This can be done by adding weight to the bar (i.e. 10 lbs.)
or completing more reps (i.e. 10 reps since you got 8 last time). You must progress in
order to grow!
With this information in mind, I have created a 3-phase mass program. Each
phase is three weeks long and focuses on one of the three training stimuli variables and is
designed to promote a steady state of progression. Let’s get into the program.