Ladders: How do you do them...

[ReformingBB]

And how would you incorporate them into a program?

I am reading Pavel's "Beyond Bodybuilding," and he says that Jason Brice upped his bench from 335 to 420 in 4 months using a PTP/Ladder Hybrid, but I still have a question about them.

Pavel says that under Brice's method you take your 5RM, do 1 rep and after "resting briefly" do 2, rest briefly again, do 3, when you can't add another rep you start at 1 again. You continue until your form gets sloppy.

Does the rest mean that you should rack the weight, or hold it with arms extended?

Brice did it every other day for 2 weeks. I saw that LNT had a different method of doing them that had a pre-determined number of reps and increased the weight rather than reps from WO to workout.

I also saw Kdub recommended them to someone for pull ups.

[kbdub]

rack the weight and keep rest to a minimum. i've never tried them on anything besides pullups, but they can be used on any lift. you will need less rest between 1 rep and 2 reps than between 3 reps and 4 reps. in pullups you time your rest by the time it takes your partner or imaginary partner to do their pullups.

[ReformingBB]

Cool, and for pullups how often would you do that (1x per week, etc), and how long do you typically keep that as part of your training program before you cycle it out or deload?

On a side note, I'll have to ask you more about that Pavel bench program you mentioned in a thread that got locked.

[Kane Fan]

sounds like you need a spotter on this

[kbdub]

Originally Posted by ReformingBB

Cool, and for pullups how often would you do that (1x per week, etc), and how long do you typically keep that as part of your training program before you cycle it out or deload?

On a side note, I'll have to ask you more about that Pavel bench program you mentioned in a thread that got locked.

this is going to depend on what else you are doing for your back. if all your doing is pullups then 3x per week will work. right now i'm on a westside setup and i train back 4x per week with 3 sets each day.

i stopped doing it when once i got to my last ladder of 10 pullups(at the time put my dead hang max at around 25)...which means i had done 55 pullups in one ladder. sometimes i would start another ladder and work my way back up. the back is one group that i feel can be worked very frequently as long as intensity is not through the roof.

the bench program was great. that was the program that got me repping 275. it was basically a russian program.
you bench 3x per week. i trained chest once per week along with this. i did incline db and probably flyes.
start with your 10rm
do 5,4,3,2,1 reps resting only 1 minute between sets. you add 5lbs to the bar each workout and suptract 5 lbs the following week so you go up 10lbs per week, but then next monday you start using the previous wednesdays weight...it's like a weekly mini deload. this is going to be really light the first few weeks (like SS is). the kid i had doing this felt like he wasn't progressing becasue it wasn't hard enough. i told him to just trust me. he did and he repped his old max in 2 months time.
when the weight starts to get heavy, like in 5 weeks, you may find that you will want to rest longer between the first sets...feel free to do so. there is no right or wrong way to do this.
ex-for 225 10RM
M 225
W 230
F 235
M 230
W 235
F 240
M 235
W 240
F 245

[Lifting N Tx]

That's a pretty good description by kbdub.

There's also a pretty good write-up on Power and Bulk here. You have to scroll down to the first divider "------------.." to where he starts talking about them. He has perhaps a bit better write up here at Lyle McDonald's bodyrecomposition forum, but you have to register to see it.

I think that he (same guy on both forums but different user name) does them a bit different than Pavel, but probably a similar idea. As kbdub said, there's not one exact right way to do them.

[Kane Fan]

but if you do it just till form starts to deteriorate
I mean what ar we counting as breaking down form
how off does it have to be

[ReformingBB]

Originally Posted by Kane Fan

but if you do it just till form starts to deteriorate
I mean what ar we counting as breaking down form
how off does it have to be

Good question. I was hoping someone else would enlighten me cause that's as in depth as Pavel goes in his description

My feeling is that you stop in bench when you feel that you have to alter the Bar path (i.e. J hook when you usually don't), lose your leg drive, or just generally feel that you'll have to do something sub-optimal form wise to get the next rep.

[ReformingBB]

Kdub,

Thanks man, I need to spend reputation around before I can get you again. Come fall semester (I have alot of interuptions coming this summer), I am either to run that program or the MM2K bench program. I think I like the one you described better because I am not sure how I feel about doing negatives.

[kbdub]

Originally Posted by ReformingBB

Kdub,

Thanks man, I need to spend reputation around before I can get you again. Come fall semester (I have alot of interuptions coming this summer), I am either to run that program or the MM2K bench program. I think I like the one you described better because I am not sure how I feel about doing negatives.

the bench program i described above is from an old issue of MM that pavel wrote. i will try to find the article and scan it in an email to whoever. i think the one you described is what shawn phillips wrote in MM a long time ago. both programs will work. seems like it is easier to do what i described while still keeping your workouts normal. the one that shawn wrote, if i remember correctly, has the rest of your body go on a maintenance cycle to focus on your bench. i know i wouldnt like to neglect the rest of my body just for the sake of benching a few more pounds.

[ReformingBB]

Originally Posted by kbdub

the bench program i described above is from an old issue of MM that pavel wrote. i will try to find the article and scan it in an email to whoever. i think the one you described is what shawn phillips wrote in MM a long time ago. both programs will work. seems like it is easier to do what i described while still keeping your workouts normal. the one that shawn wrote, if i remember correctly, has the rest of your body go on a maintenance cycle to focus on your bench. i know i wouldnt like to neglect the rest of my body just for the sake of benching a few more pounds.

It is the Shawn Phillips one, and you're right...only maintaining everything else would be kind of wack.

When you did the Pavel WO you did a MWF workout for the rest of your body as well?

[kbdub]

Originally Posted by ReformingBB

It is the Shawn Phillips one, and you're right...only maintaining everything else would be kind of wack.

When you did the Pavel WO you did a MWF workout for the rest of your body as well?

that was back in the dark ages of my training before i was down with fullbody and westside. i was probably on a 1x per week split...i'll try to find some of my old logs. i know i wasn't lifting on Wed, because when I went in i only did my bench which took an entire 10 min.

i have given thought to incorporating this into an HST type of setup with using the above mentioned bench program for chest throughout the entire program. you may not put as much size on your chest as a conventional HST, but if increasing your bench is your key concern it doesn't matter. i think HST progression would work well with this program since the workouts are only really intense the last for 1 or 2 of the 6 workouts per rep range. this wouldn't be to taxing on your body to allow your bench to go up.

[ReformingBB]

Originally Posted by kbdub

rack the weight and keep rest to a minimum. i've never tried them on anything besides pullups, but they can be used on any lift. you will need less rest between 1 rep and 2 reps than between 3 reps and 4 reps. in pullups you time your rest by the time it takes your partner or imaginary partner to do their pullups.

Damn, tried this today with Chinups, which I never really did (always did pullups till Dave convinced me to switch). I got 1,2,3,4,1,2,1,2,1,2,1

Lol. I got a long way to go.

[Kane Fan]

better then me best I can do is 2 lol

[VikingMan]

Originally Posted by kbdub

the bench program i described above is from an old issue of MM that pavel wrote. i will try to find the article and scan it in an email to whoever. i think the one you described is what shawn phillips wrote in MM a long time ago. both programs will work. seems like it is easier to do what i described while still keeping your workouts normal. the one that shawn wrote, if i remember correctly, has the rest of your body go on a maintenance cycle to focus on your bench. i know i wouldnt like to neglect the rest of my body just for the sake of benching a few more pounds.

Is this the program you're talking about?

http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=899851

[ReformingBB]

Originally Posted by VikingMan

Is this the program you're talking about?

http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=899851

Yea this is the MM one. I see a less detailed variant of the Pavel one Kdub describes in Beyond Bodybuilding.