Program Design Resources

[RevolutionFF]

What would you say are the best resources that have helped your program design for a range of clients?

I have supertraining, the science and practice of strength training and a few other books which I have to go and look up the names.

I need to get a more consistent training design philosophy to make things a bit less time consuming.

[MikeMahony65]

What would you say are the best resources that have helped your program design for a range of clients?

I have supertraining, the science and practice of strength training and a few other books which I have to go and look up the names.

I need to get a more consistent training design philosophy to make things a bit less time consuming.

Practical Programming by Mark Rippetoe. He breaks down programming in a way that makes it easy to do for anyone.

[RevolutionFF]

Practical Programming by Mark Rippetoe. He breaks down programming in a way that makes it easy to do for anyone.

Cheers.

Got that one already though. Would be good to find something that looks into fat loss specifically and hypertrophy specifically.

[rdferguson]

Honestly, my best resources have not been books you can buy over the counter, they've been the notes and documents stuck together by my earliest mentors in the fitness industry, and the various discussions and debates I've had with them over time -- the lecturers who taught me anatomy, physiology and the fundamental principles of program design in the first place. Specific programs are just lists of exercises and a bunch of numbers; the underlying training principles are generally more important. Everything ultimately comes back performing some magical voodoo, in which somehow everything is masterfully balanced except for one thing: how fit you were before and after the program.

[RevolutionFF]

Honestly, my best resources have not been books you can buy over the counter, they've been the notes and documents stuck together by my earliest mentors in the fitness industry, and the various discussions and debates I've had with them over time -- the lecturers who taught me anatomy, physiology and the fundamental principles of program design in the first place. Specific programs are just lists of exercises and a bunch of numbers; the underlying training principles are generally more important. Everything ultimately comes back performing some magical voodoo, in which somehow everything is masterfully balanced except for one thing: how fit you were before and after the program.

Nice answer. But what about those of us who never had mentors like yourself?

[Kraverman]

Practical Programming by Mark Rippetoe. He breaks down programming in a way that makes it easy to do for anyone.

Thank you, I'll have to check that one out.

[rdferguson]

Nice answer. But what about those of us who never had mentors like yourself?

I can try and impart on you the knowledge and understanding I got from them?

I don't know. My starting advice would be to acknowledge that all the experts have something useful to teach, and each and every one of them is wrong. The best of the best got that way by knowing (or figuring out) something, but they're still fallible, so don't put any of them on a pedastol. This applies to all experts. Even me, even you. There is plenty of good stuff I can teach you, and yet every year, without fail, I look back to something was teaching or omitting the year before and think: "Wow, Ryan, you're an idiot." Be willing to critique yourself in this fashion, be willing to critique all other experts in this fashion. Be willing to test what you think you know, and make sure that you understand the things that you teach well enough to be able to justify it. Furthermore, make sure your justifications are based on real reasoning, and not just perpetuating what sounds good. For example, I occasionally get hate on these forums for preaching against the teaching that the deeper you squat, the more you use your glutes and hamstrings. I could give you a lengthy anatomy lecture to support this, but really, anyone who's ever hinged properly or performed a front squat knows from experience that "deeper = more glutes and hamstrings" is inaccurate, yet so few of us here actually think about what experience has taught us. But don't forget, I'm wrong.