Some westside advice.

[patricky]

I currently do westside training with strongman events on Saturdays.

One thing I notice about Westsides conjugate method is that they have a ME day devoted to good mornings. I'm a bit scared to max out on these in case I hurt my back. Is it vital that I do them?

My routine is
Monday
ME bench
Dumbbell bench 2x10
Tricep extensions failure

Tuesday
ME lower
Glute ham raise failure

Thrusday
DE bench
High rep log press
Tricep extensions

Friday
DE lower

Saturday
Yoke carry
Farmers walk
Trie flip

For ME upper days I use board press, bench with chains and incline press
For lower at the moment I use rack deadlifts and deadlifts with bands.
I want to get a SSB for squats but don't have the cash at the moment.
Also I want a leg press. I suppose I could do hip belt squats for now for RE work?

Cheers.

[BloodandThunder]

For GM ME Work, keep the rep range to a 3RM, especially if you're not predisposed to doing them heavy. You can do them walked out, seated, off chain or pins in a concentric manner, arched/bent over, or straight legged/slight bend. However, if you are not totally confident in an exercise that you can do safely (without proper coaching), don't do it for the sake of doing it. It may be best to keep GMs as a supplementary exercise done for 5-10 reps cycled over.

For RE lower work with no leg press, you can load the lower body through single leg work (step ups, lunges, dumbbell RDLs, bulgarians) or through pull throughs and even high bar squats/front squats. You want to keep the load off the spine so that the legs would fatigue rather than the back. Belt squats accomplish this too.

Anytime you read something about Westside, it's typically written at a certain point in time of their training. I'm sure there was a time when they did the 7/2/1 breakdown of a GM,squat, dead out of 10 week ME cycle. They did GMs since they rarely pulled heavy (they supplemented with speed pulls against tension on DE day for specificity). Now it seems they do ME squats and pulls a lot more often. Again, this is a reflection on how Westside grows as a gym, their lifters getting stronger, and what Louie changes to cater to that.

Again, anytime in your conjugate training, the exercise selection should grow as your training years accumulate. Pick exercises that elicit a good response and work them until you plateau hard before you start throwing in every exercise under the sun. Big Rob on here has several 600 lb benchs yet keeps his exercise selection pretty small it seems.

[patricky]

Wow cheers man for that info. I might add Gm's for a 3rm one day. But for now I reckon I'll just do SSB and different deadlifts.
Yeah Big Robs an inspiration. I'll keep it simple.