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Other/Mixed Returning to the Fold!

Other strength modalities (e.g., Clubs), mixed strength modalities (e.g., combined kettlebell and barbell), other goals (flexibility)

rvaldrich

Level 5 Valued Member
Good morning! I have returneded!

So I detoured during the pandemic. I spent some time doing increasingly ambitious (read: silly) calisthenics work before finally coming to the long-overdue conclusion that my body just DOES NOT LIKE unilateral exercises (I finally got the one-arm Push-up and was progressing towards the one-arm pull-up and undid months of work to stop my shoulders from aching constantly).

Concurrently, I spent quite some time doing the ATG program. I originally investigated their system as a way to help motivate my father to exercise (boy did that fail), but I ended up sticking with it and really liking it (I have become a HUGE fan of not waking up in the middle of the night due to aching knees). I’ll save the endorsement and review and simply say I feel my time with them was very well spent.

But! I’m back to StrongFirst. But! I really liked a lot of ATG so I will be incorporating some of it. How? Well, I’m glad you asked!

I reread Easy Strength and was really taken once again by the bits about Quadrant II and that being where the champions prowl and all that jazz. I also liked Pavel’s remark somewhere (Easy Strength? 4-Hour Body?) about ‘many champions have ‘the courage’ to do less’. So I’ve decided I’m going to spend some time doing ‘the bare minimum’. I’m going to run an 8-week cycle doing PttP & PM, alternating every two weeks. I plan to pair this with the ATG Zero program as it is almost exclusively mobility and ankle/knee stuff.

After that, I plan to start alternating 8-week blocks of PttP and PM (probably graduating on to S&S). I know the recommendation is to do some form of conditioning during PttP, so I’ll do either Strength Aerobics or one of the ATG ‘body comp’ systems.

Now! Because I’m me and I don’t want to spend the money to buy barbell plates to do PttP properly, I will be doing weighted push-ups and single-leg kettlebell deadlifts instead. I hope the StrongFirst Leaders can find it in their hearts to forgive me for this substitution.

As for the Program Minimum/S&S, since I was working with the Bulldog last time I did S&S, I don’t foresee much trouble on that front.

I imagine I will eventually “graduate” back to Rite of Passage and Easy Strength, but surrendering almost all of my calisthenics goals has been hard (stares into heart-shaped locket with picture of me and planche push-up). I’ll probably keep doing Stand-to-Stand Bridges and the Trifecta, but everything else will be relegated to variety days or just tossed onto the junk pile along with my exercise bands, sandbags, and Tim Ferriss books.

Good to be back!
 
Welcome back to training bro!

If you’re having to adjust PttP that much, maybe a different program would be better? Don’t want to lose sight of the intended stimulus of the program
You think so? Hmmm. Could you recommend one? I don't mean to sound flippant; I simply don't know much about the SF "pure strength" programs. I've got most of Pavel's books but everything else seems to have a lot more moving parts or deprioritize raw strength.
 
I don’t, but others might. Single leg KB deadlifts just aren’t similar enough to real dead’s in stimulus for a one to one swap IMO.

If you have the kettlebell, why not just run ROP?
 
I don’t, but others might. Single leg KB deadlifts just aren’t similar enough to real dead’s in stimulus for a one to one swap IMO.

If you have the kettlebell, why not just run ROP?
Stress, for one. I'm trying to do an 'exercise detox' of sorts (cripes, I feel Pavel scowling at me for just writing that).

Secondly, I just don't really enjoy overhead pressing. I could blabbity-blah about a trick shoulder and whatnot, but it really is just the pure dislike of lifting weight in the vertical plane. I don't even like incline presses that much and that's supposed to be the 'feel good' chest lift.
 
A good fit might be schedule C in Geoff’s Easy Muscle. It’s swings, squats, chins and dips. If you can get your weighted push ups to a 10RM that should work for a dip sub.
 
Kettlebells strongfirst from Pavel, an AGT spin to Swings, GS and Getup programming. And C&J of course but it is reserved for people who can play with the bulldog. A As much as I love and appreciate PM and S&S, and find them genius I love KPSF as much. If I were to ask Pavel to write a personal program for me given all my history, existing schedule, goals, desires, the program he writes might have been the KBSF

If I were you I would look at coach Louka’s youtube channel. He is giving of glimpses of many SF programs including a new version of RoP. You might catch up easier by looking at some programming samples from the channel.

 
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You think so? Hmmm. Could you recommend one? I don't mean to sound flippant; I simply don't know much about the SF "pure strength" programs. I've got most of Pavel's books but everything else seems to have a lot more moving parts or deprioritize raw strength.
KB strong with double kb squats, or just double cleans?

Weeks of set reps and sets, twice or three times a week. I’m 42 and it’s just no thinking, not overly complicated and works very well. Very well.
 
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