PlanStrong/BuiltStrong Splitting Built Strong sessions

[Erik W]

I've found that some of the sessions can get quite long with Built Strong. I've fiddled a bit with splitting up the sessions, but I like the efficiency of circuits. Have any of you experimented with making one long session into multiple, shorter sessions? Fabio said that he will sometimes do this, but I was curious about any approaches taken by others here.

This week, I tried doing one lift per session and completely breaking down the sessions. For example, I did heavy presses on Saturday, then medium squats in a circuit with light upper body pulls on Sunday. I went on to heavy squats Monday evening. To save time before work, I just did medium rows Tuesday morning and light presses this morning. If I continue this pattern, tonight or tomorrow night will be heavy rows, and tomorrow morning will be medium presses.

As you can see, this pattern left me often doing the same lift two days in a row. I don't really know if that's so bad. What I can say, for sure, is that circuits enforce longer rests between sets of the same lift, making the volume easier to tolerate within a session.

I suppose a simpler approach could just be to start my session as usual. Then, let's say I'm running out of time to train in a given morning, I can just finish that session after work or the next morning.

I dunno; I guess I'm just thinking aloud and I'm interested in your thoughts.

 

[Donny Williamson]

I've been doing my Built Strong plan in a circuit fashion. I'm currently doing a BTS6 plan. I train at home and with the equipment I have and the lifts I selected I basically do 2 lifts in a circuit, then set up the next 2. Some sessions can take me over an hour if the volume of is high enough.