Program Hoppers Anonymous

One of the mistakes that I see people make on an alarmingly frequent basis is bouncing from program to program without giving what they are doing time to work.  The new guru on the internet said I should do Zercher squats so I'm going to quit this program and jump on that.  The editors of Magazine X, Y, or Z said I should do curls for the girls every single day if I want to get the pump that leads to long lasting meaningful relationships with my biceps.  Then before they know it, this victim of marketing has spent a great deal of time (the one irreplaceable commodity) chasing after twelve other people's goals without making much if any headway in the last six months.  Sound familiar?  But how do you decide what program to follow, how long to follow it, and if it is time to ditch it altogether?  Glad you asked.

What program should I follow?

Whenever someone asks me this question I respond with a question.  For what?  What is it you hope your training program will accomplish?  Do you want a bigger squat, bench, or deadlift so you will be more competitive in strength sports?  Do you want to see your abs?  Do you want to be able to get down on the floor and play with your grand kids without pain?  You see, your goals should determine what you are working on at any given time.  I'll use myself as an example.  Over the last year, my training has primarily consisted of barbell squats, barbell bench press, barbell overhead press, barbell deadlifts, and a few assistance moves like power cleans, chin ups, and ab work.  Why?  Because my goal is to be as competitive as I can be in unequipped powerlifting.  Following a recent hip injury that prevented me from doing any serious lower body work, I modified the program to include more conditioning that would have otherwise been too much for me to recover from with all of the heavy lifting.

You can see that the most important thing is determining what goals you think are worth spending the next 6-12 months of your life tackling with everything you've got.

How long should I follow my program?

If you are one of those people who gets bored with progress, I'm not sure what to tell you.  I stick with a core program until said program stops producing gains.  If I can look myself in the mirror and say, "Self, you are really working as hard as you should be, but this just isn't making you better," then it's time to make some changes.  Notice I said, make some changes, not throw the baby out with the bathwater.  No matter what you are doing there are some basic principles that should apply to your training.  You should be working on all five of the basic human movements that Dan John talks about in all of his writing.  You, as a human on planet earth, were made to push, pull, hinge, squat, and loaded carry.  No program is complete without hitting all five elements.  The intensity and volume of your work will depend on your goals.  Do you want to roll Brazilian Jiu Jitsu?  Again, according to Dan John, spend 80% of your available training time on Jits, about 10% in the weight room, and another 10% on correctives like the foam roller, stretching, and massage/chiropractic work.  Other endeavors would look the same.  Spend 80% of your time on your main goal and divvy up the remaining 20% between the weights and corrective/recovery work.

When do I ditch my program altogether?

I'm going to argue that you never completely quit your program, unless you got it out of a muscle magazine and it isn't producing.  If your training is organized around the big five human movements then you might need some changes to start making progress again, but you don't need to throw your program out the window.  When progress has stalled, there are several things that I look at as a coach to try to find the culprit.  Are you eating well/enough?  If your diet is twinkies (save some for the apocalypse) and beer, don't expect your progress to be monumental.  What does sleep look like right now?  If you have an I'll sleep when I'm dead mentality, it is going to handicap your performance.  Are you doing too much/too little?  Goldilocks was onto something looking for that just right dose.  When we find the answers to those questions it's easy to make some simple changes that should continue progress without changing the entire program.

So, as I hope you can see, it is unwise to change a gift horse of a different color in mid stream.  It doesn't move you any closer to your goals, if you had goals in the first place besides just going to the gym and goofing off for an hour to feel better about life.  Build a program around the big five: push, pull, hinge, squat, and carry heavy stuff around.  Stick to your program for as long as you are seeing progress.  When progress stalls, tweak an aspect of your program and keep busting your tail until you crush your goals, set new ones and smash those ad nauseum.  Go forth and conquer.