Dealing With the Ups & Downs of Training
by Bill Starr
If there’s one truism that all serious weight trainers learn, it’s that they’ll eventually hit some valleys on the way to gaining strength. The down periods will come regardless of how diligently they pay attention to their nutrition and rest, and there will be certain periods when gains just won’t come. In fact, they may even slip backward on many lifts. While that may seem to be a rather pessimistic attitude on my part, it really isn’t. It’s a physical law and a vital part of what we call strength training.
Consider the alternative for a moment. If you could consistently add five pounds to every single lift on your program every week and trained for any length of time, you’d end up being a world champion – no contest. But there isn’t a strength athlete alive who can brag about such a career. Every champion – and, of course, everyone who never got close to that level – has had to plod through periods when all progress came to a grinding halt.
I’m not referring to times when you’re injured or extremely ill, for those are ponies of a different color, but, rather, stretches of weeks when you simply cannot get your lifts to budge an inch. As I said, it’s a natural law, and I believe it’s built in to save our bodies in the long run. Otherwise, in our quest for greater and greater strength, we’d all end up hurting ourselves big time. The down periods force us to slow down, even if it’s just a bit.
I know from experience that no one has ever hesitated to load more weight on the bar immediately after setting a personal record. That’s one of the traits of a serious lifter. Serious lifters are never – and I mean never – satisfied. When they finally reach a lifetime goal of benching, say, 400, what do they do? They put 405 or 410 on the bar and go after it. If they miss, they’re dejected. So Mother Nature devised a system to slow them down, at least temporarily.
The idea that the body goes through regular, systematic cycles is nothing new in strength training. Very precise information explaining the phenomenon has been available to athletes since the mid-1960s. The first piece I ever read on the subject was written by Dr. Kenneth Sommers for Peary Rader’s Lifting News. It was a revelation to me because I knew full well that my lifting fluctuated at certain intervals, but I couldn’t put my finger on the exactness of the changes. All I could do was guess, which didn’t work out very well. Dr. Sommer’s articles led me to the definitive book on the subject of biorhythms, “Is This Your Day?” by George S. Thommen.
In a nutshell, Thommen explained that our bodies go through cycles in a precise mathematical course. There are three cycles. Each cycle has a different rhythm, and each is divided equally into highs and lows. The physical cycle lasts 23 days, the intellectual cycle lasts 33 days and the emotional cycle lasts 28 days.
Here’s a short course in how each cycle affects behavior. The physical cycle has a bearing on pure strength, endurance, energy level and even confidence. The first half of the cycle -11 ½ days – is the ascending, or discharge period. During that time you’re more vigorous and can handle a greater workload. You’re also better able to learn more complicated physical skills.
The second half of the cycle, the recharging period, is where you learn about the valleys. During that period you have less reserve, less energy to put into your workouts and less endurance. For some time I only calculated my physical cycle, believing that it was the only one that really mattered to my training. I was wrong, however, because the other two also have an influence.
That also goes for the emotional cycle. I knew that when I entered a weight room in a very positive frame of mind, the chances of my having a great session were much better than when I really didn’t want to be there at all. The 28-day emotional cycle governs the nervous system, so its implications for strength athletes, especially those who do high-skill movements such as snatches and clean & jerks, is rather obvious. During the 14 up days of that cycle, coordination is excellent. Since mood is also connected to the nervous system, you’ll have a better attitude during that period. The flip side can bring on some irritable fits and negative thinking. People vary a great deal in the way they respond to the recharging period. If they’re by nature rather easygoing, the alterations in their moods may be too slight to notice. On the other hand, excitable people will often become almost impossible to be around.
Now, it may seem as if the intellectual cycle wouldn’t have any effect on lifting, but it does. Lifting heavy weights requires exact concentration. If lifters aren’t able to think precisely about their technique during a max attempt, they’ll generally fail. The intellectual cycle lasts 33 days, and during the 16 ½ positive days it’s easier to learn new subjects. In strength training it’s the best time to teach complicated lifts, since athletes can pay attention better. The down days, on the other hand, can be used to practice old skills and do lifts that require less concentration. Better to do deadlifts or bentover rows rather than full cleans, to do the basics rather than starting something new.
Critical days, also known as cross days, are the first days of a new cycle and the days when a rhythm changes from its high into the recuperating phase. They’re the most important times because you’re in a state of flux and have a high degree of instability. All the responses to the various cycles are multiplied on those days. How greatly they’re multiplied depends largely on your personality. For some people the critical days are mild, hardly noticeable, but for others they’re extremely dramatic. Then, of course, we’re all faced with the prospect of having more than one cycle cross on the same day. Double-cross days occur, on average, less than six times each year, and triple-crosses, fortunately, occur only about once a year.
If you know you’re in a double or triple-cross, your best bet is to lay low because the chance of your injuring yourself escalates tremendously. I’m not big on skipping a workout for any reason, but having a multiple-cross day is an excuse I can deal with.
Now, I also realize that there’s a school of thought that believes you’re better off not knowing about your various cycles. The feeling is, if you know you’re in a low physical cycle, you’ll be predisposed to having a poor workout. Not at all. Knowing where you stand in terms of biorhythms should be of value because it will enable you to prepare more wisely. Having a low cycle doesn’t mean you must have a sub-par session in the weight room. On the contrary, you can make improvements if you’re smart enough to go with the flow.
Another point that’s often misunderstood about the cycles is that they’re variables – no more, no less. They have a bearing on training, but so do many other factors, such as drastic alterations in the weather. People vary greatly in how well they cope with extreme fluctuations from very hot and humid to frigid cold. Some thrive in the heat and push their lifts up during the warmest weather. Others wilt when the temperature soars, and their training goes in the toilet. The same goes for cold weather. Many people like to bundle up and train in a cold gym, but others dread the winter months, since their joints ache more and they have difficulty working up a good sweat, which they need in order to lift heavy weights.
Another primary factor in strength training is stress. In fact, it just may be the most critical variable of all. When you’re stressed out for whatever reason, your energy level is always low because you’ve used it up on the stressful situation. Again, what may be stressful to one person is a walk in the park for another. I notice that in my student athletes, especially during midterms and finals. Some waltz through their tests without any ill effects on their training, and a few do their best lifting during those times, using the physical activity to release their anxieties. Others, however, simply wear themselves out with worry, so much so that they generally come down with some sort of illness. Needless to say, that group doesn’t do well in the weight room.
Stress can come in many ways; for example, a shattered relationship, loss of finances or the need to relocate to another part of the country. It may come because of a family problem such as a death or a serious illness. Stress taps energy at an alarming rate – mostly mental energy, which is so important to heavy, hard training.
The question is, what should you do about the ups and downs that everyone encounters? Training during the up periods is, of course, the easier of the two, but I’ll make some suggestions about the high phases because I believe a bit differently from some people about the way to approach them. There are many programs around today that are strictly patterned. The exercises, sets, reps and top-end poundages are regimented and adhered to, and no deviation is allowed. That approach is a takeoff on the European concept of training. Lots of coaches and trainees like it because it can be programmed so precisely, often on a computer. It takes a lot of the guesswork out of setting up individual routines.
The problem is, it doesn’t factor in those many variables I’m talking about – and it doesn’t allow you to attack some new numbers when you’re having one of those exceptional days that come along only a couple of times a year. I’ve seen coaches stop an enthusiastic lifter from trying a personal because he wasn’t programmed to do that much weight just yet.
My thinking is, take the good days for all they’re worth. If you can break a personal record six times in a given workout, all the better. Grab the gold ring whenever it presents itself. Whenever I see one of my athletes on the brink of a personal best, I push him toward it. The up days are what we all live for, and to hold back because of some plan has always seemed self-defeating to me. Lifting is a game of numbers, and once you conquer a certain weight, you’ve beaten if forever. Yes, I fully realize that you may not be able to lift it again for some time, but it’s no longer a mental barrier, and that makes a huge difference.
In that same vein of thinking, I always encourage people who are obviously having an exceptional week of training to run their workloads up as high as they possibly can. That serves a few purposes. It allows them to do a few more exercises than usual and in many instances gives them the opportunity to learn some of the more involved movements. It lets them expand their foundation, which is critical for long-range progress. By expanding their base during those up periods, they can afford to ease off when things aren’t going so great and still end up having an excellent month in the gym.
Of course, lifting when everything is clicking is really rather easy – and fun. The problem is knowing how to deal with the down days and down weeks. Again, that’s a beef I have with fixed routines. They make no allowances for negative influences.
What’s the best approach to training when you know you’re off? Some believe it’s best to skip the session and wait until things are right again. I don’t. The practice of skipping a workout is contagious. Missing one workout, even for a legitimate reason, makes missing another one so much easier. Before you know it, you’ve established a pattern, and soon your lifts begin to slip.
Always train – that’s my philosophy. By the same token, however, if you’re feeling punky, make some changes in your workout. One simple step is to switch the days of the week. It really doesn’t matter which days you choose, just so you train three or four days, as you always do. Another easy plan is to do a light day when you feel off and come back later in the week to do your designated heavy or medium day.
When I notice athletes struggling with weights they usually manhandle, I have them change their routines. Instead of forcing the numbers up, I have them pull back and do extra work with the lighter poundages. That way they can maintain their workloads without failure. When athletes are down, I have them stay away from high-skill exercises and substitute low-coordination ones. If they’re having trouble with power cleans, I have them change to high-pulls. If those are also troublesome, I have them switch to deadlifts or pulls in the rack. I have a number of athletes who do the Olympic lifts during their off-season programs. When they have off days, I alter their programs from snatches or full cleans to high pulls or deadlifts with clean or snatch grips. I also believe that the off days on the platform are perfect days to work in the power rack, doing pure isometrics or isotonic moves followed by isometrics. It’s rather difficult to fail doing isometrics, and that’s an important consideration. I think everyone should leave the gym feeling as if he or she accomplished something.
Even if lifters are having an off day, I still try to push them toward a personal record in some exercises, usually an auxiliary movement such as chins, dips, pullovers or presses with dumbells. The lift itself doesn’t matter. What matters is that the lifters end the training session with a positive attitude because it will carry over to the next workout.
Sometimes I pull them off one or even two of the core exercises and replace them with lots of auxiliary work. Auxiliary exercises aren’t nearly as demanding, but they can be most beneficial in the total scheme of things because you can use them to improve weak areas, such as the triceps, lower back or calves.
Even if you think the concept of biorhythms is a pile of horse fritters, you must realize that you’re going to have days and weeks when the weights are unusually heave and your coordination makes you resemble a cow on ice skates. You must learn to make adjustments. If you’re hardheaded and try to force through one of those bad days, I can assure you that you’ll leave with a sour taste in your mouth. Instead, change your exercises, stay lighter than normal, and if you feel you can handle more work, throw in some back-off sets. Limit your core exercises, especially the high-skill ones, and increase the number of small-muscle auxiliary movements.
When you know that you’re in one of those down periods, pay more attention to getting plenty of rest and also to your nutrition. Load up on B-complex vitamins, for they’ll help you with your energy level. Vitamins C and E are also beneficial. If you’re smart and pay attention to the way you feel, you can still have a good workout.
by Bill Starr
If there’s one truism that all serious weight trainers learn, it’s that they’ll eventually hit some valleys on the way to gaining strength. The down periods will come regardless of how diligently they pay attention to their nutrition and rest, and there will be certain periods when gains just won’t come. In fact, they may even slip backward on many lifts. While that may seem to be a rather pessimistic attitude on my part, it really isn’t. It’s a physical law and a vital part of what we call strength training.
Consider the alternative for a moment. If you could consistently add five pounds to every single lift on your program every week and trained for any length of time, you’d end up being a world champion – no contest. But there isn’t a strength athlete alive who can brag about such a career. Every champion – and, of course, everyone who never got close to that level – has had to plod through periods when all progress came to a grinding halt.
I’m not referring to times when you’re injured or extremely ill, for those are ponies of a different color, but, rather, stretches of weeks when you simply cannot get your lifts to budge an inch. As I said, it’s a natural law, and I believe it’s built in to save our bodies in the long run. Otherwise, in our quest for greater and greater strength, we’d all end up hurting ourselves big time. The down periods force us to slow down, even if it’s just a bit.
I know from experience that no one has ever hesitated to load more weight on the bar immediately after setting a personal record. That’s one of the traits of a serious lifter. Serious lifters are never – and I mean never – satisfied. When they finally reach a lifetime goal of benching, say, 400, what do they do? They put 405 or 410 on the bar and go after it. If they miss, they’re dejected. So Mother Nature devised a system to slow them down, at least temporarily.
In a nutshell, Thommen explained that our bodies go through cycles in a precise mathematical course. There are three cycles. Each cycle has a different rhythm, and each is divided equally into highs and lows. The physical cycle lasts 23 days, the intellectual cycle lasts 33 days and the emotional cycle lasts 28 days.
Here’s a short course in how each cycle affects behavior. The physical cycle has a bearing on pure strength, endurance, energy level and even confidence. The first half of the cycle -11 ½ days – is the ascending, or discharge period. During that time you’re more vigorous and can handle a greater workload. You’re also better able to learn more complicated physical skills.
The second half of the cycle, the recharging period, is where you learn about the valleys. During that period you have less reserve, less energy to put into your workouts and less endurance. For some time I only calculated my physical cycle, believing that it was the only one that really mattered to my training. I was wrong, however, because the other two also have an influence.
That also goes for the emotional cycle. I knew that when I entered a weight room in a very positive frame of mind, the chances of my having a great session were much better than when I really didn’t want to be there at all. The 28-day emotional cycle governs the nervous system, so its implications for strength athletes, especially those who do high-skill movements such as snatches and clean & jerks, is rather obvious. During the 14 up days of that cycle, coordination is excellent. Since mood is also connected to the nervous system, you’ll have a better attitude during that period. The flip side can bring on some irritable fits and negative thinking. People vary a great deal in the way they respond to the recharging period. If they’re by nature rather easygoing, the alterations in their moods may be too slight to notice. On the other hand, excitable people will often become almost impossible to be around.
Now, it may seem as if the intellectual cycle wouldn’t have any effect on lifting, but it does. Lifting heavy weights requires exact concentration. If lifters aren’t able to think precisely about their technique during a max attempt, they’ll generally fail. The intellectual cycle lasts 33 days, and during the 16 ½ positive days it’s easier to learn new subjects. In strength training it’s the best time to teach complicated lifts, since athletes can pay attention better. The down days, on the other hand, can be used to practice old skills and do lifts that require less concentration. Better to do deadlifts or bentover rows rather than full cleans, to do the basics rather than starting something new.
Critical days, also known as cross days, are the first days of a new cycle and the days when a rhythm changes from its high into the recuperating phase. They’re the most important times because you’re in a state of flux and have a high degree of instability. All the responses to the various cycles are multiplied on those days. How greatly they’re multiplied depends largely on your personality. For some people the critical days are mild, hardly noticeable, but for others they’re extremely dramatic. Then, of course, we’re all faced with the prospect of having more than one cycle cross on the same day. Double-cross days occur, on average, less than six times each year, and triple-crosses, fortunately, occur only about once a year.
If you know you’re in a double or triple-cross, your best bet is to lay low because the chance of your injuring yourself escalates tremendously. I’m not big on skipping a workout for any reason, but having a multiple-cross day is an excuse I can deal with.
Now, I also realize that there’s a school of thought that believes you’re better off not knowing about your various cycles. The feeling is, if you know you’re in a low physical cycle, you’ll be predisposed to having a poor workout. Not at all. Knowing where you stand in terms of biorhythms should be of value because it will enable you to prepare more wisely. Having a low cycle doesn’t mean you must have a sub-par session in the weight room. On the contrary, you can make improvements if you’re smart enough to go with the flow.
Another point that’s often misunderstood about the cycles is that they’re variables – no more, no less. They have a bearing on training, but so do many other factors, such as drastic alterations in the weather. People vary greatly in how well they cope with extreme fluctuations from very hot and humid to frigid cold. Some thrive in the heat and push their lifts up during the warmest weather. Others wilt when the temperature soars, and their training goes in the toilet. The same goes for cold weather. Many people like to bundle up and train in a cold gym, but others dread the winter months, since their joints ache more and they have difficulty working up a good sweat, which they need in order to lift heavy weights.
Another primary factor in strength training is stress. In fact, it just may be the most critical variable of all. When you’re stressed out for whatever reason, your energy level is always low because you’ve used it up on the stressful situation. Again, what may be stressful to one person is a walk in the park for another. I notice that in my student athletes, especially during midterms and finals. Some waltz through their tests without any ill effects on their training, and a few do their best lifting during those times, using the physical activity to release their anxieties. Others, however, simply wear themselves out with worry, so much so that they generally come down with some sort of illness. Needless to say, that group doesn’t do well in the weight room.
Stress can come in many ways; for example, a shattered relationship, loss of finances or the need to relocate to another part of the country. It may come because of a family problem such as a death or a serious illness. Stress taps energy at an alarming rate – mostly mental energy, which is so important to heavy, hard training.
The problem is, it doesn’t factor in those many variables I’m talking about – and it doesn’t allow you to attack some new numbers when you’re having one of those exceptional days that come along only a couple of times a year. I’ve seen coaches stop an enthusiastic lifter from trying a personal because he wasn’t programmed to do that much weight just yet.
My thinking is, take the good days for all they’re worth. If you can break a personal record six times in a given workout, all the better. Grab the gold ring whenever it presents itself. Whenever I see one of my athletes on the brink of a personal best, I push him toward it. The up days are what we all live for, and to hold back because of some plan has always seemed self-defeating to me. Lifting is a game of numbers, and once you conquer a certain weight, you’ve beaten if forever. Yes, I fully realize that you may not be able to lift it again for some time, but it’s no longer a mental barrier, and that makes a huge difference.
In that same vein of thinking, I always encourage people who are obviously having an exceptional week of training to run their workloads up as high as they possibly can. That serves a few purposes. It allows them to do a few more exercises than usual and in many instances gives them the opportunity to learn some of the more involved movements. It lets them expand their foundation, which is critical for long-range progress. By expanding their base during those up periods, they can afford to ease off when things aren’t going so great and still end up having an excellent month in the gym.
Of course, lifting when everything is clicking is really rather easy – and fun. The problem is knowing how to deal with the down days and down weeks. Again, that’s a beef I have with fixed routines. They make no allowances for negative influences.
What’s the best approach to training when you know you’re off? Some believe it’s best to skip the session and wait until things are right again. I don’t. The practice of skipping a workout is contagious. Missing one workout, even for a legitimate reason, makes missing another one so much easier. Before you know it, you’ve established a pattern, and soon your lifts begin to slip.
Always train – that’s my philosophy. By the same token, however, if you’re feeling punky, make some changes in your workout. One simple step is to switch the days of the week. It really doesn’t matter which days you choose, just so you train three or four days, as you always do. Another easy plan is to do a light day when you feel off and come back later in the week to do your designated heavy or medium day.
When I notice athletes struggling with weights they usually manhandle, I have them change their routines. Instead of forcing the numbers up, I have them pull back and do extra work with the lighter poundages. That way they can maintain their workloads without failure. When athletes are down, I have them stay away from high-skill exercises and substitute low-coordination ones. If they’re having trouble with power cleans, I have them change to high-pulls. If those are also troublesome, I have them switch to deadlifts or pulls in the rack. I have a number of athletes who do the Olympic lifts during their off-season programs. When they have off days, I alter their programs from snatches or full cleans to high pulls or deadlifts with clean or snatch grips. I also believe that the off days on the platform are perfect days to work in the power rack, doing pure isometrics or isotonic moves followed by isometrics. It’s rather difficult to fail doing isometrics, and that’s an important consideration. I think everyone should leave the gym feeling as if he or she accomplished something.
Even if lifters are having an off day, I still try to push them toward a personal record in some exercises, usually an auxiliary movement such as chins, dips, pullovers or presses with dumbells. The lift itself doesn’t matter. What matters is that the lifters end the training session with a positive attitude because it will carry over to the next workout.
Sometimes I pull them off one or even two of the core exercises and replace them with lots of auxiliary work. Auxiliary exercises aren’t nearly as demanding, but they can be most beneficial in the total scheme of things because you can use them to improve weak areas, such as the triceps, lower back or calves.
Even if you think the concept of biorhythms is a pile of horse fritters, you must realize that you’re going to have days and weeks when the weights are unusually heave and your coordination makes you resemble a cow on ice skates. You must learn to make adjustments. If you’re hardheaded and try to force through one of those bad days, I can assure you that you’ll leave with a sour taste in your mouth. Instead, change your exercises, stay lighter than normal, and if you feel you can handle more work, throw in some back-off sets. Limit your core exercises, especially the high-skill ones, and increase the number of small-muscle auxiliary movements.
When you know that you’re in one of those down periods, pay more attention to getting plenty of rest and also to your nutrition. Load up on B-complex vitamins, for they’ll help you with your energy level. Vitamins C and E are also beneficial. If you’re smart and pay attention to the way you feel, you can still have a good workout.
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