Westside Question

Guys I have a question and the Westside Template. I have been using Joe D's Westside for Skinny Bastards program with my football team for about 1 1/2 years and we have had great success. THE question that I have is when you guys have your athletes work to a 1, 3, or 5 rep max, is there a template that you use to help your athletes properly warm-up and work up to there max effort. I have so many kids to keep up with; I am just trying to find a template using percentages or something to make it run smoother. I have read articles on Elitefts dealing with this; I just wanted to know what you guys do. Thanks in advance and thanks for the great site.

JOE MULLINS
PICKENS HIGH SCHOOL

Great topic for discussion Coach. I have struggled with this myself and experimented with some different ways to control how they work up to their max. Percentages may be the easiest, but I like to try and get my kids to learn how to work up on their own because I think it will help them when we do our 1RM's. Like most of you guys, I want my kids to learn how to train themselves. We still have kids in class who work up way too fast, and these are the same kids I have trouble with with almost everything we do. They are idiots who are uncoachable. I have a couple that are just dumb and they need/ want to be told exactly what to do with everything we do. I usually watch them closely and tell them what to put on the bar for the next set. I dont know if I helped you out at all, maybe someone else can help us both.

Coach,
Great question. Here is how i do it. For a 5 rep max I have 5 sets plus one bonus set.
61%x5 67%x5 73%x5 79%x5 85%x5

If they get all of their reps, they are able to attempt a 6th set with 85% plus 5. If they miss a set, they go back to the last set they made and repeat it. Remember that these percentages are really just arbitrary and only really work on the core lifts. I have found that it is much too hard to tell kids to "work up" unless you have many eyes watching. They have to be told what to do.

I was hoping you would jump in on this Jay. My kids are doing a pretty good job this semester with performing 5 and 3 rep maxes. We only do it on a core lift, so that means 6 racks at a time. I dont have to watch every rack because as I said, most are pretty coachable. The ones who dont get it would be the ones who will not follow the prescribed percentages anyway, so to me its 6 one way, half a dozen the other. Anyway, just playing devils advocate, but I think as far as how to set it up percentage wise, Jay has it nailed.

And its not set in stone. I have moved the percents around a ton. I usually just pick my target percentage and subtract 6% from each set for my warmups.

Hey Guys,

Thanks for the info, I have been using percentages to help kids work up to a max. What do you think is the correct number of sets needed to warm-up and work to a max. I have heard Joe defranco say 8 sets. Thanks for all the help.


JOE MULLINS

Joe,
I use 6 sets because I follow the Tier System. In the Tier system the foundation exercise gets 6 sets. The secondary exercise gets 5 sets. the third exercise of the day gets 4 sets. When I first implemented this rep system at Troup, the average squat increase in the 1st 9 weeks was 58 lbs. Bench was 14 and clean was 15. These werent all beginners either. About 75% had already been with me half a year and a summer. I had one kid go from 435 to 525 in the squat during that time. I had 4 increase by 90 or more lbs.

Now when I was powerlifting I did a ton of warmup sets before my max effort set. A typical board press workout during my "prime" would be
Bar x 10
135x5
185x5
225x5
275x5
315x3
add board 365x3
405x3
Then I would start my max attempts for the day.

Hey Coach,

Thanks for the info, where can I find more information on the Tier System. I appreciate all the help.


JOE MULLINS

Search for Joe Kenn's Book. It is awesome.

Coach Floyd,

I purchased Joe Kenn's Tier System Book and it is great. I have 2 questions. Do you use the elite model described in the book, and do you know where to get a copy of the excel program he uses. There was a snap shot of the excel sheet in American Football. Thanks for recommending the book.

JOE MULLINS
PICKENS HIGH SCHOOL

I dont have his program. I use a mix of the traditional and elite model. Basically it is the traditional with the elite dynamic day for lower body as a the teir 2 lower body for the day. if that makes any sense...are you coming to the clinic?

Coach I will be at the clinic. Thanks for the info.


JOE MULLINS