LP transition to four-day split

[quadro]

Hey Coach Wolf,

I'm a 35 year old male at 190 pounds that is running toward the end of LP. My numbers are: Squat 210, Press 76, Bench 115, Deadlift 275, Power Clean 85. I know those numbers aren't impressive, but this is my third run through LP and all those numbers are a 10-20% jump from my previous LP that ended with a shoulder injury, so I want to stay out in front of getting hurt. I want to set PRs weekly instead of every workout. To answer the three questions: I get 8-10 hours of sleep a night, run between 2800-3500 calories, and generally get 170-200 g of protein a day. The past week and a half my rest periods have been seven to eight minutes each, and I was barely making my reps in the squat and bench, and know I'm close to max effort on my deadlift, though I know I have mileage in the DL, the press, and the clean.

My primary goal is to get stronger and to become a better baseball player. I've decided to switch to a four day split and I wanted your advice on two things: first, how to incorporate the powerclean into my split, and how to best incorporate throwing into my program.

Right now my methodology is:
Monday: Squat 3x2 for PR, Deadlift 5x3 @ 85%
Tuesday: Press 3x3 for PR, Bench 5x5 @ 85%
Thursday: Deadlift 2x3 for PR, Squat 5x5 @ 85%
Friday: Bench 5x1 for PR, Press 5x5 @ 85%

Question 1: I'll be continuing to alternate singles, doubles, and triples on the intensity lift every day, but I'm wondering the best place to put the power clean. I'm still learning the technical aspects of the clean, so I know I have a lot more weight I can add to the bar as I get the movement pattern down. Right now I'm cleaning between my upper body lifts while it is 'light' but I'm wondering if there is a better way to program it in.

Question 2: As I get closer to the baseball season I'm going to program more dynamic effort lifts in place of the intensity lifts. Should I throw on my off days, in place of upper body days, or some other scheme? Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks for your time and consideration regarding my programming. Really appreciate you taking a look Coach Wolf.

[Michael Wolf]

Man, I gotta say, unless those numbers are in kilos, they seem too light. You skipped that part of first three questions where we ask about weight increases - but if you're being honest about the rest, microloading bench and press still wouldn't explain the squat and DL numbers being so low, and lack of microloading still wouldn't explain 76 and 115. Form/technique could be an issue, and you might want to get that checked if you haven't already, and cals may be slightly low but not ridiculously so, so this strikes me as odd, especially for a 190 lb baseball player. You press just more than 1/3 of your bodyweight, at the end of LP? How is that possible? Do you play ball for 2-3 hours every day, then go train afterwards without eating in between? And if so, how do you manage to live such a life of leisure at 35 years old?!?

I'm genuinely curious about this, and would like to discuss it before getting into any nitty gritty about programming. It could very well be that when it comes to strength, you're just on the far left side of the bell curve. And I've coached plenty of people like that before - dozens, at least. But none of them were ever athletic in any other way, at all, and they were all also either quite small or over-fat. If you're athletic enough to play serious baseball, but have these numbers with an LP done correctly, that would be a first for me. Are you 7' tall? Maybe that would explain it.

[quadro]

Thanks for responding – at the moment I can’t afford coaching and input is greatly appreciated. I will try to keep my response as concise as possible. FYI, those are indeed pounds, I’m 5’9 and now 196 lbs.

1. As much as I dislike special snowflakism, I do believe I’m on the far left of the strength curve. According to the 2010 Anthropometric Survey of U.S.M.C. Personnel I’m between the 1st and 5th percentile for hand breadth, length, and circumference and wrist, ankle, and neck circumference. Even accounting for selection bias, I’m sure this puts me at most in the 10th percentile for Gen Pop. I recall in SS 3rd ed. Rip mentions that people with narrow wrists and ankles will have a tougher time making gains. It’s not all bad news. Fortunately I’m agile as all get-out, I can field my position well and I have a great hit-tool which keeps me productive as a middle infielder.

2. I live in MN, so I haven’t been able to do sport specific training so far. Once late March hits hopefully I’ll be shifting to dynamic effort work and throwing and hitting off a tee at least two to three times a week. I do have the time to go to the gym four times a week for hour-and-a-half workouts. I recently acquired a belt and wrist wraps which have helped my squat and press quite a bit. I am confident that for the most part I have good form on my lifts.

3. Since I last wrote, I reread sections of Practical Programming, listened to the Barbell Logic podcast on split routines, then went ahead and moved to a four-day split. I reasoned that recovery was the sticking point and I believe the data has borne that out. Note that I dropped cleans about a week ago because I’ve been having trouble getting into the rack position (I believe due to relatively long forearms) and prefer to focus on the four lifts for now.

2/26 Squat 210x5x3 DL 245x5x2
2/27 Press 76x3x2 Bench 100x5x5 Clean 80x3x3

3/2 Squat 215x5x1 200x5x2 (Backoff Sets) DL 250x3x3 Clean 85x3x3
3/3 Bench 117x5 Press 68x5x5

3/5 Squat 225x3x3 DL 275x3x2 (Adrenaline from my first ever two-plate squat day made the 10 pound jump happen)
3/6 Press 80x3x3 Bench 105x5x5

3/9 Squat 230x3x3 DL 285x3x2
3/10 Bench 120x3x2 Press 70x6x5

3/12 Squat 235x3x3 DL 255x5x2
3/13 Press 82.5x3x3 Bench 108x5x5

(Planned)
3/16 DL 290x2x3 Squat 210x5x5
3/17 Bench 123x3x2 Press 73x5x5

3/19 Squat 240x3x3 DL 260x5x2
3/20 Press 85x3x3 Bench 111x5x5

Triples have been working well for me, but I know at a certain point I’ll have to bring doubles and singles into the program and perhaps shift to doing all intensity and all volume on separate days, but so far, this schema has resulted in new PRs on a weekly basis. I don’t feel as ‘beat up’ as I did on my Wednesday and Friday workouts and like focusing on a single lift each session.

So my questions have changed somewhat: 1) Do you see any potential pitfalls to the split routine I’ve been running? 2) I am curious to know if you have trained any other baseball athletes, and how you programmed around throwing in particular.

[Michael Wolf]

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See #1. If you can make this of reasonable length and digestibility, repost and we'll take a look.