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Thread: Garage Gym Warrior Assistance Work feedback

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Aug 2010
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    66

    Default Garage Gym Warrior Assistance Work feedback

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    Bought garage gym warrior recently. Looking for the very structured approach as I look to lose fat and gain/preserve strength. My goal in 2020 is to achieve 20% BF and be able to hit 225 bench, 315 squat and 405 DL. Hopefully achievable but even if not getting close would be great.

    Started last year in March at 286 w/ about 43% bf, couldn't do a pushup, couldnt properly squat 135, bench was nothing, etc. I am 41 and 6'1". Worked with a guy that started building up endurance, then we switched to barbell work. I was kind of consistent save for a two month stretch and a few weeks missed due to neck issues but I've been back at it a few months now. Never got my diet really under control but gained strength to 175 bench / 285 squat / 365 deadlift. I'm at 278, about 39 bf so gained some muscle lost some fat but still quite fat. My endurance and capacity for cardio is way improved. I am getting diet dialed in, getting great at recording food last few weeks and been hitting 230-250 in protein and limiting carbs a bit but still eating good ones. Cheat time is day before heavy day, so Friday for me as I lift Sat/Tue/Thurs

    Anyways I'm doing the exact prescribed HLM routine in GGW. No need to cover that since it's a paid deal.

    Assistance work I'm curious about and would love to get thoughts.

    Heavy day
    -Wall stability ball squats for mobility work
    -hollow hold, dbl kb swing, ab dolly 30 seconds on 30 off, 4 sets
    -air bike 30/90 4 sets

    Light day, basically 27 minutes of hell
    3 minute timer, rest is whatever is left of the 3 minutes, 3 sets of each
    -.13 miles on skill mill, 12 hand release pushups
    -.13 miles skill mill, 12 leg lifts
    -.13 miles skill mill, 12 ring rows

    Moderate Day
    4x10 of each
    - lat pulldown
    - rear delt machine
    - prone hamstring curl
    - single leg press

    On cardio days (2 per week) do 4 sets of 30 second planks.

    So decent amount of core and endurance work / calorelie burning work. One fear I have is overworking as the weight gets very heavy but then I suppose I'd just cut back to ensure I make the big lifts.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2017
    Location
    Uk
    Posts
    1,468

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    Quote Originally Posted by highergr0und View Post
    Bought garage gym warrior recently. Looking for the very structured approach as I look to lose fat and gain/preserve strength. My goal in 2020 is to achieve 20% BF and be able to hit 225 bench, 315 squat and 405 DL. Hopefully achievable but even if not getting close would be great.

    Started last year in March at 286 w/ about 43% bf, couldn't do a pushup, couldnt properly squat 135, bench was nothing, etc. I am 41 and 6'1". Worked with a guy that started building up endurance, then we switched to barbell work. I was kind of consistent save for a two month stretch and a few weeks missed due to neck issues but I've been back at it a few months now. Never got my diet really under control but gained strength to 175 bench / 285 squat / 365 deadlift. I'm at 278, about 39 bf so gained some muscle lost some fat but still quite fat. My endurance and capacity for cardio is way improved. I am getting diet dialed in, getting great at recording food last few weeks and been hitting 230-250 in protein and limiting carbs a bit but still eating good ones. Cheat time is day before heavy day, so Friday for me as I lift Sat/Tue/Thurs

    Anyways I'm doing the exact prescribed HLM routine in GGW. No need to cover that since it's a paid deal.

    Assistance work I'm curious about and would love to get thoughts.

    Heavy day
    -Wall stability ball squats for mobility work
    -hollow hold, dbl kb swing, ab dolly 30 seconds on 30 off, 4 sets
    -air bike 30/90 4 sets

    Light day, basically 27 minutes of hell
    3 minute timer, rest is whatever is left of the 3 minutes, 3 sets of each
    -.13 miles on skill mill, 12 hand release pushups
    -.13 miles skill mill, 12 leg lifts
    -.13 miles skill mill, 12 ring rows

    Moderate Day
    4x10 of each
    - lat pulldown
    - rear delt machine
    - prone hamstring curl
    - single leg press

    On cardio days (2 per week) do 4 sets of 30 second planks.

    So decent amount of core and endurance work / calorelie burning work. One fear I have is overworking as the weight gets very heavy but then I suppose I'd just cut back to ensure I make the big lifts.
    Why aren't you doing starting strength Novice Linear Progression ? If you want help with GGW then the logical place is Andy Bakers Barbell Club. Seriously, your body weight is going up, you are a 6'1" Male only 41 years old and your lifts aren't anything spectacular-hardly over body weight. Why not run NLP and get a lot more weight on the bar, then add in some conditioning/recomp work ?

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2018
    Posts
    599

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    I have run through GGW a couple times, enjoyed it and made good progress.

    Some weeks you will probably feel able to do tons of assistance/conditioning, but other weeks not so much. Weeks where you do sets of 4 at higher intensity were more draining for me. If you are realistic and don’t totally bonk yourself with the extras, and adapt the amount each workout according to load, you’ll probably be fine.

    Andy Baker is very responsive to emails about his templates, and I’m sure he could tell you about the experiences of his clients doing similar things on GGW.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Aug 2016
    Location
    East Haddam, Connecticut
    Posts
    111

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    Andy’s Garage Gym Warrior Program is an HLM template intended for intermediate lifters. Based on the information provided, it sounds like you’re still a novice. I’d recommend buying Starting Strength Basic Barbell Training 3rd edition: Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, 3rd edition (Current Revision, Paperback) – The Aasgaard Company

    As for feedback on your assistance exercises, how do you plan on recovering from all of that extra work?

    Further, what’s the point of doing all those “core exercises” when your abs will be much stronger if you get your press to 225? Why would you do prone hamstring curls and single leg press when you could just get your squat to 500? Ultimately, this seems like a lot of wasted time in the gym.
    Last edited by Cody Annino; 02-11-2020 at 09:21 AM.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Aug 2010
    Posts
    66

    Default

    Thanks folks. Chose the garage gym HLM due to it being seemingly more conducive to supporting fat loss. I realize I'm still around novice land but LP was about maxed out on bench and press and getting close on other lifts unless I ate a lot, and at 39 BF wasn't wanting to go up in weight like that. I am primarily all stomach. My plan is to do the HLM 2x then evaluate one more cycle of that or go back and hit LP again.

    We will see.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Feb 2012
    Location
    Village of Afton, Virginia
    Posts
    947

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    At the age of 51, I did the Novice program and became stronger then I've ever been in my life. Now with 60 a month off, in the area of squat and deadlift, I'm one of the strongest people in the gym and the strongest over 45. Occasionally, I get asked about what I'm doing that the questioner isn't doing. My answer is “It's not what I'm doing, it's what you're doing that I'm not”.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jun 2019
    Posts
    178

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    Quote Originally Posted by highergr0und View Post
    So decent amount of core and endurance work / calorelie burning work. One fear I have is overworking as the weight gets very heavy but then I suppose I'd just cut back to ensure I make the big lifts.
    Congratulations on your progress, great work!

    At your age, body weight and strength numbers I would suggest you train with intensity but less less often and focus more on diet and recovery.

    It takes way less effort to not eat a big mac than it does to burn 750 calories an hour in the gym and your recovery time is much quicker.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Apr 2019
    Posts
    13

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    OP,

    There is no such thing as a weight loss exercise program.....nor does one program lend itself easier for the end user to lose weight compared to another. At the end of the day, its simple.....your calories in need to be less than your calories out. The only way to lose weight is to get a handle on your diet. Period. You have to consume fewer calories than what your body needs at the end of day.

    As far as the GGW program....you’d be better off running the SSNLP first, and then do the GGW program once you’ve exhausted your linear progression. I don’t want to speak for Andy, but I’m fairly certain he’d give you the same advice. Also, he has a few other programs worth mentioning that warrant the $27 per month subscription to his barbell club. You should check it out. Money well spent IMO.

    Getting back to weight loss....if I were you, I would set my self up to lose a pound per week by cutting my daily caloric intake by 500kcals. Keep in mind this isn’t ideal as your recovery will be limited by the caloric deficit. However, once your weight is under control, and your able to pump up the calories a bit, you should be able to start making more serious progress. But for the time being, your going to have pick one goal (weight loss) and make it your priority. That’s doesn't mean you still can’t effectively weight train though.

    I would run the SSNLP as written with one simple modification, I would add 2ea 30 min sessions of cardio per week. No running. A rower would be great. I would do one session after your Monday and Friday workouts. I suppose you could possibly do Monday's cardio session on Sunday. If you did, it shouldn’t have too much of an impact heading into Monday’s lift session as you should be fully recovered by then from Friday’s workout. But nonethelsss, there still could be a slight recovery issue if you choose to do a cardio session the day before your lift day.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Oct 2017
    Location
    Uk
    Posts
    1,468

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    ^^^

    Exactly what I'm doing under Andys coaching. He also advised me that if I wanted to continue to cut, that GGW is a good programme on which to continue because it's less intense until the last few weeks. However I have done NLP, I gained weight plus muscle and I'm 60 years old.

    Fat loss, as far as I'm concerned, is a completely different goal to getting stronger and will result in reduced strength as a consequence. The point of continuing to train during a fat loss programme is to minimise strength loss as much as possible and the wholly Grail is to continue to make moderate strength gains if possible.

    The OP should set his goal to be either maximum fat loss, with minimum strength loss; or maximum strength gain, with minimal fat gain. It's not possible to have both, particularly over 40 and most definitely over 60. If someone is particularly weak, they should get stronger first-only if someone is particularly obese with serious fat related health issue should they look at a fat loss program first. IMO

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Mar 2016
    Posts
    43

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    starting strength coach development program
    Another big shout out to Andy's GGW. Just finished first time through and Got PR's on every lift by about 10% across the board.

    sq - 320
    Bench - 225
    Press - 145
    DL - 350

    Not big numbers by any means but having just turned 50 and really stuck with this since re-starting for the umteenth time in October I'm pretty psyched to keep this going through this golf season and not stop as usual and have to brutally restart the NLP all over again. Oh wait, we can't golf now anyway.......

    question I do have, looking at the bench setup for round two, boy does the setup look extremely light for the first like 6 weeks. I created a spreadsheet for all the %s and plugged in 225 and at week 4 I'm only going to be doing 4x6 168. I've read the suggestion of adding some weight to the earlier weeks, is there a recommended amount to program in? or is it better to add a few more sets?

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