Texas Method Programming - Intensity Day

[nathanm89]

Afternoon Team,
For the last few blocks I've been moving the intensity day sets/reps from 1x5, 2x3 etc for Squats & DL's and plan to continue running down to singles. Squats don't change however with the DL's I plan after the singles are over to change it up and add assistance excercises like Rack Pulls, HDL's. Question is in regards to how you would normally programme in these assistance excercises?

[Maybach]

Haltings and rack pulls aren't really "assistance" exercises. They're heavy pulls. You just slot them in to your intensity pulling at a frequency determined by your need, at around the same rep range. You can do deadlifts every other week, or every third week, and do either rack pull/DL/halting/DL, or rack pull/halting/DL/rack pull/halting/DL. Or you can just alternate haltings and rack pulls and only deadlift at the meet (or equivalent). Either way, they're just your "intensity pull.".

Both should be done as heavy as you can. Rack pulls should be done at probably 110% of your DL. Haltings are trickier: I find I can only do 5 at my deadlift max, but then I haven't used them for any very long stretch. They take some getting used to. The Blue Book programs them for sets of 8 at your DL 5rm but Rip has said he would recommend those be done for 5s as well, which means they can follow your planned intensity rep scheme. It's going to be up to you.

[nathanm89]

Thanks Maybach, would you think running the intensity day from 5's to singles for subsequent blocks best practice or have the alternate pulls (RP, HDL etc) interdispersed between running down from 5's to singles? When you mention 'when needed' what do you mean? Thanks again

[Maybach]

The point of including these movements is as less-fatiguing variations on the full deadlifts, which means your relative need for them depends on how fatiguing you find full deadlifts. Maybe you can deadlift every 2 weeks, or only every 3. Maybe deadlifts for 5 knock you on your ass for a week, so you need to incorporate partials exclusively for that block, but you can run out triples and singles with no problem, so you don't incorporate them in that phase. Use the information you obtained running out your training the first time to inform your programming the second time. At this phase, these decisions are quite individual.