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This leads to the question of what types of fatigue to expect for different types of work. There is definitely a metabolic and neural fatigue factor. I use my own limited knowledge of these factors to influence the design of my own workout. But if we attempt to separate out the two and ask questions about CNS fatigue versus Metabolic fatigue within the context of single day parameters we will just over-analyse and confuse ourselves. This is because there is not a perfect line separating the two effects. They overlap of course.

Basically we are talking about two types of “work” right now. Maximal work (Monday volume) and maximal strength (Friday single set). Fatigue from maximal work can be expected to have a quicker onset onset than that from maximal strength. It should also be of lesser intensity. But it will be of longer duration. The fatigue from maximal strength will tend to be slower onset, higher intensity but much shorter duration. It is very simple to predict the difference between Monday and Friday in this way. Of couse there is a neural component involved in Monday! The intensity is relatively high. But in general we can just think of Monday as maximal work and predict that the fatigue will be of longer duration, which of course practice bares out. In essence there are different types of fatigue and different fitness effects and the above characteristics result from the interplay among them. Just remember that the different types of fatigue ARE cumulative.

I’m dealing in generalities. Many factors influence the magnitude of fatigue such as taining status.

Because the total workload on Friday is so low and because the fitness response is relatively speedy the difference between a 1RM attempt and a 5RM is of little importance when viewed within the context of the training week. You might predict that a 5RM would be more immediately draining and take a bit longer to recover from IN GENERAL and you’d probably be correct. You may also predict that any new fitness gained would be a little less immeditate but of longer duration and you’d also be correct. This goes into what I was saying about “new fitness” from a new 1RM attempt. There is a very quick fitness response from that which offsets fatigue to some extent. But it is much more fleeting in nature. It comes quick and it goes quick. IMO, sticking with 5RM at first and for as long as you can get away with it will likely be more successful in the short term for the less experienced.

BTW, the idea that assaults of the CNS take longer to recover from is incorrect and I’ve already went through. If this were true, a set-up like TM would be doomed to failure since Friday’s wokout would cause a fatgue long lasting enough to bleed into Monday and thus accumulate.

But IN GENERAL (I have to stress the general part) the fatigue effect from Monday trumpts anything you are going to generate of Friday. It is the more important of the two in terms of manipulation (not to mention the off-load of course). More important on Friday is the individuals own experience and their readiness to attepmpt 1RM’s. For the most part you should be able to progress happily along without ever seeing 1RM territory and I would rather see people at first using these as more of a way of gauging one long period of time with another. I.E. every once in a while you might imagine you are having a “competition day”. But this should be after you have gotten more comfortable with heavier loads. To some extent just switching around from 3’s and 5’s and stuff like that tends to give the CNS some breathing room. But I don’t want to overanalyze all this.

The idea of progressing from 1RM, to 2, 3, 4 and so on in a linear fashion is very powerful for those who are ready for it and can pull it off. But I don’t recommend it for many. Lots would get bogged down very quickly from this.

Another old time trick that one could use to gear themselves up for heavier loads is to use “holds”. On Friday you could pick a load that you extimate as your 1RM or a little higher and simply hold it in the starting position for a little while. Then go on to your regular RM attempt. For some this is actually a very good part of a warm up. Better than the idea of doing 1 rep at a higher rep which is not all it’s cracked up to be. But I don’t want to get into these holds in all kinds of detail. That is another discussion in itself.

I will say that for a lesser trained individual fatigue from maximal strength is very marked. Much has been made of the idea that someone working with more pounds is going to incur more wide ranging fatigue effect than a weaker individual. But if you compare another type of work, speed work, with maximal strength work within a single session you’ll see that this is not exactly the way it works. What you’ll find is that weaker individuals do very badly at maximal intensity work (speed work) following maximal strength work because of the fatigue effect. Whereas more advanced or elite individuals can do speed work after maximal strength work much more successfully although they too might be advised to do speed first for other reasons. It would be hard, knowing that, to say that RM attempts are automatically of less impact than for a stronger guy. A stronger more experienced guy should have more ability to work within his present potential due to many more factors than fatigue or just load on the bar. But there is no way of actually predicting training responses over a large population. You can make broad generalizations about novice, intermediate, or advanced lifters but the only very accurate training model is that for one individual.

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If you act sanctimonious I will just list out your logical fallacies until you get pissed off and spew blasphemous remarks.

whew, i'm going to have to re-read these last 2 posts a few times!!!!

Sorry, I got on a roll

i need to go print this stuff out....

dont apologize, this is exctly the kind of stuff i like to find on forums!

one can only read so many threads about "paralell vs 45 degree angle stance on bent rows?" before one loses one's mind!

and lets not even go into the "keeping the pinky higher or lower than your thumb when doing lateral raises?" type discussions.

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Here are a couple of generic programs written by Rip himself. I found these on another board. The poster trains at Rip's gym and he's been helping people out who are interested in the method. I hope he doesn't mind me re-posting it here. I haven't edited it.

Jeff


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Monday night, I asked Rip to write a couple of generic programs for someone coming off of SS and interested in the Texas Method. It's not an easy thing to write a generic program because different people will be interested in bringing up different lifts. I said "just write something" and he came up with the following:

Routine 1

Monday
Squat 5X5
Heavy Press (5X5)
Bench Press Assistance
Power Clean (5X3)or Row

Wednesday
Front Squat 3X3
Back Extensions or GHR
Chin ups

Friday
Squat 1X5
Heavy Bench Press
Press Assistance
Dead Lift 1X5

Routine 2

Monday
Squat 5X5
Bench Press 5X5
Power Clean (5X3)or Row

Wednesday
Front Squat 3X3
Press 5X5
Back Extension/GHR
Chin ups

Friday
Squat 1X5
Bench Press
1X5
or 5X3
or 5X2
or 5X1
Dead Lift 1X5

Where I don't list sets/reps, he didn't write them down. I can surmise the sets/reps by looking at my current program. I didn't want to throw that information in here because I wanted you guys to see it exactly as it was written. The second workout was written at my urging. I said, "what if I want to get strong at the bench since that's what a lot of guys want to do".

Just throwing this out as a couple of workout suggestions.