Step 1: Basic Routine Template Monday: • • •
Snatch: 3 singles, using 'Maximum Training Resistance' (use matrix) Clean & Jerk: MTR matrix Front Squat: 3 singles, using MTR, then 2 doubles with MTR -15 kilos
Wednesday: • • • •
Back Squat: 3 doubles with Monday CJ MTR + 20 kilos Power Snatch: 3 singles with MTR Power Clean and Push Jerk: 3 singles with MTR Romanian Deadlift: 3 triples with Mon CJ MTR + 20 kilos
Friday: • • •
Snatch: work up to true 1RM CJ: work up to true 1RM Front Squat or Back Squat: work up to true 1RM
[Basically this is a 'Total Day' or a simulated competition. Again, you don't want to psyche up like this is the Olympics, but you do want to 'let loose' and push yourself to darn near what your absolute max for that day would be.] Now, one of the important concepts here is that of "Maximum Training Resistance." This is what some of you may have heard referred to as a 'daily max' before. The definition of the MTR is "the maximum resistance that can be overcome one time without a strong effort of will or emotional stress." This is key in this program, at least as I have it structured to work for the individual. We want to use the MTR so as not to burn out the nervous system. Thus, on Mondays and Wednesday, the singles in the classical and power lifts must NOT be 'balls to the wall, my youngest son is hanging suspended over a Judas Cradle' type of lifts. They are 'I can walk up to the bar and pull this weight' lifts. Of course, you have to toe the line. Also, you have to learn whether you are missing lifts because you are actually working above your MTR, or because your form sucks. For me, it is an issue of pulling in the snatch and clean and the drive in the jerk. If I am pulling the bar high enough to snatch it or clean it, and driving it high enough to jerk it, I don't feel that I have exceeded my MTR, whether I am making the lifts or not. If I am missing my snatches out front, it is likely just because of my crappy first pull and lack of a full shrug, and not because I am going too heavy. As a lifter progresses, he will learn exactly where that line is. At the start of the program, Mondays and Wednesdays only will be done using the 'MTR Matrix'. This matrix will appear at the very end of the article, and I will place appropriate comments with it.
Step 2: Adding a Session Alright, the first step beyond the basic workout on your way to becoming a Bulgarian. What is it? On the middle day of the week, you are going to do 2 sessions. The session you have already been doing will be the AM session, and the following will be done in the PM: • • •
Snatch 80%/2 (3-4 sets) CJ 80%/2 (3-4 sets) Snatch Pulls 3-4 sets of triples with a weight 10 kilos over what was used for the snatches
The issue here becomes on what day of the week are you able to add a session. So, if you can do an AM and PM workout on Thursday, that becomes your 'middle day', and you are now lifting Tuesday-Thursday-Saturday. Though, if adding an AM (or basically just a session 2-3 hours earlier in the day) session is a big stumbling block, continuing on with the progression of the program might be next to impossible. The other issue here is when to take these steps. That, I am afraid, is up to the individual lifter and/or his coach. I would say that once you have been 'through the matrix' a couple of times at each and are able to keep making progress, add the next step. Your body is ready for the challenge. Step 3: Adding a Day So, you have added a session. A few months later, you should be ready to add a fourth day. What previously would have been the M, W, F workouts, respectively, will now take place on M, Tu, and Sat. What do we add in? On Thursday, you will do a workout that looks exactly like Monday's. That wasn't so hard, was it? Step 4: Adding a Session You have now been lifting 4 days a week, twice on Tuesdays. Your hair has gotten a little longer than is stylish, and you tend to wear t-shirts bearing '80s slogans that were not even cool in the '80s. It is time to move on... You will add an AM session to Monday. (with the previously done Monday session moved to the PM, or done second) What will that AM session look like? • • •
Snatch: 85%/2 (3-4 sets) CJ: 90%/2 (2-3 sets) Back Squat or RDL to MTR
Step 5: Adding Two Sessions This is it. The final bump in the road. It may have taken you a year and a half to work through the prior steps. You now can answer your cell phone between the clean and the jerk portions of the lift, and you got a new driver's license that says "?a?C?/4??" instead of "Dave Smith". You are ready for the final step in truly becoming a Bulgarian... What is added? It's simple, really. On Thursday you add an AM workout that looks the same as Monday's AM workout, and on Saturday you do the following workout (though it is more of a CNS warm-up than a workout) in the AM: • • •
Back Squat 80%/3 (3 sets) Power Snatches: 'light' Power Clean and Push Jerk: 'light'
So, there you have it. You now do 8 workouts a week. Craziness? Hardly, if you have added the steps only once you were ready. Not quite as extreme as the Bulgarians? Think again, because you are now using almost the exact same routine that the Bulgarian team has been doing since new Head Coach Plamen Asparukhov took over for Abadjiev in 2001 and reaffirmed the Bulgarian team's commitment to staying in line with IOC doping regulations. You now train just like Boevski and Jeliazkov, so good luck and go lift like them... *The MTR Matrix This is basically a system of volume/intensity progression that was used by the old Bulgarian regime that has not fallen out of favor. You can play with and rearrange the weeks as you like, but my preference is to go A-B-B-C-A. Some people can handle A-BB-C-C-A. Try different things and see what works for you. Also, to start with a lifter is probably best off basing the entire mesocycle on the MTR that was used during the first week. So, the weeks will just build upon each other. As the lifter becomes more comfortable with the system and his own capabilities, however, he will become more in tune with what his true MTR is on any given day, and during weeks B and C, respectively, will basically just do a second wave and a third wave back up to that weight irrespective of what MTR was used during week one. "A" Week: Predicted MTR -20kilos for 2 reps, Pred. MTR -10 kilos for a single, MTR for 3-4 singles. "B" Week: Perform A week progression, followed by MTR -10 kilos for a double, MTR -5 kilos for a single, and then MTR +5 kilos for 2-4 singles. "C" Week: Entire B week progression performed, followed by a double with MTR -20 kilos, another double with MTR -10 kilos, and finally 3-4 more singles with MTR plus 5 or 7.5 kilos.
So, if you were doing a simple A-B-B-C-A progression over 5 weeks, and you found that your snatch MTR was 100 on the first Monday, for the next 5 weeks your Monday snatch workouts might be as follows: Week 1: 80/2, 90, 100 (3-4) Week 2: 80/2, 90, 100 (3), 90/2, 95, 105 (2-4) Week 3: 80/2, 90, 100 (3), 90/2, 95, 105 (2-4) Week 4: 80/2, 90, 100 (3), 90/2, 95, 105 (3), 80/2, 90/2, 105 (2), 107.5 (2) Week 5: 80/2, 90, 100 (3-4) At this point, the lifter would start over, this time likely using 105 as the MTR for the first A week in the mesocycle. http://www.criticalbench.com/bulgarian-weightlifting.htm
