Thoughts on S&C Training: 5/3/1 September 2012

Just finished another 5/3/1 cycle yesterday. Since I'll be fighting again soon, I decided not to include Squats and Deadlifts - I just tend to put on too much mass when doing these. Instead, my lifting sessions revolve around the olympic lifts: the snatch and the clean & jerk. Additionally, I do bench presses and weighted pull-ups. Hence, I cover all of the following functional movement patterns:

•     Vertical Push:    Jerk
•     Vertical Pull: Pull-Ups
•     Horizontal Push: Bench Press
•     Horizontal Pull: None, although some coaches classify the deadlift as such. Hence, it's safe to say that the clean serves this purpose just as well.
•     Knee-centered Stand-Up: Overhead lunge following the jerk
•     Hip-centered Stad-Up (aka hinge): Both the clean and the snatch
•     Anti-Flex, Anti-Rotation, Anti-whatever: Putting a big weight overhead and keeping it there

Snatches and pull-ups make up workout A, while bench pressing and the c&j form workout B. During the workout, I'm alternating between the olympic lifts and the grinds. As a general rule, however, the o-lifts always come before the grinds. So, for example, I'd do the following:

1.     Snatch, 75% 1RM, 5 Reps
2.     Pull-Up, 75% 1RM, 5 Reps
3.     Snatch, 85% 1RM, 3 Reps
4.     Pull-Up, 85% 1RM, 3 Reps
5.     Snatch, 95% 1RM, AMRAP
6.     Pull-Up, 95% 1RM, AMRAP

In between sets, I'm taking as much time as I feel like. I used to be rather strict about timing in the past, but now I consider it a rather autoregulatory thing. Well, autoregulatory or not, I feel that the grinds did suffer from their placement after the extremely CNS-intense O-lifts. As a matter of fact, this feeling is well backed by my training log, which is presented below:

	Snatch	Clean&Jerk	Pull-Up	Bench Press		Exercise 1		Snatch
Test Result	55	75	120	100		Exercise 2		Clean & Jerk
95,00%	52,25	71,25	114	95		Exercise 3		Pull-Up
90,00%	49,5	67,5	108	90		Exercise 4		Bench Press
85,00%	46,75	63,75	102	85
80,00%	44	60	96	80		Odd Sessions:		Snatch		Pull-Up
75,00%	41,25	56,25	90	75		Even Sessions:		Clean & Jerk		Bench Press
70,00%	38,5	52,5	84	70
65,00%	35,75	48,75	78	65
Session	1		2		3		4		5		6
Date	30.08.12		03.09.12		06.09.12		08.09.12
EXR 1	Snatch		C&J		Snatch		C&J		Snatch		C&J
	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps
Set 1	35	5	50	5	37,5	3	52,5	3	40	5	55	5
Set 2	42,5	5	57,5	5	45	3	60	3	52,5	3	65	3
Set 3	47,5	5	65	3	50	4	67	5	52,5	5	70	5
EXR 2	Pull-Up		Bench Press		Pull-Up		Bench Press		Pull-Up		Bench Press
	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps	Weight	Reps
Set 1	80	5	65	5	84	3	70	3	90	5	75	5
Set 2	90	5	75	5	95	3	80	3	102,5	3	85	3
Set 3	102,5	5	85	5	107,5	3	90	3	115	x	95	1
			Snatch			Pull-Up
Session			1	3	5	1	3	5
H1RM			55,17	54,55	59	115,32	113,83	118,29
Test Result			55	55	55	120	120	120
Estimated strength increase (%)			0,3090909091	-0,8181818182	7,2727272727	-3,9	-5,1416666667	-1,425
			Clean & Jerk			Bench Press
Session			2	4	6	2	4	6
H1RM			68,83	75,95	78,76	95,63	95,3	95
Test Result			75	75	75	100	100	100
Estimated strength increase (%)			-8,2266666667	1,2666666667	5,0133333333	-4,37	-4,7	-5

H1RM stands for "hypothetical 1 RM" and refers to 1 RM estimations made with [this app]. So, to sum the above up:

• Snatch +7,3% (55kg -> 59kg)
• Clean & Jerk +5% (75kg -> 79kg)
• Pull-Up -1,4% (120kg -> 118kg, including bodyweight)
• Bench Press -5% (100kg -> 95%)

Since the O-lifts are imho more important than the grinds (especially for fighters), I call that an OK month. Not perfect, but by all means ok. There'll be no regeneration week for me - tuesday, I'll jump right into the next cycle. Although Wendler proposes adding 5kg to the big lifts at the beginning of each new cycle, I feel that this is too much for the O-lifts. Hence, I'll only increase them by 2.5kg each.

What are your thoughts on O-lifts for martial artists? Just feel free to post your point of view to the comments section below. Looking forward to reading them.

So long,

take care