Intermediate trainees can start to focus on slowly adding extra training volume. They may also require periodization to handle the stresses placed upon their bodies by frequent heavy lifting sessions. An intermediate lifter is generally bench pressing pounds, squatting pounds and deadlifting pounds. If they are training specifically for strength, they will be placing well at local powerlifting meets.
An experienced intermediate lifter is able to train up to times per week with a fair amount of volume. They require some form of periodization, deloading or fatigue management with their programming because of the weight they are moving in the gym.
Experienced intermediate lifters know their major weaknesses and feel confident with setting up their own workouts,and with making workout adjustments. When they do not have the answers, they seek out help from more experienced lifters. They are the very few guys at local gyms who are moving big iron and sporting large arms. They are driven, dedicated and make no excuses. They find a way to succeed, despite the obstacles placed in their path. Progress has slowed dramatically, and success is now viewed as adding a couple pounds of muscle per year, or adding 25 to 50 pounds to a major lift per year.
An experienced intermediate lifter is generally bench pressing at least pounds, squatting at least pounds and deadlifting at least pounds. Very few lifters reach the advanced stage. Advanced lifters have faced very difficult challenges, and have learned to overcome these challenges by trial and error. They know their bodies and limits well, and are mentally tough. An advanced lifter is elite or near elite level in powerlifting, or near their natural genetic muscle building potential if a bodybuilder.
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They also have the cutting stack with alternatives to Anavar, Winstrol, Clenbuterol and Testosterone. You can also buy them individually. If you're interested in more potent compounds you can always check out the latest research on SARMs and buy them from Science. Skip to Section. Perhaps you see that your back is rounding when you try to lift heavier. These are the kinds of nuanced decisions that advanced lifters need to deal with.
In this case, maybe you decide to switch to doing snatch-grip deadlifts, which require more hip mobility but do a better job of developing your upper back. Then, as an accessory lift, perhaps you add in some bent-over barbell rows to help bulk up your spinal erectors and lats. The purpose of this classification system is that it helps lifters figure out which workout program they should be doing:.
What we do in our Bony to Beastly Bulking Program is start beginners off with a Phase Zero, where we teach them the ropes. This phase is all about mastering push-ups, goblet squats, Romanian deadlifts, and building some basic upper-back and biceps strength to prepare for chin-ups. If someone has more lifting experience, we have them start right into Phase One.
Here, we begin to get into the bigger bulking lifts, focusing more on progressive overload. When people run into problems progressing their lifts, we help them in the coaching community. That means that you may benefit from bulking more aggressively, eating more calories, gaining more weight each week. However, the rate that you can gain muscle has less to do with how long someone has been lifting, more to do with how muscular someone is. His frame still has a ton of room for growth, so he can probably handle a pretty aggressive bulking diet.
For another example, if someone is skinny-fat , then being far away from their muscular genetic potential means that they stand a good chance of gaining muscle while losing fat.
Or maybe not. I bulked up aggressively for two years, gaining 55 pounds. During that time, I never ran into the wall that intermediate lifters hit, let alone needing to worry about lean bulking. Gaining strength and gaining muscle are similar. The more muscle we have on our frames, the higher our strength potential is.
For example, if we look at bench press research, we see that how much someone can bench press is directly correlated with how big their chests, shoulders, and triceps are.
Muscle size and muscle strength are intimately linked together. For example, if someone bulks up their legs with the leg press, they may never develop the back strength that they need for heavy front squatting. This adds some distinction between the size and strength sections. This is going to allow you to gain strength at breakneck speed. During this period, it can help to do each lift multiple times per week, allowing you to add small amounts of weight to the barbell more often.
With this progression system, your workout program allows you to add up to five pounds to your squat every week. I mean, theoretically, that would add pounds to your squat in a single year. However, many beginners can gain strength much faster than that. A beginner might be able to add five pounds on Monday, another five pounds on Wednesday, and then another five on Friday. That allows you to pile fifteen pounds on your squat every week.
Theoretically, that would add a whopping pounds to your squat in a single year. As you blast through your newbie gains, your progress will slow. However, during your early weeks of lifting, it pays to progress as quickly as possible. Another reason is that it allows beginners to get more practice with the lift, helping them improve their lifting technique more quickly.
Now, of course, after a couple of months of this, your progress will start to slow. There are a couple of reasons for this:.
Once your strength starts to plateau with a beginner program, it often makes sense to switch to a plan with a greater variety of exercises , but to train those lifts with a slightly lower training frequency : 1—2 times per week instead of 2—3 times per week.
At an intermediate level, training a muscle twice per week seems to be just as effective as training it three times per week. As a result, you might choose to train each movement pattern less often. There are many different ways to do this. Another popular approach is daily undulating periodization DUP , which uses heavier and lighter days, like so:.
This definition helps people know whether they can get away with more straightforward programming and quicker weight progressions. Then when that stops working, you switch to intermediate workout programs, persisting with them for as long as you can manage. When that stops working, you gear into advanced programming and fight for any hint of progress.
It takes the law of diminishing returns into account, helping people align their workout programming with their rate of progress. The skinny guy might have excellent lifting technique and mobility, allowing him to do deep front squats with ease. The muscular guy might have bulked up his lower body with the leg press, never developing the back strength or the shoulder mobility that he needs to even get into the starting position for the front squat.
By that same token, the muscular guy clearly has a muscular chest, big shoulders, and burly triceps. In fact, he may already be getting quite close to his muscular genetic potential on the bench press.
Furthermore, given the sheer amount of muscle mass in his shoulder girdle, his bench press is probably well over pounds. Furthermore, some guys are beginners in some ways, advanced in others. Still, we can make some good generalizations. The best lifts for beginners are the brute strength exercises that are easy to learn.
Think of lifts like push-ups, goblet squats, Romanian deadlifts, dumbbells rows, biceps curls, and lateral raises. These lifts are simple, which will help you bulk up in a hurry while improving your lifting technique and overall coordination. You can stick with these lifts until they become hard to progress with. Or you could blast past these lifts quickly, progressing to heavier variations as soon as you feel ready for them. The best workout programs for beginners tend to be somewhat repetitive.
They probably involve doing the same lifts several times per week, often in the same repetition range. For example, you might be doing 8-rep goblet squats 2—3 times per week. Due to a phenomenon called newbie gains, beginners often benefit from pretty aggressive bulking. We often recommend that beginners eat a hearty bulking diet , with a calorie surplus of around calories, aiming to around a pound per week.
This aspect of bulking is easier said than done. For us naturally skinny guys, eating enough calories to bulk up can be incredibly difficult. This is how ectomorphs often get stuck at a beginner level, sometimes for years.
The beginner phase is a flash of beauty. Enjoy it for as long as you possibly can. I gained forty pounds this way, but I was exceptionally skinny. This trick with bulking up as an intermediate lifter is to get stronger at the big compound lifts.
This is where the Big 5 compound lifts come in:. But intermediate lifters also benefit from greater exercise variety, so feel free to include a good bunch of assistance and accessory lifts. That will help you build stronger, rounder, fuller, and more aesthetic muscles while keeping your joints healthy and strong.
This is because lifters at different stages of their journey need different things to make the most progress possible. However, the main issue most people face is that the typical methods for determining your lifting level leave a lot to be desired. These methods are often less than ideal, and not very accurate when it comes to figuring things out.
The first method looks at your total training experience i. Anyone with less than a year is a beginner, one to two years is intermediate and anything beyond that is advanced. Let me show you what I mean:. The next method of determining your lifting level is to look at how strong you are. This often includes people throwing about arbitrary strength standards you must meet to move for beginner to intermediate and beyond:.
This method is also often expressed as strength standards based on your weight, which breaks down your progress into different weight classes and whilst knowing how strong you are is useful to gauge your progress over time, it also has issues. The last method commonly used to determine your lifting level is the amount of muscle you have. With the idea being that the more you have the longer you must have been lifting for and therefore the more experience you must have.
However, these numbers are just a rough benchmark and in my opinion, this method is the least accurate of the 3 as everyone has their ideas of what constitutes a muscular body. It also fails to consider:. Ok, so we saw earlier than knowing your lifting level allows you to know which lifts are appropriate for you, which approach is best suited to your situation and how quickly you should expect to see progress.
For example:. The trick is being able to accurately determine your lifting level in a way that accounts for all the factors we discussed earlier. In my opinion, the best way to do this is to view your overall training experience and strength in the context of consistent and intelligent training.
In my book, you are a beginner lifter for your first 6 — 12 months of consistent and intelligent training as this gives you enough time to learn good technique and get familiar with weightlifting, maximise your newbie gains and start seeing results. After this point, you become an intermediate lifter which is further characterised by having a good level of strength and muscular development as well as be familiar with and proficient in all common exercises deadlift, bench press, shoulder press, chin-ups, rows, squats, etc.
Now, we need to look at how this influences your training frequency, exercise selection and overall progression. Beginners will benefit the most from compound exercises that are easy to learn and progress with. This means things like the flat bench press, barbell back squat, barbell rows and bicep curls.
It could also mean using machines to do exercises like lat pulldowns, seated cable rows, the leg press or bodyweight exercises like the press up or squat.
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