10 Programming Rules I Live By.

Programming fun and effective workouts and training programs is one of my strengths.

It's probably the most common piece of feedback I get from clients (you can read my testimonials here and read my Google reviews here to see for yourself).

It probably comes from a couple of sources.

A) I've written literally THOUSANDS of phases of programming (I have the spreadsheets to prove it) and you get good at what you do often.

B) I'm actually an absolute NERD for program writing and my logical brain loves the process of writing progressive programs.

So today I'm going to share with you 10 programming rules I live by, which shape the majority of the programs I write.

Rule 1: Bang For Buck Warm-Up.

An effective warm-up is ESSENTIAL for a great training session.

It primes your body and mind for what's to come, and sets you up for success in the session you're about to tackle.

But when you're pressed for time, it'll be the first thing you drop out (I know this, I've seen it hundreds of times).

So I make sure you always have time for your warm-up by making it as bang for buck as possible.

Can you get your body temperature up quickly and effectively?

Can you mobilise and activate as many joints and muscles in as few simple movements as possible?

Can you feel significantly better for you first lift of the day within 5 minutes of setting foot in the gym?

The answer to all of the above is yes, so I do it.

Rule 2: Work Your Weakness First

Over the years I've worked with a lot of people with either sporting goals, or injury rehab goals.

It comes with the territory of being a qualified Strength and Conditioning coach.

This often means that clients have an obvious area of focus that needs direct attention, and I always work this first.

It'll often be a movement/mobility deficit worked with a movement drill, or an injury rehab necessity worked with graded exposure to loading.

Either way, it's the biggest priority so we do it first while you're focussed and fresh to get the most out of it.

If you don't have a specific weakness to work on, you move straight on to...

Rule 3: Use Indicator Lifts

I'm a big fan of using "indicator" lifts.

An indicator lift is a lift that you test/measure over time to identify whether progress is being made.

This really suits bigger compounds like squat variations, deadlift variations, presses and rows, but certainly isn't limited to those.

The specifics of what you chose and how you measure them depends on your goals, but at the end of the day I am accountable to you in terms of making progress, so an indicator lift is a solid in-session fact-checking practice to show things are working.

This is progressive overload in practice, as something that you program for, but more importantly is an outcome of effective training.

Rule 4: Full Body Workouts Are Option 1

9 times out of 10 I will write you a full body program. This is for a few reasons.

1. Most of my clients train 2-3 times per week

2. Most of my clients only need to train 3 times per week

3. Most of my clients will benefit from greater frequency rather than greater intensity.

4. All of my clients want to look, feel and perform better in AND out of the gym, and not be knackered and sore all the time.

All of these things point towards a full body approach.

A three day per week full body program where you squat, hinge, push, pull, carry and core gives you three exposures each week to those key movements.

And remember what I said at the start. You get good at what you do often, so every time we train we hit a variation of these patterns.

Rule 5: Alternate Push and Pull, Upper and Lower.

After indicator lifts I move onto "Accessory Work", or the stuff that will help your indicator lifts improve quicker, or keep your body healthy and happy.

I organise these by alternating between push and pull, and upper and lower.

So for example, if your indicator lift today was a squat (lower body push), next up would be an upper body pull (maybe a pull-up progression).

If your indicator lift was a bench press (upper body push), next up would be a lower body pull (maybe a dumbbell RDL).

Then in the next section you'll do the opposites again.

So Upper Push/Lower Pull will be followed by Upper Pull/Lower Push.

What does that give you?

Some really simple, quick and easy balance in your programming.

Rule 5: Superset Often

The other huge benefit to alternative upper/lower and push/pull is you can easily program non-competing supersets, i.e. two movements that don't really fatigue each other.

Pairing these together lets you keep your rest time down by allow one muscle group to rest which you work the other, allowing me to fit more quality work into less time.

Time is money for you and I. If you're paying for an hours training I want to give you as much EFFECTIVE training and as little rest as possible (some rest is essential to performance and progress).

But too much rest is wasting your time and money, and I want to give you the best value training experience possible.

Rule 6: Done In An Hour With A Shower

As I said above, the biggest benefit to time-efficiency techniques like supersets is that you can get more work done in less time.

Most of my clients are busy people, with demanding jobs and various family/life commitments.

They can't afford to be spending 90 minutes in the gym PLUS the time that they have to spend travelling there and back.

So I aim for most of my sessions to be done in an hour with a shower. So that 45/50 minutes work of quality training time.

If someone has more time and they genuinely need the extra work, we will do it, but most of the time that isn't the case.

Simply being efficient and focussing all your energy on the work set in that 50 minutes, then a quick 10 minute shower before you're ready to take on the next challenge of your day.

Quality > Quantity

Rule 7: Use Filler Movements

Filler movements are another great way to optimise the use of your training time.

They are low intensity movements that you can complete in your rest time between sets of larger exercises to get additional work done when you would otherwise be totally resting. Most importantly they are so low intensity that they do not subtract from the intensity of the main movement.

They way I will regularly utilise them are:

- To work an opposing muscle group to heap create balance in a training program (i.e. face pulls between sets of bench presses).

- To increase range of motion around a joint required in the main movement (i.e. leg swings between sets of back squats).

- To warm up for a following movement coming next in the session (i.e. overhead mobility between sets of lower body work if military press is next in the session).

This helps you be super efficient with your time, your accessory work, your mobility work, and your warm-ups.

Time is money, spend it wisely!

Rule 8: Minimum Effective Dose - Maximal Tolerable Dose

The Minimum Effective Dose (MED) is the smallest dose of training that provides a significant training effect to a client.

The Maximum Tolerable Dose (MTD) is the maximum dose of training that doesn't create a negative effect on training.

Everything between those two doses is the development zone, where training adaptation happens (i.e. you get better).

Go below the MED, and you're not training hard enough to get better.

Go above the MTD and you're training too hard to the extent you cannot recover effectively to apply another effective dose of training.

Now you know that, you know that you should set your training somewhere between the MED and MTD, and personally I work through waves of being closer to the MED, then closer to the MTD.

You want to maximise the training and results you get, so doing the maximum tolerable dose will be king here, but going through phases of doing the minimum necessary amount to prioritise recovery and other areas of life (you do have other areas to focus on other that training) and hugely valuable too.

So I believe you should work through waves of each too.

Rule 9: Flexibility Is KING

You will miss a session.

You will be late for a session.

You will go on holiday for a week.

You will get hurt, be sore, or pick up a niggle.

We're human, things happen, and your program must account for that.

This even happens to professional athletes who dedicate their whole lives to training.

So I program in a way that allows the plan to be flexible enough to tolerate missed sessions or movements and still drive progress.

It's another reason why I mainly program full body. If you miss a session, no bit deal, we'll hit the movements you missed today tomorrow anyway.

It's why I work between the minimum effective dose and maximal tolerable dose. If you're short on time you know the minimum that'll still work.

It's why I undercook rather than overcook most sessions. You can add more of you feel great and get rewarded, but still be rewarded from hitting the session when feeling a little off.

Flexibility is KING. A rigid program that's set in stone is unrealistic and won't work.

Rule 10: It MUST Be Fun

The only effective programs are the ones that get done.

The programs that get done most often are the ones that are fun and rewarding.

You need to strike a balance between making long term progress and picking up short term tangible wins.

You need to strike a balance of what you need to do and what you want to do.

You need to strike a balance of variety for novelty and consistency to build upon.

But most of all that programming needs to add to someones day, otherwise they're not going to come back and want to do it all again.

Thanks, Ian.