Tom's INSANE Strength Gains (3 Key Lessons)

Tom is absolutely KILLING it on STRONG IN 60 right now. And this is a story all about how his life got flipped, turned... Actually it isn't. It's a story about how he's gone from a regular gym goer, racking up the newbie gains and hitting some legitimate numbers... To a Dad of two kids for whom memories of hitting the gym everyday with his 5pm lifting crew seemed like a long time ago... To now, back in the gym consistently, while juggling work, dad life, and house renovations and experiencing INSANE strength gains WAY beyond his original PB's after just 14 weeks. To me that is SO impressive, and a perfect example of what I wanted people to get from the STRONG IN 60 coaching experience. And before I get into some of the details, I just want to make some of the thing Tom HASN'T done really clear.

He hasn't been perfect. He's average 3.1 sessions out of 4 per week since he started.

He hasn't "never missed a Monday", or any other bollocks like that. He's got in the gym when life has allowed and followed the plan for that day. He hasn't played catch-up when he's missed a session or two. He does what's planned for the day, and gets back on with his other responsibilities that are waiting for him outside the gym. Which I think is epic, because this demonstrates just what can be achieved by someone living a life that is for a short while going to be largely sub-optimal for training and gains. And it demonstrates what can be achieved by someone who has realistic expectations, does what is asked of them, and focussed on what is in their control. So lets run through what Tom has achieved over 14 weeks, while completing the STRONG IN 60 programme and progression onto his first 6 weeks of the ongoing Forever Athletic programme.

High Bar Back Squat

All Time PB: 130kg

Week 1 SI60: 60kg x5

Week 14 SI60: 130kg

Bench Press

All Time PB: 100kg

Week 1 SI60: 60kg x5

Week 14 SI60: 110kg

Deadlift

All Time PB: 182.5kg

Week 1 SI60: 100kg x5

Week 14 SI60: 190kg

Not bad going for someone who's already had their newbie gains and is running on 75% session adherence. And I think there are 3 key things at play here that made Tom's Dad strength dreams a reality that most guys with young families won't do.

Have A Plan

We all have the plan of getting back into the gym after a period of time off, to shift the weight, get our fitness back and in Tom's words "put on a jumper for the first time in a long while and it's snug in all the right places rather than the belly".

That's not actually a plan. That's the outcome.

Most people will get to work on that with no roadmap in place.

They'll take off from Sedentary Street looking to find Action Man Avenue without knowing whether they need to turn left or right out the end of the street. Or in gym terms, they'll get to the gym, quickly get changed, walk out the changing room and think "well fuck, so what should I do today?". Tom invested in himself and joined STRONG IN 60. In the process he took out all of the guesswork, and of the overwhelm, all of the indecision, and ensured that every time he had a chance to get to the gym, he had a session planned that was going to get him closer to his goal.

So all he had to do was turn-up and work hard. Which he absolutely did.

Agile Periodisation

Some coaches love to go in depth on the specifics of programming, creating clients their bespoke optimal long term training plan with fancy progressions, advanced loading techniques and tracking algorithms.

In the process totally forgetting that regular people who don't live at the gym have other shit going on that means they're going to miss the odd session pretty consistently.

Which is where "agile periodisation" comes in.

This is a process I learned from Mladen Jovanovic, where your programming needs to be flexible to the changing demands of the client.

Developed in sport, where athletes pick up injuries, have constantly changing match schedules, have international travel and tactical changes, if the strength coach and their programme is too rigid, it no longer fits the need of the athlete.

I believe it's exactly the same with everyday people who want to become everyday athletes.

We have to account for the sessions missed due to work, family commitments, illnesses picked up from young kids, etc.

And we have to account for the low energy sessions due to stress, poor sleep, and physical jobs.

And we have to account for the occasional niggle picked up from pushing hard in a sub-optimal recovery environment.

And when you do that, with a programme that works at 95% when you miss a quarter of the sessions because you were expecting that, rather than work at a best case scenario of 75% when you didn't account for it... massive strength and performance increases can still occur.

You need a plan, but shit will still hit the fan.

Have a plan that is flexible (like STRONG IN 60). Prioritise Intensity

Training for an average of 3 hours per week isn't a lot.

It's roughly 2.5% of the time you spend awake per week.

It's absolutely enough to make epic strength progress like Tom has. He's the living proof.

But only if you make the most of it.

And to make the most of it, you need to prioritise intensity.

Where most people go wrong when training on a tight time budget is they try and fit as much movement into their 3 hours a week as possible.

You attend circuit classes, sign-up for brutal WODs or Metcon's, and try to sweat as much as possible, burn as many calories as possible and make those 3 hours as miserable as possible.

Huge mistake, because intensity is going to be the single biggest driver of performance and physical change. That means heavy weights, done with a close proximity to failure, with adequate rest to do so for 12-18 sets per workout.

So bin off the 40 minute AMRAP's for 40s on 20s off circuits and other high volume sweat sessions.

Value quality over quantity, get some weight on the bar and train in a way that forces you to take proper rest periods.

If you're training for 3 hours per week you've got a hard cap on your calorie burn anyway. It going to be 5% of your total daily energy expenditure at best.

So sort your calories with your nutrition, and use your training to facilitate physical change.

Proper, old fashioned, intense strength training is the best way to do that.

STRONG IN 60

These are the key principles that STRONG IN 60 is build on, and why it works so well for people like Tom.

It's a group training programme that still meets you where you're at, and sets you the right challenges at the right time.

I'm going to say it does it better than most 1-1 Personal Trainers will do in their "bespoke" sessions.

It cuts out all your indecision and gives you clarity on the process.

It cuts out all of the fluff and helps you focus intensity on your highest priorities.

And by cutting out everything you don't need, it can still include what you really do need, which is personal accountability and coaching from me.

This is the real recipe for success, and how you become your strongest self yet just like Tom.

Let me sign off with some words directly from Tom in response to me asking what are the most valuable bit of progress he has seen from returning to training.

"Mostly the fact that the progress I've made, feels vastly disproportionate to the amount of effort and time I spend at the gym". "Sometimes I've been extremely tired and go to the gym and those times just turning up seems to be good enough, even if I do drop the weight or reps by 20%. But those days I'm good, I turn up, smash it out because I have the plan there ready to go, it's all timed and I just don't have to think. Before you know it the 40/50 minutes has passed and I'm done, ready to go back to work or be a dad". "When I'm actually lifting the weights, yes it's intense and I push, but when I'm done I rarely feel drained".

"The second most impressive piece is how quickly I've gone back to reaching my PB's and then without even thinking about it, tried one day and smashed through it by 10%".

"Under your programme before, it took over a year to build the base. And after having over a year away from the gym, it's taken less than 5 months to be back where I was which I am genuinely shocked at, especially considering the point I made above about not feeling like I'm killing myself every week to get there".

Thank you Tom for letting me share your story!