Different training phases? Neuro/Strength, Metabolic, Hypertrophy? Who can share their experience?

nay0m3

I am just starting to learn about different training phases. I have been lifting for about 2 years now and realize I have always been in the hypertrophy phase. I am just shifting to neuro/strength phase for the next 4 weeks, then back to hypertrophy for 4 weeks, then metabolic for 4-6 as I try to reverse diet/cut a bit and increase cardio. Just curious if others are familiar and have experience with this and what works best for you.

heybales

Usually some overlap between hypertrophy and strength, can usually just tweak 1 of your weekly workouts to shift some focus to the other while not losing gains.

Metabolic out on it's own though - and doing just that, especially during a cut, can lead to some muscle loss as it's just not the same intensity.
So you can back off to maintenance level but keep the weight on the bar, shorten the workouts, and add some metabolic. But don't switch to just metabolic during a diet.

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/training/weight-training-for-fat-loss-part-1.html

cwolfman13

My program doesn't target any of that specifically all at once, but incorporates those things overall as the program is run (except for metabolic lifting). For example, my squats and deadlifts and flat bench are the only lifts I do for neural adaptation, but that also depends on where I'm at. I perform them in 4 sets of 5-8...I usually spend a few weeks at 5 reps and start increasing...once I'm up to being able to do 4x8 at that weight, I add weight to bring it back to where I can only do 4x5 again...and then back up the ladder I go. So it's basically this ladder from strength to more of a hypertrophy reps scheme that I climb up and down...usually over the course of about 4-6 weeks depending.

My other lifts like incline bench, RDLs, leg press, OH press, lat pulls, rows, etc I do the same kind of ladder thing, but the reps are 8-12. I don't like to live in any one particular rep range. I typically keep rest shorter for these lifts. I don't really do much in the way of metabolic training in the weight room...maybe some kettlebell swings here and there. My lifting program is full body so it's only 3x per week so that leaves me plenty of time to get out on my road or mountain bike for my cardio work and I love my bikes and only kinda sorta like the weight room.

cwolfman13

A quick ETA to my post, when I worked with my coach/trainer, he would include metabolic conditioning work in my overall workout, but it was never a stand alone workout.

cupcakesandproteinshakes

I don’t know what metabolic conditioning is?

heybales

Hmmm - my prior link was updated.

https://bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/a-guide-to-fat-loss-for-athletes

See section 2.5 for what metabolic training is.

cwolfman13

cupcakesandproteinshakes wrote: »

I don’t know what metabolic conditioning is?

Depends. When my trainer would work metabolic conditioning into my overall workouts, it was usually barbell complexes of some kind...so for example, he would have me do a complex of deadlift, to bent over row, to hang clean, to press, to overhead squat where I'd go through each movement within the complex 2-3 times before putting the bar down to rest and repeat for 4 sets. Sometimes sled pulls or kettle bell circuits or something, but it was usually complexes.

The weight is fairly light given that you use the same weight for each movement within the complex and the exhaustive nature of the work (it is exhausting and generally at the backend of the training session). It is great cardio and IMO, well worth implementing into a more standard weight training routine in some capacity, but I wouldn't personally do it in lieu of either strength or hypertrophy training...more of a complimentary thing.

My wife trains with my trainer's wife and some workouts are very heavy on metabolic conditioning and some lean more towards strength or hypertrophy but all of her workouts have some or a lot of metabolic conditioning built in depending on that days session. Her metabolic work is typically more high rep (15-20) stuff with lots of supersets of 2 or 3 different movements within the superset. My wife enjoys this thoroughly and ultimately gets a pretty good mix of everything, but I worked out with her and her trainer for a bit (discount) and found it to not be to my liking as even the lower volume metabolic days were still more metabolic conditioning vs traditional weight training than I liked. Metabolic training doesn't do a whole lot in terms of actually building muscle or strength, but it's great for overall fitness and endurance which is my wife's primary focus in and out of the weight room as she is predominately an endurance athlete.

nay0m3

Thank you all for sharing! @heybales Thanks for the link to some great info! @cwolfman13 Love how you explained this and shared the usefulness of different styles.

I don't love this strength/neuro phase but I am going to stick with it for 4 weeks that I committed to and then switch back to hypertrophy I think. Based on what @heybales shared, it definitely makes sense that I don't switch to metabolic right away.

cwolfman13

nay0meh wrote: »

Thank you all for sharing! @heybales Thanks for the link to some great info! @cwolfman13 Love how you explained this and shared the usefulness of different styles.

I don't love this strength/neuro phase but I am going to stick with it for 4 weeks that I committed to and then switch back to hypertrophy I think. Based on what @heybales shared, it definitely makes sense that I don't switch to metabolic right away.

Something you might ultimately want to consider is a combination of both strength and hypertrophy, rather than one or the other, particularly if you're not training for competition or something...not that periodizing them into blocks is necessarily a bad thing either. I typically do strength rep ranges for squats, deadlifts, and flat bench and all of my other stuff is hypertrophy range. I do a full body program that looks like this in an A,B,A...B,A,B...A,B,A, etc, etc

Workout A:
Deadlift - 3x5-8
Leg Press - 4x10-12
Incline Bench - 4x10-12
Cable Rows - 4x10-12
Arnold Press - 4x8-10

Workout B:
Squat - 4x5-8
RDL - 4x10-12
Flat Bench - 4x5-8
Lat Pulls - 4x10-12
Arnold Press - 4x8-10

Note> when I have the time I usually throw in some dedicated rear delt work to correct some personal imbalances and posture issues.

My trainer put this together for me as I am short on time to use the weight room and have to go over my lunch break at work and still have time to get to the gym (not far) and back to the office. I started this after having been pretty hit or miss in the weight room for a couple of years. I kept my strength movements in the 5 rep range for awhile when I was able to more or less linearly add weight every week. After linear progression was peaked I started working them up to the higher end of the prescribed rep range before adding weight and dropping it back down to 5.

I'm sure there are about a million and one ways to go about combining both efforts depending on your available time and one's preferred split and ultimate goals. I'm middle age, so my goals are primarily to maintain functional strength as I age as well as my muscle mass and to still look pretty good pool side for a guy pushing 48. I don't typically have time during my lunch hour to throw in any metabolic conditioning, but one of my sessions is usually a Saturday or Sunday so I generally do my barbell complexes after my main workout on the weekend.