Who's waiting for Cathe's STS?

cherapple

I pre-ordered STS, cancelled it, and then pre-ordered it again. It's finally coming soon! I have mixed feelings about it, but I'm excited to be getting some new workout videos. "Never the same workout twice" will be right up my alley!

Anyone else waiting for STS to come?

cherapple

I pre-ordered STS, cancelled it, and then pre-ordered it again. It's finally coming soon! I have mixed feelings about it, but I'm excited to be getting some new workout videos. "Never the same workout twice" will be right up my alley!

Anyone else waiting for STS to come?

schoonmp

:blushing: What is STS?

cherapple

STS stands for Shock Training System, Cathe Friedrich's latest strength training program. It consists of 41 workouts on 41 DVDs. It's huge! From the site:

"Only STS gives you a different workout every time and that means you won’t have to worry about hitting plateaus or workout boredom. The advantage of STS is you maximize “muscle confusion” by doing a different workout every week varying the intensity and volume of the workout over the entire program by utilizing periodization. Muscle Confusion is one of the most important rules of strength training and no other workout program on the market today utilizes this principle to the same degree that STS does."

www.cathe.com

cherapple

Woohoooo! STS is shipping! (Guess it's only me who's waiting! :bigsmile: )

cherapple

I got it two days ago, although I haven't opened it! :laugh: Even so, all I can say is, "Wow," Cathe has outdone herself this time. I'll never need to buy another strength training video again because I'll be acquainted with just about every possible move in the universe!

Having waited so long for it, however, I started a different program (BFFM), which I'm now not ready to abandon for STS. What I think I'll use STS for is ideas on new moves to do in my current program. Cathe will be like my personal trainer, who's teachings I can take with me into the gym and adapt for my own workouts. All in all, I would say it was a good investment, even if I don't follow the program to the letter.

StiringWendel

I'm scheduled to get my STS on Tuesday, and am really looking forward to it given all of the feedback I've read from those who have already received their copies. I'm planning on doing it in a six month rotation (Week 1 twice, week 2 twice, etc) as that how it was originally planned apparently. I'm wondering how I'll handle committing to a six month rotation because this will be a first for me in terms of committing to a certain program for this long, but given what I think is quite a bit of variety in this program, I should be okay. I'm really looking forward to it right now though.

cherapple

Hey, I'm not *totally* alone with STS! :laugh:

Let me know how it goes and what you think of it. Cathe does too many reps and sets for me, which always causes me to grab lighter weights. I was stuck in a plateau after over two years of doing her videos, and now I'm lifting heavier because I'm concentrating on just 3 sets of 8-12 reps per exercise. I'm lifting a lot more weight now!

The STS workouts look like they're still a lot of sets on the same muscles, and higher reps than I do, plus she only works each muscle group once per week, when I'm more comfortable with two. When I get tired of the program I'm doing, I may give STS a shot, though, just to see how it works out for me, and eventually I will feel like my body needs another change.

StiringWendel

I've had good luck building strength with Cathe's Slow and Heavy series, but aside from that, I agree with you that she really does focus on more endurance than strength.

I don't know if you did the 1RM tests or not, but I did (on my upper body), and after printing out the workout card for the first week of discs, I can honestly say that the weight recommended for me to lift during that first set of discs (the endurance-based ones) are in some areas a bit higher (and in a couple, more than a bit higher) than I would have grabbed naturally. Based on that alone (without having seen the workouts), I'm actually encouraged that I may build some strength using this series because it may actually push me out of my 'this is comfortable!' range (where I sometimes like to be a little too much ).

I'm okay working my upper body once a week, but my lower body needs to be worked twice a week, so I'm working my own rotation to do just that. I'm not going to use the STS discs for that second leg workout each week because I think my body will respond better to a little more variety on the lower body (including more floorwork than the STS series offers from what I hear). But upper body, I'm planning on doing the series as planned (at least for a six month rotation).

I'll post here how it goes. I'm planning on starting a week from today. I've been working out with Cathe DVDs for over 10 years now, so I'm always curious whether she can still challenge me with each new series. But aside from a couple of workouts, she has always managed to do so, so right now I'm pretty excited about this!

cherapple

I've been doing Cathe at least that long, too! I bought her videos before she made DVDs, but I always did step and didn't start doing her strength workouts until almost two and a half years ago. I have my "comfortable range," too :bigsmile: which I couldn't seem to break out of with her concentration on endurance. I can endure a heavier weight if I don't have to lift it so many times! I am afraid of her doing that again with STS.

I haven't done any 1RM testing yet, but I did print the workout cards for the first week. I may take the workout cards to the gym and use the suggested exercises for ideas of new moves I can do there.