Chad Wesley Smith

No rating as I haven't actually done the program; I read this for research.

The book presents a basic intermediate-level lifting program and advice for adapting it to fit a number of different goals. The core of the program is a periodization scheme that has you doing a variety of set/rep combos over the course of 4 different 4-week waves, going from medium-intensity/high-volume to high-intensity/medium-volume. The structure is reminiscent of Jim Wendler's 5/3/1, but with higher volume and somwhat less maximal weight work, over a 16-week meta-cycle instead of a repeated 4-week structure. I like the idea of regulating the weights you use based on your performance rather than adding weight each cycle until you have to reset, but I'm unsure how I'd work in practice. There's also a good bit of information of different types of conditioning. I don't think I'll be ditching 5/3/1 anytime soon, but there's some decent food for thought here.

The quality of the writing is unfortunately what you'd expect from a self-published ebook from a non-profressional writer. The ideas and material are there, but it's poorly organized and is rife with grammatical mistakes and typos. It's also fairly overpriced, especially given the lack of editorial care.… (altro)