The fitness industry is p*ssing me off

I've been lifting for a while, and I'm a pretty big advocate for HIIT as a supplement to my weight lifting. I believe that HIIT is the only way to really accentuate the explosive properties of each movement. Is the argument in this thread that HIIT is pointless or counterproductive? I don't mean to sound like an ass, but I'm one of the strongest p4p people I know, and I utilize HIIT training multiple times on a weekly basis. Phone Post 3.0

Not disagreeing with the general intent of what you're saying Doug, but the bit about tabata and it not being repeatable is incorrect. The actual tabata protocol is very repeatable. The study was done doing it daily! Where most people screw up is that they try to take something that was supposed to only happen for 4mins and do it for 60. That's not repeatable, but 4mins is.

The reason why it's repeatable? Do the math. It has a 10min warm up daily at 70% MHR and a further cool down, for sake of argument let's call that 5mins. On the 6th day you did 30min all at 70% MHR. In a given week you do 80min of 70% work and only 12min of max effort. (It looks like 4mins x 5 days, but it's only 2/3 of 4mins each day as it's 20:10 x 6-8), That's only 15% of the week being done at high intensity with the remaining 85% at relatively low intensity.

The tabata protocol is actually the greatest proof that most of your training should be moderate and low intensity than it is proof that high intensity training is the bees knees. But the only way to get those benefits is to do plenty of low intensity work to soak up the high intensity, and you do that by doing it daily.

vermonter -
Angle 5 - 
vermonter - 
Angle 5 - Sounds like an anti-Crossfit rant (not that I'm necessarily against that!).

I don't think Crossfit type training is good for much except for it's own sake. As Eel alluded to, it seems that crossfit might not even be the best training methodology for crossfit....

I believe this to be true.

I think Rich Froning and other competitors periodize their training with strength and power cycles, and when they get closer to the Games, they start practicing the skills and exercises that might typically be used during an event.

Even some boxes will have a general warmup, followed by some strength training (e.g., 5-3-1), and end with some iteration of a typical MetCon. I believe that many boxes don't even do HQ WODs and do structured programming.

But regarding "weekly volume" vs. "daily volume", can weekly volume be seen as some sort of "Grease-the-groove" technique?

For example, instead of doing 250 pullups in a day as part of a back workout, it'd be better to do 50 reps a day (M-F), with those 50 reps spread out throughout the day to minimize fatigue, have more practice where each technique is done with the best form possible, while maintaining the same volume in a given week.

RE: Weekly volume.

First of all, who the fuck does 250 pullups a workout??

That said I think you've got the general idea but it goes even beyond that.

Let's say that doing pullups with my bodyweight happens to be my 10 rep max. Most people with a body building mentality, and an approach that emphasizes the volume of a given set and the volume of a given workout will do a set of 10, then a set of 8, and then maybe two sets of 6. Each would be to failure. They'd be pretty toast after that. They'd be sore the next day too, most likely. They'd take a week to recover and hit another pullup workout then. That's a pretty typical scenario, and a pretty realistic one too.

With a different paradigm that focuses on weekly volume, you'd avoid failure in any given workout to reduce fatigue. Maybe you have time to grease the groove in a day, and maybe not. But let's say on Monday you hit 2 x 8 with a lengthy rest period. On Wednesday you had more time, hit your 2 x 8 and took it back to 1 x 6 for a third set. Same on Friday. Much like before, this scenario would be very realistic for the very same hypothetical person, but much less typical for some reason.

Now, with the same resistance, in scenario A the person has done 30 reps in that week, and in scenario B the same person did 60.

If this person's goal was to get larger, which workout better served that goal? If this person's goal was to get stronger, which workout better served that goal? If this person's goal was to get better at pullups, which workout better served this goal? If this person's goal was superior muscular endurance in the pulling muscles.......

This is not dissimilar from a pullup workout I did myself. I went from 4 pullups to 14, nonstop in two months. My bodyweight went up as well, ultimately ending at 240. I was stronger, bigger and had better local endurance. If I had done a pull up based workout from the set/daily paradigm instead, I would not have achieved anywhere near those results.
Damn long quote...

Am I over simplifying things or are you saying a full body workout 3x a week would be better than a split (hit body parts once a week).

ASSUMING intensity and reps are the same. Phone Post 3.0

HIIT works very well when you are using just the movements of your sport of choice. In other words, athletes should do HIIT using movements from their primary sport and not basic/general strength and conditioning movements.

 

 For example, for Bjj I suggest doing HIIT using shrimp, hip heist, and other movements commonly used in Bjj. I would also suggest using techniques, like the armbar from the guard or the armbar from the mount, where you can perform many reps in a short amount of time. This is the best use of HIIT for athletes.