Table of contents I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII.

Quick intro & prerequisites Avoiding/minimizing calluses Program overview Dynamic warm-up The 3 week program Options for progression Helpful details & information

I.

Quick intro & prerequisites

So, youve downloaded this and want to give it a quick look over. Cool. Its nothing fancy or extravagant. Its a very simple straightforward beginner program and created as such for several reasons. The main points it deals with is bringing up weak aspects and setting up strength/movement patterns for more complex exercises in the future. Hence, its only 3 weeks long. There are only 3 things you need before starting the program, which are: 1) Access to a gym that has dumbbells of various weights, an Olympic-sized barbell with plates to go along with it, and cable machines (lat-pulldown, seated cable row, free weight cable stack w/ interchangeable attachments). The Olympic bar is standard in most gyms and is 7 feet long. The other items are commonly found too. 3) Some way to track your progress in the gym after each session. How much weight, reps you completed, good workout or bad, problems you felt, or anything else relevant to making the next workout better. A notebook or Excel spreadsheet can be easy enough to fill out. 2) Flat shoes. The cheapest option is low top Converse ($40ish). If you have all the above items at home, then by all means go barefoot. If you want something more stylish, the Puma Future Cats work too, albeit more expensive (80s price range). There are other shoes out there, and if anyone wants to know about them, feel free to ask. Im making shoes a prerequisite because of the huge change in performance I felt from switching out of running shoes into flat shoes. I use the Asics Tiger Tai Chis in the gym and lift barefoot at home. My deadlift form literally fixed itself just by a change of shoes.

II.

Avoiding/minimizing calluses

Women dont want rough nasty hands. This coincides with proper gripping of the bar. After I learned this, via Mehdi on stronglifts.com, I noticed my thick calluses reducing greatly by how I positioned my hands. Here are 2 pictures to help explain how to grip the bar during certain exercises.

First, yes, that is my hand. Now optimal position on the, Left Where to grab the bar in exercises which involve pulling the weight towards the body. Right Where to grab the bar, possibly lower, in exercises which involve pushing/pressing the weight away from the body. Hand direction is shown when force is being exerted upon the bar. This is during the concentric portion of the lift. During this part, the bar will be going against the movement of your hand (shown by the 2 arrows coming out of the bar). If youre doing a pushing exercise, such as the bench press, but improperly grab the bar high in your hand, as seen on the left, the bar will move down while you perform the exercise. Gravity works like that. As a result, skin will get rubbed and folded upon itself while the bar slides down. It not only forms calluses, but is inconvenient and irritable while you perform a set. In the program below, pulls will be in blue and pushes/presses in red for conveniences sake.

III.

Program overview

Its 2 full-body workouts a week, for 3 weeks. Each session begins with a quick dynamic warm-up. A workout should take a maximum of 1 hour and not a minute longer. Ive made it short and simple, and keeping in mind that whoever tries it wont get bored and feel that its dragging out. Its a beginner program, hence only 2 sessions per week. There will be 3 ways to approach progress, and youll be able to choose which you want to utilize. The main focus is to develop base strength. If a person follows the program for the full 3 weeks, Ill make a new one as a follow-up. Exercise video demonstrations to view will be hyperlinked in the main post. Before diving into the program, lets do a quick overview of the details. BB stands for barbell and DB stands for dumbbell. Repetitions mean how many times you perform the movement. A set consists of repetitions. 1 x 6 means one set of six repetitions and 7 x 5 means seven sets of five repetitions. 2a & 2b means you alternate between the two exercises. If you see, 2a) pull-ups 2b) push-ups You would perform your first set of pull-ups, rest, do your first set of push-ups, rest, then go back to your next set of pull-ups, and alternate between the two until the designated sets are completed. Guys in the gym really push themselves near their ending sets to get that last repetition. You wont be doing that. I want you to choose a weight for each exercise that youre comfortable with and you know near the end of a set that you can still do 1 or 2 more reps. That doesnt mean its a free pass to go light and easy. Intensity is key here. You must time your rest.

Thats about it for the basics, but Ill mention more cues to keep in mind in the final section.

IV.

Dynamic warm-up & warming up for an exercise.

Perform before every lifting session. DO NOT SKIP IT. 1) Standing hip flexor/quadriceps stretch 1 x 5 per each side, 10 total 2) Side-lying leg raise 1 x 6 per each side, 12 total 3) Glute bridge 1x6 4) Wall slides 1x8 5) Pec stretch 1 x 5 per each side, 10 total; hold each stretch during a rep for 1 second 6) Standing split squats with hands overhead [reach for the sky] 1 x 5 each side, 10 total To prepare for a specific exercise, use the following method. 1st pre-work set: 1 x 6 at 50% of the weight youll be working with 2nd pre-work set: 1 x 4 at 70% of the weight youll be working with 3rd pre-work set: 1 x 1-2 at 90% of the weight youll be working with

Rest between your 3rd pre-work set and your 1st work set. Heres an example of what it would look like in practice. If I were to perform sets of squats with 200 lbs, My 1st pre-work set would be 6 repetitions of 100 lbs. 2nd would be 4 reps of 140 lbs. 3rd Id do 1 or 2 reps at 180 lbs. I rest 90 seconds, then begin my first work set with 200 lbs.

Skipping pre-work/warm-up sets is asking to make the workout a struggle. Dont skip them.

V.

The 3 week program

Day 1 1) Pull-throughs or conventional BB deadlifts* 2a) Underhand seated cable rows [shoulder-width grip or narrower] 2b) DB flat bench press 3) Plank** 4) OPTIONAL: Use 5 minutes to work on anything not included in the program. Only rule is avoid machines. *If doing deadlifts with less than 135 lbs, put the bar on the safeties in a squat at 1st pin hole from the bottom. **Sets will be time-based rather than performing reps. Day 2 1) DB goblet squat 2a) Overhand lat-pulldown [shoulder-width grip or wider] 2b) Standing DB overhead press 3) DB single-side farmers walks*** 4) OPTIONAL: Use 5 minutes to work on anything not included in the program. Only rule is avoid machines. ***Go for distance. Depends on where you exercise. Increase distance if following option 1 progression. Reps & Sets Week 1: 3 x 6 Week 2: See next section. Week 3: See next section. Week 4: Rest. Rest + Rest between sets: 1 minute & 30 seconds Rest between 2a & 2b: 1 minute
+

Subject to change according to progression choice, see next section.

VI.

Options for progression

Choose 1 of the 3, and that will be your method of progressing each week. Options 1, rep progression: Adding 1 rep to all your exercise work sets each week. Example: Week 1: 3 x 6 Week 3: 3 x 8 Week 2: 3 x 7 Week 4: Rest Options 2, set progression: Adding 1 work set to all your exercise work sets each week. Example: Week 1: 3 x 6 Week 3: 5 x 6 Week 2: 4 x 6 Week 4: Rest Options 3, time progression: Subtracting time from your rest periods between exercises each week. Example: Week 1: 1m30s & 1m between 2a-2b Week 3: 1m & 40s between 2a&2b Week 2: 1m15s & 50s between 2a-2b Week 4: Rest For planks, in week 1 youll do 3 sets of anywhere from 15-30 seconds. If you choose option 1, youll increase your time 5 seconds each week. Options 2 & 3 will follow the same rules.

Helpful details, cues, & information Here are some body cues to make use of to get the movements down better. 1) For almost all these exercises, you want to actively pull your shoulder blades down and back when performing sets. 2) Stand/sit tall and upright. Think about sticking your chest out instead of having a forwardrounded posture lean. 3) Keep your chin tucked in throughout an exercise. Wherever your chest is pointing, thats where your head/face should be facing as well. 4) Every time your knees are locked out, squeeze your glutes hard. 5) Dont think about doing upper-body pulls and presses through the arms, but instead thinking about pulling & pressing through the elbows. 6) Each rep of a cable seated row, your arm shouldnt go excessively beyond your torso. 7) Keep your body tight. A relaxed body will make it harder to perform the exercise. 8) Along with keeping your body tight, grab the bar or DB hard and squeeze throughout the movement. 9) The speed of reps shouldnt be done deliberately slow. Simply focus on pushing & pulling hard. 10) For squats, DB bench press, and deadlifts/pull-throughs push off through the middle/heels of your feet rather than your toes. 11) During squats, initiate each rep by pushing your hips back. Use your hips to lead and think of it as a sitting back motion. Go as low as possible without letting your lower back round out. Push back up through your feet after the midpoint, actively pushing your legs out to the side, and finish by locking out your hips & squeezing your glutes. 12) During the middle portion of each movement (i.e., bottom of a squat), do not pause. Just keep moving through the rep at a normal pace just like the rest of the movement. Thats all I got. Questions, comments, or anything else? Feel free to ask in the post or email me at nielkpatel425@gmail.com. If someone does follow the program, please do tell me how it goes and what you think of it. Ill be more than happy to give someone who wants to give it a shot more assistance/help/info.