“Absorb what is useful, Discard what is not, Add what is uniquely your own” – Bruce Lee
Brett Contreras recently wrote a T-Nation article on the frequency and nature of training at John Broz’s gym Average Broz’s Gymnasium. Average Broz’s is a gym that is set up specifically for olympic lifting (although I understand that he has recently added in powerlifters to his group). I guess the controversial part of this article is the frequency of training that his athletes perform. They train 13 times per week. Yes, you read that right 13 TIMES PER WEEK! They perform daily max’s on squat, front squat, snatch, and clean and jerk. Again, you heard that right – THEY PERFORM DAILY MAXES!
Here’s a few oberservations I took from the article:
- They don’t do any assistance work. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. Not at all. I’m just saying that while the volume is very high on the main lifts, there is zero volume done on assistance lifts. This would help tremendously with recovery time.
- While I don’t know the work schedules of his athletes, one could assume that the ones preparing for the olympics don’t have jobs. Their job is to prepare for London 2012. This means they aren’t working in a warehouse 12 other hours per day. I’m guessing all they do is lift, eat, and sleep.
- If he has their training down to that much of a science (and he does), he probably has their recovery down to a science as well. This means they probably don’t eat like crap and go out boozing it up every weekend like your average gym rat.
- John lifts AND competes. Most of the people who read this article and left negative comments probably don’t have the guts to sign up for a competition and do it. John walks the walk and it’s hard to argue with that. It’s not like he’s some coach who expects his athletes to do one thing, when he doesn’t do it himself. He does.
- Notice the program calls for “daily” maxes. It’s not like you’re attempting a new 1rm every day. There’s a bit of autoregulation it seems.
- His athletes only deadlift 2 – 4 times a month. The volume they have on the clean and jerk is also significantly lower. This is huge, as cleans and deads take way more time to recover from than squats and snatches.
His results speak for themselves:
Jim Wendler also had a response here. My response to the article was about the same. I’ll take the information that applies to me out of it. That’s it.
In the end, I think the people who would not do well on this type of program have way too much stress in their life. Remember that exercise is a stress as well – along with work demands, family, poor diet, and poor sleep habits. The athletes that Broz trains have managed to get rid of (or at least keep at bay) all those other stressors. At least the successful ones that is…
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