Max-Effort Upper Body
"Not much about the max-effort movement has changed since my original article was published. I still prefer a 3-5 rep max (RM) - as opposed to a 1RM - for my skinny bastards. The one thing that has changed – you’ll notice this later on in this article - is the second movement on max-effort upper body day. We recently started having our athletes perform two high-rep sets of an exercise immediately following the max-effort movement.
This high-rep movement is usually an exercise that’s closely related to the max-effort movement. For example, if our athletes performed a 3RM in the bench press, their second exercise may be two sets of dumbbell benches. We don’t do this all the time, but it’s a new “twist” in our templates that wasn’t covered in previous articles."
- Joe Defranco
A.) Max-Effort Exercise – work up to a max set of 3-5 reps in one of the following exercises:
- Thick bar or regular barbell bench press
- Barbell floor press
- Rack lockouts / Suspended chain lockouts
- Incline barbell bench press (regular grip or close grip)
- Close-grip bench press (index finger on smooth part of bar)
- Weighted chin-ups
- Board presses or foam presses
- Chain bench press (*recommended for not-so-skinny bastards)
- Band bench press (*recommended for not-so-skinny bastards)
- Reverse band bench press (*recommended for not-so-skinny bastards)
B.) Supplemental Exercise – perform 2 sets of max reps in one of the following exercises.
(Choose a weight you can perform for 15-20 reps on the 1st set. Use the same weight for both sets and rest 3-4 minutes between sets).
- Flat DB bench press (palms in or out)
- Incline DB bench press (palms in or out)
- DB floor press (palms in)
- Barbell push-ups (wearing weighted vest)
- Blast strap push-ups (wearing weighted vest)
- “Criss-cross” chain push-ups
- “Triceps death”
- Chin-ups (don’t perform these if you chose to do weighted chin-ups for your first exercise)
C.) Horizontal pulling / Rear delt superset - Superset one exercise from “Group 1” with one exercise from “Group 2.” Perform 3-4 supersets of 8-12 reps of each exercise.
Group 1
- DB rows
- Barbell rows
- Seated cable rows (various bars)
- T-bar rows
- Chest supported rows
Group 2
- Rear delt flyes
- Scarecrows
- Face pulls
- Seated DB “power cleans”
- Band pull-aparts
D.) Traps – Perform 3 – 4 sets of 8-15 reps of one of the following exercises:
- DB shrugs
- Barbell shrugs
- Safety squat bar shrugs
- Behind the back barbell shrugs
E.) Elbow flexor exercise - Perform 3-4 sets of 8-15 reps of one of the following exercises:
- Barbell curls (regular or thick bar)
- DB curls (standing)
- Seated Incline DB curls
- Hammer curls
- Zottmann curls
- Iso-hold DB curls
Here's what we did:
A.) Thick Bar Bench Press (Fat Gripz)
- Work up to 5RM
B.) Incline DB Bench Press (2 x max)
C1.) Seated Row 4 x 12
C2.) TRX Scarecrow 4 x 12
D.) DB Shrugs 3 x 10
D1.) Barbell Curls 3 x 10
D2.) Rope Tricep Push-Down 3 x 15
