Lenaburg Training Cycle

Brett Lenaburg is one of our coaching assistants as well as being an accomplished Junior Raw Powerlifter. He holds the national squat record in the NASA Jr. Raw 240 class. He also holds state records in the squat and bench in several weight classes. In this post and several to follow I will detail his training cycles as he prepares for his upcoming meet in November.

Brett began his preparation period with a 25 week macrocycle. The goal of this macrocycle was to set the National Jr. and Open/Pure Raw record for the Squat in the 220 weight class. In order to break up the training cycles we scheduled a mock meet half way in-between. The first 10 weeks emphasized a high volume of training in order to set a solid base for the second 12 weeks of training. During the first 10 weeks Brett performed 2,160 lifts >60%, using 32 variations of the competition lifts. The weekly volume was varied from 15% of the total mesocycle all the way up to 35%. The intensity was structured in such a way that 10% of his lifts were in the 50-60% range, 25% in the 60-70% range, 35% in the 70-80% range, 25% in the 80-90% range, and 5% in the 90+ range. The training cycle culminated with Brett setting PR's in all three lifts as well as his total.

The transition period between the two cycles lasted 2 weeks and was highlighted by a large reduction in loading. The goal during the transition period was to allow Brett's body to recover from the heavy loading, to make sure that his body weight remained close to 220 and that his general work capacity was elevated to prepare for the next cycle of specific work capacity development. Brett performed extended dynamic warmups, body weight circuits, light plyometrics, and 200m runs.

The next 12 week stage began with another cycle accumulating the training load. The goal of this cycle is to continue to raise Brett's work capacity and address specific weak-points while using variants of the competition lifts. The loading will be primarily in the 60-80% range with a high volume. The first two weeks came from an idea from Mark McLaughlin and Landon Evans at PTC. Brett performed glycolytic and oxidative squats and benches. During the glycolytic session Brett performed 4 sets to partial failure using a 70% load with 60 seconds rest between sets. The oxidative session was characterized by 4 sets of 30 seconds (time under tension) with 60 seconds rest between, using a 30-40% load. The glycolytic session was performed first with a 6 minute recovery prior to the oxidative session. Squats and benches were performed on separate days. The following videos show both a squat and bench session.