Welcome to PROGRAM NAME

Program Execution

Your program will have between 3-6 training sessions programmed per week.

Most of our sessions are designed to be under 1 hour in duration.

Although ideal, it’s not mandatory for you to do all of the sessions in a single week. For some athletes (older athletes or those that are training another discipline) 3-4 sessions per week will be more appropriate than 5-6 sessions.

The key idea is to follow the sessions in order. Remember that if you train at a lower frequency then the program will take longer to complete.

Assessments

Some programs will start and/or end with an assessment. It’s important to note that assessments are done at much higher intensities than training circuits.

If you are just getting back into training then be conservative with your initial assessment as you don’t want to injure yourself before you start your new program. If there is a end of program assessment your body is much more acclimated to the work and you’ll be able to push closer to your limits more safely.

Session Structure

Every session will start out with a warm-up which is to be done at an easy to moderate intensity. It’s important that you understand the difference between warming up and training. Runs should be slower, weights should be lighter. Don’t turn the warm up into a training circuit!

Although we often account for it, sometimes you’ll need additional warm up rounds or exercises. This may come in the form of 10 minutes of soft tissue work before the prescribed warm up or it can be additional sets of a heavy barbell movement before starting a training circuit. You are free to do any additional warm up you feel necessary to execute the training circuits as prescribed!

Each circuit is labeled by the type of attribute you are training. You will execute that circuit in its entirety before moving onto the next one. Sometimes you will see an “A” and a “B” circuit. When you see this it means that you will do “A” until completion then move onto “B.” It’s not a “choose one” type design.

Loading

We prescribe loading (weight) a few ways.

For newer athletes and programs that are more general in nature you will often see “DBD” which stands for “difficult but doable.” This type of loading allows you to choose a weight based on how you feel that day. It does not correlate to a specific % of 1 rep max. It simply means that we want you to use a load that allows for near-perfect technique yet that is still challenging. Oftentimes it takes a few rounds to figure out what this load is, especially on non-traditional exercises.

In our more advanced programs we will prescribe a % of 1RM or a range of percentages (65-80%). Do your best to stay within these ranges as they will most likely progress over time. If something feels off we suggest backing down a bit and making note of it.

For Work Capacity efforts we will often prescribe a set load for male / female athletes. It will look something like this: 35/25lbs. When we assign loading like this it means that unless you have an injury in that area of the body we want you to use that loading. These prescriptions are based off of working with thousands of athletes over the past 12 years. If for some reason you simply cannot do that load then scale down as needed.

Bodyweight exercises don’t have an external load. As such a pull up or jump lunge can be very different for a 150 lb person and a 275 lb person. Since we cannot simply remove bodyweight you’ll need to scale the movement to an easier variation or do fewer reps.

Pace

Pace, or intensity, is specific to our conditioning circuits.

For aerobic capacity your pace should be easy to moderate. Many people struggle with what this means and are accustomed to working much harder than our desired pace here. A good rule of thumb is that you should be able to breathe through your nose the entire time and hold a comfortable conversation.

For work capacity circuits your pace will be as hard a pace as you can sustain for the specific effort. Your output should be consistent round after round or minute after minute with a little to spare for the final portion of the effort.

Equipment

We do our best to design our programs with equipment that is common in most gyms. If you are training at home you may be missing certain things that a gym will normally have. This usually includes: sandbags, sleds, rowers, tires, ski ergs, and bikes.

To convert single modes we have a Single Mode Conversion Chart.

In regards to substituting specific exercises you can reference our Exercise Matrix

Final Notes

Purchasing the program is oftentimes the easiest step.

Your primary goal is to complete this program within a week or two of it’s intended duration.

We’ll check in with you in a few weeks to make sure you’re on track. 

If you have questions about any part of this program, contact me at Coach@atomic-athlete.com 

– Jake