Strength Training – 9-Week Deadlift Specialization

About the plan

9-week strength training plan that concentrates effort on the deadlift while the rest of the body gets maintenance. There are two deadlift days a week with opposite purposes: Monday is the heavy day, with sets of two to five reps rising from 75% to 91% of your max, and Thursday is the speed day, with many short sets around 70% pulled as fast as possible and the bar coming to rest on the floor on every rep. The rack pull above the knee comes in on Thursday to load above your max in the top part of the movement. Tuesday is upper-body maintenance and Friday is light squats and core. Weeks 1 to 3 form the base block, week 4 is a deload, weeks 5 to 7 are intensification, week 8 is a deload and week 9 is the test. The deadlift is the exercise that taxes the nervous system and lower back the most, which is why the plan has two deload weeks in nine — cutting those weeks is the most common mistake of people who run a cycle like this. It requires a known max and solid technique.