Designing a power/hypertrophy program

Posted on 2024-02-27

They say that good artists copy and great artists adopt an existing power/hypertrophy program.

I’ve been lifting consistently for about 5 years, mostly with powerlifing programs (Stronglifts, Ketogains, 5/3/1). I’m at a point where I’m pretty happy with my PRs (minus my bench) and feel like I’m not going to make a ton of progress without a.) gaining more weight that I’m comfortable with and b.) risking injury or constant soreness. So, I’m in the market for a new program – mostly focused on hypertrophy, but retaining most of my strength (even if my PRs won’t go up).

My criteria

What am I looking for in a program?

First, I’m looking to balance hypertrophy with strength. I like getting a pump, but also feel like I’m wasting my time if I’m not lifting close to my max occasionally.

Second, I’d like to lift 4-6 times a week. Any fewer and I feel restless and over-recovered. Only with very high volume programs like 5/3/1 Building the Monolith do I feel like I need the recovery that 3 sessions a week allows for.

Along with that, I’d like to keep my sessions to fewer than 100 minutes. Combined with my walk to the gym (about 30 minutes round-trip), ~2.25 hours is the maximum amount of time I’d like to spend on this hobby.

Third, I want to be able to bring my experience and preferences to adapt the program to my liking. After 5 years, I know what I like and what I don’t. I have a rough idea of what works for me and what’s a waste of time. For example, I know I like compound lifts and super sets; I know I dislike overcomplicated setups with bands.

My goals

I have a few points of my physique that I’d like to improve or at least train more consistently than I’ve been using other programs.

1. My back has always been a strong point in terms of recovery. I can pour volume into it and be ready to train again within a day or two. However, I want to improve back thickness. I’ll incorporate Meadows rows, supported rows, etc. to focus on isolating my lats and mid back.

2. Delts, delts, delts. I feel they’re essentially to building an aesthetic taper and I’ve noticed that most powerlifting programs neglect them since they’re not essential to the big three. I want to do more delt work than just barbell overhead pressing, especially focusing on side delts and rear delts

3. Legs. My legs have always been a strong point in terms of strength, but I’ve never felt that they’ve looked the part. Plan to incorporate more time-under-tension and volume into quads and hamstrings

4. Triceps. Like many lifters, I think I spent too much time early on focusing on biceps or neglecting arms altogether. High volume is key here, focusing on feeling the stretch and squeeze and avoiding using either shoulders/chest to cheat the movement

The program

With all that in mind, I’ve landed on an adaptation of PHAT (Power/Hypertrophy Adaptive Training) from Layne Norton. The rough breakdown of PHAT is that you lift 5 days per week – 2 of them power days (upper/lower) and 3 of them hypertrophy days (chest + arms/back + shoulders/legs).

It hits my goals of balancing strength and hypertrophy and is right in the middle of the frequency range that I’d like to stay within.

However, the prescribed (possibly recommended?) exercises are where I’ll deviate. Norton favors dumbbell bench presses over barbell bench presses for both power and hypertrophy and does not include any main exercises in the power days for deadlifting.

I briefly thought about upping the power days to three, one for shoulders + back and one for chest and back, but I worry about recovery with only one rest day. So, I’ll give my front delts a rest from overhead pressing and hope that incline bench + bench covers it.

Deadlifts are easy to incorporate by just adding to the lower power day and alternating between weeks as to which comes first in the day.

Breakdown

• Day 1: Upper Power
  • Main power movements
    • Bench Press, 3x3
    • Supported Row, 3x5
  • Secondary power movement
    • Incline Bench Press/Decline Bench Press, 3x3
    • Kroc Row, 3x10-15
  • Accessory movements
    • Weighted pullups, 3x6 superset with:
    • Weighted dips, 3x10
    • Heavy loaded bicep curl (hammer/dumbbell/EZ bar/straight bar), 3x6 superset with:
    • Skull crushers, 3x6
    • Lat pulldown, 3x8 superset with:
    • Side lateral raise, 3x10
    • Concentration curl, 3x5 superset with:
    • Overhead tricep extension, 3x6
    • Cable side lateral raise, 3x8 superset with:
    • Cable face pull, 3x15-20
• Day 2: Lower Power
  • Main power movements
    • Squat, 3x3
    • Deadlift, 3x3
  • Accessory movements
    • Leg press, 3x6
    • Glute ham raise, 2x8
    • Leg extensions, 3x10
    • Seated leg curls, 3x10
• Day 3: Back + Shoulder Hypertrophy
  • Meadows row, 3x10
  • Upright row, 3x12-15
  • Supported row, 3x10
  • Machine shoulder press, 3x10
  • Lat pulldown, 3x10 superset with:
  • Side lateral raise, 3x15-20, last set to failure - descending in weight
  • Seated cable row, 3x10 superset with:
  • Cable side lateral raise, 3x10
  • Reverse pec deck, 3x12
  • Reverse dumbbell fly, 3x10 superset with:
  • Dumbbell shrugs, 3x25
• Day 4: Leg Hypertrophy
  • Barbell squat/barbell pause squat, 3x8
  • Romanian deadlift, 3x8-12
  • Leg press, 3x10 with a slow (>3 sec) eccentric
  • Seated leg curl, 3x10 with a pause and slow eccentric
  • Hack squat, 3x10
  • Laying leg curl, 3x15 with a slow eccentric
  • Leg extension, 3x10 with a slow eccentric
• Day 5: Chest + Arm Hypertrophy
  • Dumbbell bench press, 3x8
  • Dumbbell incline press, 3x10 with a pause at the bottom
  • Machine chest press, 3x10 superset with:
  • Pullups, 3x8
  • Single arm supinated pulldown (thanks John Meadows), 3x8-12 superset with:
  • Side lateral raises, 3x15
  • Pec deck, 3x10 superset with:
  • Reverse pec deck, 3x12
  • Preacher curls, 3x10 superset with:
  • Seated overhead tricep extension, 3x15
  • Incline seated bicep curls, 3x10 superset with:
  • Incline Tate press, 3x12
  • Tricep pushdown, 3x15 giantset with:
  • Cable side lateral raise, 3x10 and:
  • Face pulls, 3x15-20 and:
  • Plate shrugs, 3x25

Massive amount of text, but big things are:

• Decent amount of accessory exercises, usually done in superset
• Incorporating pauses and slow eccentrics on hypertrophy days
• Training side and rear delts three times a week
• Eliminating barbell rows from back training (I find I use my legs too much and my lower back doesn’t like it)
• Highly reducing front delt training, relying on bench/incline bench