Variations on Escalating Density Training

If you have been in the weight lifting circle for any number of years then you will have heard about Coach Charles Staley. Staley rose to fame writing for the popular Muscle Media 2000 magazine. MM 2000 was a popular, cutting edge bodybuilding publication during the 90's that was known for its gritty articles highlighting how to weight train, eat and chemically supplement. The magazine highlighted many notable strength training guru's like Charles Poliquin, Paul Chek, Dan Duchaine and of course Coach Staley.
 

Coach Staley cemented himself in strength training fame when he colloborated with MM's owner Bill Phillips in creating the weight training program used in the infamous Body-for-Life program. Though popular with the mainstream market, Body-for-life program recieved luke warm reception from the hardcore segment of exercise enthuasists.

Looking back at the actual structure if the program, one cant help but notice its simplcity, the sets, reps and exercises were all laid out for you in a straight forward manner that guraneenteed success if followed. A few years later Staley followed up with another well structured program which if used properly led to amazing transformations. This program was titled Escalating Density Training, or EDT for short.

The concept behind EDT was simple, you would choose two exercises and perform as many reps as possible in the alloted period of time( PR zones ) alternating back and forth between the movements. Once that was done you would move on to two more movements, using the same principles. The success behind the program, dependant on your ability to increase the volume (total number of reps done) each time you repeated the workout. EDT was great because it allowed for multiple variations and forced you to perform more work.

A typical EDT workout would look like this:

     Movement                         Sets                           Reps                               Rest                   Time (PR zone)               

A1           Dumbbells squat               3                       AMAP                      45 secs                15 mins

A2            Dumbells military press    3                      AMAP                       45 secs                15 mins

B1           Dumbbells split squat        3                      AMAP                       45 secs                15 mins

B2           Dumbbells bent row          3                      AMAP                       45 secs                 15 mins

 

The beauty of this system is that by changing one variable  the outcome can be greatly changed, for example if The rest is increased to 2 mins the workout changes from a muscular endurance program to a muscular hypertrophy program.The possibilites with EDT are truely endless. Some of my favourite variations are:

Including more movements per pairing eg:

  Movement                                     Sets                           Reps                               Rest                   Time (PR zone)               

A1           Dumbbells dead lift               3                       AMAP                      45 secs                15 mins

A2          Dumbells bench press           3                      AMAP                       45 secs                15 mins

A3          Dumbbells lunge                    3                      AMAP                       45 secs                15 mins

A4         3 point row                              3                      AMAP                       45 secs                 15 mins

 

Decreasing the time for PR zones

  Movement                                     Sets                           Reps                               Rest                   Time (PR zone)               

A1           Dumbbells thruster               3                       AMAP                       45 secs                     10 mins

A2           Inverse row                          3                        AMAP                       45 secs                     10 mins

B1           Dumbbells swing                 3                        AMAP                        45 secs                     10 mins

B2           Bench Dip                            3                       AMAP                       45 secs                       10 mins

 

Switching the PR zone for actual timed sets

  Movement                                 Sets                           Reps                               Rest                   Timed set 

A1           Front squat                    4                             AMAP                             45 secs                 60s/60s/60s/60s

A2           Bent barbell row            4                             AMAP                              45 secs                60s/60s/60s/60s

B1           SHELC                          4                             AMAP                              45 secs                60s/60s/60s/60s

B2           Push-up                        4                              AMAP                              45 secs                60s/60s/60s/60s

 

Increasing the time of each timed set

 

  Movement                                            Sets                           Reps                               Rest                   Timed set 

A1          Bulgarian split squat                    3                            AMAP                             45 secs                 30s/45s/60s

A2          Chin-up                                        3                            AMAP                             45 secs                 30s/45s/60s

B1          Snatch grip Deadlift                     3                            AMAP                              45 secs                30s/45s/60s

B2          Shoulder press                            3                             AMAP                              45 secs               30s/45s/60s

 

By incorporating these variations you will have a million combinations at your disposal. Give some of these workouts a try, and prepare for new levels of strength, musularity