If you want to improve how much you’re going to lift, that’s great, do it. Be a powerlifter. That’s a terrific sport, go for it. But is it for an athlete? For an athlete what are we looking for? Improvement in skill execution.

Dr. Michael Yessis joined us for his second presentation at The Seminar in 2013 to discuss his 1×20 method of training. Doc starts out by discussing with us many popular program models that coaches use in order to develop general strength with their athletes. He asks the question as to which of those programs to develop strength and comes to the conclusion that his method is most successful in developing younger athletes, and athletes with a lesser training age. This leads Doc into a discussion as to what our goals, in his mind, should be in our preparation of athletes. He also dives into what separates the 1×20 from other “high intensity” programs and what makes it more effective with low level athletes. This breakdown includes the multiple (10) reasons why he has seen the 1×20 to provide a great stimulus and adaptation in relation to other programming methods.

After he has gone through these 10 reasons he dives into the program itself. This includes a list of the 23 exercises that he typically prescribes. This number may seem high, but when you follow his thought process you can see where even more could be added.

I have personally had great success implanting this method with our athlete’s in their GPP phases of development and couldn’t recommend it enough.