I was calculating the progression of the workouts in your excel file and was a little confused – but I have to admit I am new to this. I thought the idea behind periodization was to slowly increase the intensity while decreasing volume. It appears that over the 12 week program half way through I am doing the same total volume on a given exercise as in the 2nd or 3rd week (meaning 10 reps x 10lbs = 100 lbs of volume).

Can you explain how the percentages and reps were calculated? Or how I might modify this program?

Thanks

So say I want to set up a six week mesocycle and improve my squat, deadlift, bench and OHP. I was thinking that a 1.5% increase per week would be a good starting point since I’d classify myself as a beginner or intermediate lifter and should still be able to reap some nice newbie gains. Does that sound realistic?

(To give an idea of where I’m at, I squat 165, deadlift 220, bench 105 and overhead press 82.5 – like I said, upper body pressing exercises are not my friends).