How training block length changes weekly loads

The top and the bottom do not move

Whatever length you pick, a block built from one working set starts and finishes in the same places. The first week sits at 95% of the set the client actually did. The heaviest week reaches 105%. The last week is the lighter one, at 85% with one set fewer.

The reps stay as you wrote them, and so do the sets until that lighter week. Only the bar moves. In percentages, the length changes one thing: how many steps the climb from 95% to 105% takes.

The same set, four ways

Take a client who squatted 100 kg for 4 sets of 5. Every week is 4 sets of 5 except the lighter week, which is 3 sets of 5. Here is each length, rounded to the nearest 2.5 kg the way CoachBlocks rounds:

• 3 weeks: 95, 105, 85 kg
• 4 weeks: 95, 100, 105, 85 kg
• 5 weeks: 95, 97.5, 102.5, 105, 85 kg
• 6 weeks: 95, 97.5, 100, 102.5, 105, 85 kg

What a short block does

Three weeks gives the climb a single step. On this lift the client goes from 95 kg to 105 kg in one week, and no week is set at 100% of the set they did.

The lighter week also comes round more often. In a three week block it is one week in every three.

What longer blocks do

Six weeks splits the same climb into four steps of 2.5%. On a 100 kg lift that is 2.5 kg a week, and week 3 lands exactly on the 100 kg they lifted. The lighter week comes round once every six weeks.

Five weeks splits it into three steps of about 3.3%. On this lift those fall between 2.5 kg steps, so rounding turns 98.3 and 101.7 into 97.5 and 102.5 kg, and the jumps the client sees are 2.5, 5 and 2.5 kg. As with three weeks, no week is set at 100%.

Length also changes when the next block is due

Block length decides how often each client's program returns for review. Across a roster, shorter blocks bring that work back sooner, while longer blocks spread the reviews farther apart.

That is an admin trade, not a reason to choose a length for the client. A spreadsheet and CoachBlocks both leave that programming decision with the coach.

Choosing a length

None of this tells you which length is right for a client. That is your decision, and it can differ from one client to the next.

In CoachBlocks you pick three to six weeks when you draft a block, and it starts at four. Every weekly load it prepares is still yours to change. The free program builder on this site always shows four weeks.