As explained in the first little article, Powerbuilding is more of an umbrella-term for blending methods of the strength sports Powerlifting and Bodybuilding. I have showed a sample training plan where those two methods/philosophies are combined in the same session, but there are various other ways to combine the methods depending on one’s personal preference and goals: As often, many paths lead to Rome. In this short follow up I want to show you two other ways to combine the methods:

1) Session to Session

You don’t have to combine different methodologies in the same training session: Similar to the good old doing cardio and strength training on different days, one can also decide to separate the more BB style work and the PL style work to different days in the week. This leaves you with one day where you focus on intensity and one on volume. This combination will most probably produce different sensations at different training days so it could be more or less suitable for ones existing life scedule. For the sake of comparison with the first example we keep a 4 day upper lower split: A session to session combination could look like this:

 

2) Training Blocks

Another possibility is to dedicate different phases to different training styles and goals: While with “same session” and “session to session” combination it is possible to do weekly rinse and repeat, using training blocks needs a bit more long-term planning when to prioritize which qualities: We enter the big world of training periodization where it gets really fun for us coaches. To keep it simple in our example: This would mean that we do two different training blocks: One is BB style and one PL style, and we change every 4 weeks. This could look like this:

Keep in mind that all shown examples are extremely simplified just to make a point: I don’t think that it is possible to strictly separate into “this is Bodybuilding” and “this is Powerlifting” as our body is a wonderfully complex system and both styles address many factors at the same time: Knowing about different training styles may add tools into your lifters or coachs toolbox, so that you can decide what makes most sense at a specific moment for a specific person: I strongly believe that in reality many successful programs/systems and athletes use a combination of many different tools at different moments. Keep exploring what works for you and your athletes and always be ready to tweak and adapt your thinking.

Have a good 2021 everyone!

Alex