S1:E8 - Stephane Cazeault - The Science and Art of Program Design

This is the show where we let you inside the doors of a world-renowned personal training studio. Welcome to the Enterprise Fitness Podcast. I'm Mark Ottobre, owner and founder, here to introduce the show with Enterprise Master Trainer Reece Adams and today's guest, Stéphane Cazilte. Stéphane Cazilte is the founder of KILO. At age 14, Stéphane knew he wanted to be a strength coach. He has spent the last 24 years perfecting his work. He has a strong formal academic foundation, earning a bachelor's degree in exercise science from the University of Montreal. During this time, he has worked with mentors to learn the practical skills necessary to enable athletes to achieve physical superiority. In his career, Stéphane has personally trained professional athletes in football, baseball, and hockey. He's worked with athletes from pro teams from the NFL, the MLB, and the NHL. These teams include the New England Patriots, the St. Louis Rams, the St. Louis Cardinals, the Cardinal Flames, and the Washington Capitals. Prior to starting Kilo, Stephan was the director of strength and conditioning for the Poliquin Group from 2012 to 2015. 2016, and the High Performance Director at the Central Institute of Human Performance from 2005 to 2012. Stephan's passion is program design, and this is certainly something you can listen to on this podcast with Rhys. His program design is carefully structured with every possible component taken into consideration to ensure the trainee reaches and exceeds their goal, making his work a combination of both science and arts. If you want more on Stefan, check out kilostrengthsociety.com or go to his Facebook page and look it up at Kilo Strength Society. Hope you guys enjoy this podcast and I'll see you on the other side.

So welcome to the show, Stefan, and thanks for, uh, taking the time out today.

Thank you. Thanks for having me on your podcast.

Oh, it's a pleasure. For our listeners, can you please explain how you got into coaching?

Uh, yeah, I mean, um, basically, like, if you don't mind me starting from the beginning.

No, of course not.

Um, so when I was 8 and 9 years old, I moved from a small town in Quebec to Burkina Faso, which is in Western Africa, and I lived there for almost 2 years. And, uh, you know, like, food, food was kind of Scars there. So when we got back to Canada, I was 10 years old, almost 10 years old. And, you know, for lack of education and stuff with my parents, like, I just started going crazy with eating ice cream and fruit juices and all that stuff. And in a matter of a year or two, I went from a skinny kid, which I've always have been, to a kind of a chubby kid by the time I was 11. So at just 11 years of age, I was becoming pretty self-conscious about, you know, that weight that I gained. So that's when I, I started looking at, you know, Schwarzenegger, like everybody in bodybuilding and all that stuff. And I started weight training at 11. And, you know, so like the first couple of years it was a big bodybuilding influence. Then I started playing American football high school and college. It was a running back. During that time, the training kind of switched to football specific, but always kind of had that love for bodybuilding at the same time. So, you know, as I got older and my body changed, and like, it was very clear to me that I wanted to be a strength and conditioning coach. And growing up in Canada, Outside of hockey, I mean, there's not much going on in terms of high-level professional sports, and my favorite sport has always been American football. So, man, so my dream was I want to train NFL players someday. So, uh, you know, I started like reading, training. I went to university in exercise science, got my bachelor's degree, did continuing education with Charlie Francis, Eric Serrano, John Berardi, Charles Poliquin, bunch of people. And, you know, it just evolved this way. So, you know, I did my first, my first consult with Charles in 2001, did their first BioSignature ever, which was in Chicago in 2002. I did my PICP Level 1 and 2 in 2004. And, you know, so I mean, from then on I was hired in St. Louis as the director of high performance for this like high performance center there, and that's when I started training professional athletes. So it kind of evolved from there.

Yeah, so was that with Polycom Group, the high performance center that you're talking about?

Um, no, it was, uh, well I mean, it, it was a chiropractor from St. Louis that knew Charles. He met Charles in medical conferences, and I knew that, like, I'm not super sure about the details, but I knew that they were talking of maybe working together. And at the time, I did my PICP Level 1 and 2 with, uh, in Montreal with Nelson Ayotte, which at the time was kind of like the second in command of Charles at his Performance Center in Arizona. And like Nelson was going to be the one leading the, that center in, in St. Louis. And so we— so Nelson is the one who hired me to come and work in St. Louis. But somehow the deal with Charles fell through. I'm not sure about the details. So it was a separate— even though there was this big connection through Nelson, it was a kind of a separate completely separate business. So that started in 2005. So we started, we had, there was a lot of hockey players from the St. Louis Blues, but you know, like athletes talk, and so it just evolved to America, to the NFL, which evolved with Major League Baseball and all that stuff.

Yeah. So who would be the main clientele that you you coach now?

So right now, right now I'm just doing online training. 90% of my online training clients are PICP coaches, which is very good for me because, you know, like, it's what I really like doing is teaching. So a lot of them, they, they hired me for— they hire me for training, but they also use the opportunity as continuing education, which I really like doing. But as far as one-on-one goes, it's still mostly professional athletes at the moment.

Yeah, if you don't mind me asking, how did you go from the Polican Group to— you're now running your own company, is that correct? Kilo Strength Society?

Yeah, well, the name of the company exactly is Kilo, but then like within Kilo we have what we call the Kilo Strength Society, which what I wanted to create is with the members, so anybody that's a client either live or online, they're part of that community revolving around strength, hence the name Kilo Strength Society. But how I came about it, I mean, so I had been with Pollock Group for 4 years now, and, you know, like the last year I kind of, I was eager to just like start doing my own thing and going on my own, and I just thought it was time. I'm 38 years old right now, and I just wanted to, to see what what was out there. So, um, basically like in December I went on a vacation in the Dominican Republic, and one morning I woke up with the, the Kilo name, the whole concept, and I'm like, man, I think I just, I'm just gonna do it. So early January I went to the owner, Carolyn Jones, and I just said, you know, I left in good terms. I just explained to her that, you know, it was just time for me to move on, and everything was good from then on.

Awesome. So with you, I've been following a lot of your posts and I've noticed that in terms of periodization, you're probably like, I'd say, definitely one of the go-to guys, if not the best from what I've seen. What would be the first thing you personally would assess before writing a program for a client, like structural balance-wise or questions you might ask?

Yeah, I mean, I really like Structural Balance for sure. I use it especially when, even more so when I train people one-on-one because I'm, I'm the one giving the assessment. But for online clients, since I have a lot of PICP people, it's either they provide me with their own results, but to be honest, because they have so much knowledge themselves I kind of go with where they are, what they're telling me. So, you know, if one of them has been training for 10 years and he's telling me that his rotator cuff is lagging and blah, blah, blah, I just, I use this information to guide the, the programming. And then I always assess as we're going on, which is the advantage of the, the software platform I use, is I can, I can always, like every month or so, at least after every cycle, I go back and verify the weight progression and the tonnage and all that kind of stuff to make sure that the client is progressing and he's on track.

Yeah.

So yeah, so I, it's mostly questionnaire, you know, and you know, I mean, it's, as you know, like, as I'm sure you know, like nobody is too strong in the rotator cuffs and trap 3. So, you know, like as a general guideline, the first 12-week cycle, I will always tend to prescribe more of those remedial exercises, but then I tend to get away from them a little bit more.

Yeah, when you say more, uh, could you be a bit more specific on that?

Yes, for sure. So depending on the training split of the client, so if he has, let's say, 2 upper body days, or even if it's split with chest and back and one day it's arms and shoulder, I will do remedial work with every upper body workout. So we're talking about twice a week usually. Or twice every 5 days depending on the split, but, and anywhere from 3 to 5 sets per workout. I rarely go beyond that. So, you know, so with the arm and shoulder workout, I will start the workout with rotator cuff trap 3 or Powell raise or bent over lateral raise, something like that. Or with upper body, I tend to stack it towards the end of the workout.

Yeah, yeah, so as not to, I guess, fatigue those stabilizing muscles before they get stuck into some heavy loading.

Exactly. I mean, if the person— like, if I know that the person is fairly weak and he hasn't trained in a while, the first Structural Balance phase, I will put it first because doing that remedial work tends to increase activation and stability of the shoulder joint. Before they do the prime movers, but generally speaking with my clientele, I stack it towards the end, except the arm workout.

That's a good point. When you do that, obviously you'd have less sets so as not to fatigue when you do, say, put it first. Would that be correct?

Yeah, I mean, yeah, you're— I mean, like I said, it's never much more than 3, 4, maybe sometimes 5, and by the time I I prescribe 5 sets. I mean, we're towards the last intensification phase because I will also use undulating periodization with rotator cuff. So I might do the first accumulation, 15 reps, then intensification 1, 10 reps, then 12 reps, then 8 reps. So by the time he gets to 8 reps, I might do 5 sets, and at that time their conditioning for these remedial muscles is good enough for them to be able to cope with that time to kind volume pretty easily.

Yeah, awesome. So whilst the reps are high, the sets tend to be low, and then as the reps come down, you bring the sets up.

Exactly.

Awesome. Um, in terms of structuring your programs, I know you're a big fan of accumulation and intensification phases.

Yeah.

For you, how long do these phases tend to be? Do you, um, or like, what kind of decisions do you take into consideration when setting a set period of time for each of these?

Yeah, I mean, it's, it's hard, these type of questions, because I don't have like a set recipe that I use all the time. It really depends on who I'm working with, but I will say that generally speaking, the more beginner the client is, I would use 4-week phases. So like a 4-week accumulation, 4-week intensification. As they get more advanced, it's usually 3 weeks. 3 weeks tends to work well with most, but then I have Like a lot of bodybuilders sometimes, to be honest, I might have an accumulation phase that lasts as— it could be as short as just 5 days.

Well, okay. Yeah, would that— so that would be a very high volume then?

High volume, a very high intensity. So I mean, the thing I've noticed, noticing with working with bodybuilders is, you know, a lot of them, they've been training forever, they've been pounding weights forever, they have a more restrictive diet. Sometimes less fats depending on what they're doing. So the joints tend to get a beating a little bit more than, you know, like NFL linemen that weighs 310 pounds that are naturally big-boned. So with these guys, I find that if I do a 5-day cycle accumulation of a ton of volume— and for me, a ton of volume, I'm talking about 36 sets in a workout— I will alternate this, like the next 5-day cycle, you will do an intensification, which the sets might be anywhere from 18 to 22, maybe 24, and then the intensity goes really high and the reps goes lower. So it's good because it allows them to use higher intensities, increase strength, but without overtaxing their joint or the nervous system too much by backing off right after with more volume. And a lot of bodybuilders somehow naturally tends to do a little bit better on higher volume. I don't know if it's just because their earlier years in training was volume-based and they just feel more comfortable with it, but that's something I've noticed. Every time I start introducing too, too much low rep training, they start complaining of joint issues, so I need to back up a little more often.

Yeah, that's a very good point that you made there. How often would you program two or more of these phases back to back?

Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, with, with most online clients, or even, let's say, general people that train year-round with no specific time goals, I will just, like, alternate accumulation, densification, accumulation, like nonstop. But with sports like hockey, for instance, they have a very short offseason. So to be honest, with them, I will use more of a linear periodization. And the reason is the main advantage of accumulation or undulating periodization is that over time you're not losing the previous quality you've trained. But if your offseason is only 8 or 9 or 10 weeks, I mean, and you've done your high rep hypertrophy work phase 1, it's not like it was that long that you're going to lose all the gains you've had in that phase. So I prefer using more of a linear approach. So I might do, depending on the needs of the client— so if the hockey player, let's say, is a smaller guy and I know that to increase his performance we need to focus on hypertrophy, I might do a 2-1 periodization scheme in which it's accumulation 1 followed by accumulation 2 followed by intensification 1 before he peaks. I will always finish with intensification, but if it's somebody that is on the flip side, he needs more strength than hypertrophy, it might be accumulation 1, intensification 1, intensification 2. Okay, so these are when I'm typically going to stack two of the same back to back.

Yeah, and obviously, like you were saying before, you take into account whether they're complaining of joints and things like that when making decisions like that, I guess, as well.

Yeah, this will mostly— with me, it would mostly affect the length of each cycle. So, you know, somebody who's more— has more joint issue, it might be, let's say, a 4-week accumulation phase followed by a 2-week intensification phase and on and on.

Very good. When and how often would you— you've got here that I read in your book, you speak about doing high-frequency training and that basically putting back-to-back rest days would give a 30% better recovery. Could you please elaborate on that? It's like instead of splitting it between the week, so say a Wednesday and a Saturday, say for a rest period, you talk about putting back-to-back days, increasing recovery when doing high-frequency training.

Yeah, so just to make sure I understand, so you want me to expand on like the split I use between that Monday to Friday, or the reasons as to why it increases recovery?

Yeah, more the reasons as to why it increases recovery, having those 2 days back-to-back as opposed to split?

Yeah, I mean, the reasons, they're more like this, to be honest. I'll give credit where credit is due. I learned this tip from Nelson Ayotte when I first started with Central Institute for Human Performance. And him, what he did is he was the Canadian head strength coach for the biathlon team, and at the time they used a lot of blood test and metabolic profile to analyze training protocols. And by doing 5 days on, 2 days off instead of having 1 day off here and there, like, there was 30% better recovery in terms of all the blood markers, you know, from, you know, like testosterone levels and all that kind of stuff. So when I heard about that and I saw him use it on his client, I started doing it myself on my power athletes and man, it worked really well. The gains were so much quicker, so I just stuck to it over time.

Yeah, so you, you mainly use that with power athletes. Would you use that with bodybuilders?

I use it with bodybuilders as well because they like, they usually get way more average total volume in a training year So, but see, again, it depends. There's also the psychological component of coaching. Some athletes, they just can't— like, if you give them 2 days off, mentally it's like it's too long, they freak out, or it might be long enough for them to fall off the wagon with nutrition and all that stuff. So I take that into account. But if I go purely in a physiological perspective, I will always start first with the the 5 days on, 2 days off, um, and it tends to work pretty well.

Yeah, I totally agree with the psychological side of things. I think placebo is so underrated as well as, um, where the mind will go, the body normally follows. So if your mind's not in it, your body's going to follow.

Yeah, I mean, for sure, because like I've seen it, like some— like I would, I would give out this protocol and then like after a month or or so, I would realize that the client, because he has off of training, like he starts cheating on his diet from Friday night all the way up to Sunday night. So, you know, you're not going to gain gains even though physiologically it might be better to have 2 days off.

Yeah. And with frequency of training, uh, in your experience, what have you found to work best? Like some people say training a body part twice a week, some say 3 times a week. What have you found to work best?

Yeah, for me with athletes, what I've noticed is the more— the closer you are to your 1RM in your training, the less frequency. So like for me, let's say I would— I will split the workout in 4. So let's say 1 day chest and back, 1 day like a quad dominant type workout, one day arms and shoulders, and one day posterior chain, because at that point you're really pounding the weights, you're really driving the nervous system. You want to make sure the nervous system recuperates, and that goes back to that good old principle of the nervous system taking 5 to 6 times longer to recuperate than the metabolic system. But now on the flip side, if I'm doing— so let's say I'm in the general preparation phase and I'm way earlier on in the off-season and the client is not as well conditioned and we're doing like 10, 12 reps or whatever, then I might just do an upper body 1, lower body 1, upper body 2, lower body 2, and the same movement pattern might repeat twice during the week. And that I find the gains more— I find the clients have better gains than if I were to split it in a 7-day type deal.

Yeah, just, just giving, giving the body more exposure to, to be able to adapt.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

I did a private internship with Charles probably 2 years ago now, and I did, um, he spoke of the fastest way he's found to put some size on people's legs is to get them to squat frequently. And, um, he spoke about this 6 times a week squatting program. It's not something I'd recommend to everyone, but I found that I definitely put a lot of size on my legs. But what I did find is that each session you have to keep it short and you can't always go to failure. Do you know what I mean? Like, it's more a case of you're stimulating than you are annihilating each workout.

Yeah.

So I found that worked quite well. Being a guy with chicken legs as a kid.

Yeah, I mean, yeah, I don't disagree. This would work. Well, but honestly, I would only do it with, like, gen pop or bodybuilders. I would not do it with an athlete simply because, to me, with an athlete, they don't compete to be a great squatter. They don't compete to have huge legs. They compete to be better athletes in whatever they do. And if I spend so much time squatting and I'm taking away from things like split squats or deadlift or stuff that I know will also help with their performance. I don't like it, but you're right, on a purely hypertrophy perspective, as long as you don't go all out with these sessions, I mean, it's, it's kind of like when you think about it, it's kind of like the same concept that you see with cyclists, you know, like those short track cyclists. Like it's intense anaerobic workouts every day, just smashing their legs. And when you look at these guys, like on a pound-for-pound basis, their legs are huge. But it's not— they're not cycling once every 7 days, they're cycling almost every day, you know.

So, and the body being an adaptive machine, it just slowly adapts. But I did find that I could only do it for a set period of time. I found about 2 weeks worked best for me, and then I did find that my strength started to actually drop.

Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't be surprised. I mean, I'll be honest, like those high— I've tried it on myself. I've never tried on a client, so I don't— I can't really speak from experience of those like super high frequency. I've never, I've never done it with clients. I mean, on myself it worked pretty well.

Yeah, yeah, I personally have never done it with clients either, just in the off chance that they get carried away. There's obviously high risk factor. Yeah, so I agree with you. With main lifts and remedial lifts, do you use percentages between, say, your bench press, trap 3, to rotator cuff. And do you— when I say that, do you use the same percentages you were using when you're working for PolyQuin?

Yes, I mean, the thing is, you know, I've been using those, the PICEP percentages since 1999. So I've been using them and repeating them, training my clients like all the time. So for me, to change what I know as a work, you know, I'm not going to do that. But I will say though that I, over time, because I've trained so many athletes, I, you know, I created and I gathered my own numbers on other lifts as well that I find works well. But the ones that are taught in PICP works very well. The exception is rotator cuff trap 3, power raise, and bent over lateral raise. There's a limit to those percentages. And by what I mean by that is when you train really, really strong athletes, uh, which to be honest, like, those numbers were based on Canadian Winter Olympic people. So outside of bobsledders, there's not a lot of like beasts in the weight room. But when you train NFL linemen and their average close grip bench press and the structural balance is over 400 pounds or like 185 kilos. I mean, it's— you're not gonna do your 8 reps of rotator cuff with a 40-pound dumbbell. It just won't happen.

So with those guys, how have you found to work best for them?

Like, honestly, if you can get them to about 5 or 6%, you're usually good. But it's— I just have never, I've never been able to with a 400+ pound bench. I've never been able to get to match that percentage.

Yeah.

So yeah, so that, that to me, that's the limit of it. But usually otherwise, I always strive to get these numbers.

What were the other numbers that you were mentioning? Are they with like particular lifts? So say your bench press, versus your overhead press? Is that—

Yeah, so, you know, so like in PICP, like they don't talk about the deadlift, but I use the deadlift a lot. So I have numbers for that. I have numbers for the overhead press, which in PICP is the behind the neck press. I have numbers for push press, you know, like those big— I'm a firm believer in the big lifts.

What would your numbers for— sorry to interrupt you— what would the numbers for your deadlift be?

I mean, I don't feel comfortable giving those out because I usually give it out to paying clients, but it's, I mean, deadlift, I'm sorry, I don't feel comfortable saying it.

No, no, that's okay. Sorry for pushing you.

That's okay.

With tendons and ligaments, so when getting clients really strong at a rapid rate, how have you found to work best for preparing someone's tendons, ligaments to take excessive load?

Yeah, like if I'm not talking about supplements, I usually like to spend a decent amount of time doing higher rep training. Especially if their training age is not too high, I might spend 12 or even maybe 24 weeks mostly just like above functional hypertrophy just to really prepare the joints for the range of motion. But obviously if the guy can use supplements, I would push for a lot of, you know, fish oil, The product that Poliquin Group has, Synuplex. So anything that I can think of that can support joint repair, I will typically, like, prescribe it or suggest it. Not, you know, not while they're doing high rep training, but as soon as they switch to lower rep, to low rep training for their first phase especially, that's when I'm going to introduce it. But, you know, just a good base of higher rep training, like a basic GPP, tends to prepare the athletes pretty well.

Awesome. So just, I guess, a classic periodization of starting with the higher reps and phasing down.

Yeah.

Awesome. And then I like the, the addition of phasing the supplementation in to support tendons and ligaments as well. That's a good idea.

Yeah, no, it works well. I mean, it's harder with athletes because there are so many regulations in their, in their sports, but with general public, it's pretty— it's a good tool.

Yeah. Uh, with athletes, uh, what supplements have you found to be a problem?

I mean, in my earlier days, none of them, but, uh, with all the, the, the whole, uh, Major League Baseball like steroid scandals, like they They've been so stringent on rules and regulation that by the late 2008, 2009, if your supplement was not NSF certified, it did not matter if it was pharmaceutical grade. If there was not an NSF for Sport logo on the bottle, the athletes just couldn't take it. Couldn't. That's crazy. Depending on the teams, you know, like the The clients I had with the, um, the St. Louis Rams, their strength coach, their management didn't care so much. But the St. Louis Cardinals, it was forget it, you couldn't. So, you know, so now it's easier because they're coming up with more and more NSF product. But just like in 2008, there was not even NSF fish oil.

Well, has Poliquin Group got in sort of create an arrangement to get their products NSF certified or anything like that? Is that possible?

Yeah, well, they have the sister company called the Fuel Nutrition, which in which I think they have 11 or 12 products and they're all NSF certified for sports. So those are no problem. And you know, they have the basics, Foundation 5, and you know, some workout stuff. So that's pretty good. Interesting.

What's your opinion on deloads, Stephane? So do you use them?

Yes, I do. I really like them, especially for people training long term. But it depends. Like, I really like them, I use them, but if you ask me, do I use them a lot? Not necessarily, because most of my online clients, they're on 3-week cycles. And they're on a, you know, once every 7-day split. So the 3-week cycle, it's only 3 workouts. So I don't find that if they bust their balls for like 3 workouts in an intensification, let's say, and then we switch right into an accumulation, I find that it's, it's, it's just good enough so that they don't really need a deload. But if the phase is longer or if the frequency within the cycle, within the phases, is higher, then I will tend to prescribe deloads anywhere from 40% to 60%, and typically on the third workout. That's how I do it.

Yeah, no, that's a good point because I do find that typically not everyone, but most, will tend to peak around that third workout. So I guess peaking their intensification phase and then swapping them into an accumulation phase where I guess the loads instantly come down. It's almost a deload in terms of load in itself.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Good structuring there, Stephan.

No problem.

Do you train females and male clients differently at all?

I mean, yes and no. I mean, if it's physique, you know, yes, like I will, I will use different splits because they have different priorities, you know. Them, it's all about, you know, shoulder, small waist, and wide lats and all that stuff. But in terms of, you know, like intensity and rest period, typically I will always go like a rep bracket above or like 15 seconds lower in rest period, but it's pretty much the same thing, I'll be honest. They do can tolerate more volume in general.

Yeah.

But no, I can't say that it's drastically different.

Yeah, those are some good points though, because I guess a female's central nervous system isn't necessarily as as good as the males, and their cardiovascular system is definitely better than most guys.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's not something I— I don't write a lot of German body comp. It's rare I do that, but that's something you notice if you do a German body comp on a 200-pound guy. You give him 75 seconds rest and he's going to puke halfway into the workout. You give the exact same workout to to a girl with 30 seconds rest and they're barely sweating. So that, so that you kind of have to, to readjust. But the reality is, once training age is— once you have, you know, over 2 years of training age with proper training, it's the, the field, like, it's pretty much leveled off. There's not much difference. I mean, there's one of my female client that I train. I mean, she's so freaking strong that I, I, I have to treat her as a basically a pro athlete in terms of volume recovery, you know. So it's, it's not as much gender as it plays, but I find it's more so in the beginning and the earlier phases of training.

Yeah, your personal system Stefan, the Cazault Special. With this, you've got the A's being a 5:01 tempo, B's 5:05, C's 5:05, and all 3 to 5 reps. How did you come up with this system and like why, I guess, those numbers specifically?

Yeah, I mean, the funny thing about that is I don't know, like I did not come up with this system. It's the whole story behind this is In 2010 when I did my PICP Level 4, in class, like Andre was teaching the class and he asked students to give a bunch of training methods for hypertrophy and I started talking about this one and people were like, "Wow, like what's that? I've never heard of it." So I just started talking about it and that one night Jonathan Wong, a coach from Singapore, like he wrote down on his computer in his hotel room like all the methods that the coaches talked about. And I guess because he didn't— there was no name to it, he called it the Cazaux Special. And it's only like years after that I knew that. So kind of like the name stayed, but I learned it from Larry Vanette. He's a bodybuilding coach in Montreal, and he was like my first mentor. Like, he's the first coach I ever hired in 1998. So it's a, it's a bodybuilding method. It's great for hypertrophy and Why the reps are at 3 to 5? It's just because of the tempo. So if you look at the A series, the A series, it's like 5 reps with a 5-0-1-0 tempo. So we're talking about 30 seconds time under tension. Then you go to the B series, you got 5 reps again, but it's 5-0-5-0. So now not only are you drastically changing the speed of contraction, but now you're going from 30 seconds of time under tension to 50 seconds time under tension. So you're hitting different fibers Then the C series, you have 5 reps again, but now it's a 5-5-5-0. So now you're at 75 seconds under tension. So it's a good, it's a good method to break a plateau because you have all these changes in the velocity and you're hitting a wide range of motor units from, you know, faster twitch to slower twitch fibers. So I wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't train like that all the time, but it's a good plateau buster. But I, so I don't know who invented it. I don't know if it's Larry, but I learned it from Larry Van Damme.

Yeah, how was he when he found out that you got your name to it?

I don't know, like, we've never talked about it. I saw it once and a student showed me the little sheet that Jonathan Wong did. I'm like, huh, that's funny. So it just stayed, but I didn't invent it.

Yeah, so with this next question, I hate to— I know it's being very vague, but obviously any information that I can get out of you is awesome. So with set amount— with clients' programs in terms of, say, an intensification phase, in terms of getting someone stronger, do you have like a set amount of weight that you kind of expect a client to progress by? Target that they should hit each week, or do you sort of just write the program and make sure that they're progressing?

Yeah, I mean, it's hard. I do have targets, but it's kind of hard. Like the first phase, you kind of have to let the athlete go naturally and you see what he can do, because generally speaking, the more advanced and the closer you are to your 1RM, Usually the gains in strength from workout to workout are going to be about 2%. The higher the reps, like, that percentage goes up a little bit, not dramatically, like we're talking about 3, maybe 4%. But then if you have people that are kind of like more beginners, or, you know, like you always have lifters that— I'm kind of like that. If I'm let's say I haven't deadlifted in, let's say, I don't know, 5 months, okay? And I do my first deadlift workout for 6 reps, I might end up only doing 275 pounds. But by my 3rd or 4th workout, I'll be up over the 500s. So it's just like my body needs those sessions to kind of like relearn that, that like neural firing pathways to be able to do the movement properly. So it takes me a while. So am I going to use for me on a movement like deadlift at the typical 2% gain? No. So you kind of have to see who you're working with to truly have real numbers. But, you know, generally speaking, between 2% and 5%, you're gonna hit most people.

Yeah, I like what you said about at the start you've got to sort of let them go and then you can kind of find out, I guess, what's normal for that person? Because I guess everyone's different.

Yeah, I mean, honestly, like online, you know, I mean, I like— I'm lucky because most of the people who buy online training, they buy a year. So I like it because I know we have time to, you know, I have time to like really assess them and see what's going on. Because when you don't see, when you don't coach them, it's really, really hard. When I have them in front of me, like the pro athletes that I train, I was lucky enough that I could train them 4 or 5 times a week, year-round. So it's not like I just saw them like once a month or something. I saw them every workout, every session. So I could, I could figure it, figure things out so much quicker as to how to adapt the workout and the training. But online, it's too difficult. And sometimes my definition of something might not be the same as the other person. And you know, some things gets lost in translation over time, and it might take a couple of weeks before you figure it out.

So yeah, and sometimes you gotta, I guess, figure out is that person really pushing themselves? And I guess it's definitely harder online than it would be face to face.

Exactly. Like, who knows? Like, maybe the person, like, everything looks good on paper, but maybe he's like, he's stopping every set 3 reps short of failure. I don't know.

Do you ever get clients to send you, say, say it's the final week on their program and they're going for, I guess, let's say a PB, do you get them to film that for you?

Yeah, yeah. I get videos all the time from my clients, so that's pretty cool. And so I can see like technical flaws or— no, yeah, that's— they're very good with that.

Yeah, and you see a lot when someone's going for a PB, don't you? It definitely exposes a lot of weaknesses.

Yeah, because you can't hide the weaknesses when you're going for like a 2-3 RM or something like that. Yeah. You see everything.

I've got a couple of questions here from a post I put on Facebook. So if that's okay with you, is that alright if I go ahead with those?

Yeah, for sure.

So Andrew Locke asked, he said, how do you estimate, determine a client's recovery ability in regards to training volume and intensity? Before giving them a program?

Yeah, so, you know, a lot of it is just like the initial question and answers and gauge their past training, their goals, their nutritional status, their experience, training age, and all that kind of stuff. Then I go with a general guideline, but how I really adjust it though, it goes with keeping track of their, their training. So for instance, like This guy that I trained, fairly advanced trainee, but we started with— these phases were 30 days. Within 30 days, he would do each workout 6 times, and he progressed really, really well for maybe 3 phases. But then I noticed that his workout 5 and 6, his load was actually less than his workout 4. So I decided to let him do one more, one more cycle just to make sure that, you know, it was not like he was tired this week or whatever. And the same thing happened. So it's at that point that I dropped the, the, his training phases from 6 workouts to 4 workouts. Then he was very good. He progressed for maybe 8 more months. and then after workout 3, workout 4, for 2 phases in a row, the load came down, so dropped it down to 3 times. So that's how I assess it.

That's a very good assessment.

Yeah, so you know, you're not guessing, you're really going— because the, the problem too, like, if you, if you have someone that his training ability at the time allows him to improve for 6 workouts, It means that his nervous system needs these 6 workouts to get all the benefits of the exercise. But if I change the workout after 3 workouts when he would progress for 6, then I'm shortchanging him on his potential.

I love that. That's great. Andrew's final question is regarding recovery and programming. How do you adjust and consider age and gender when programming? I think we touched on the gender, so let's touch on the age.

The age, so for me, training age is much more important, but obviously, so if we're talking about teens, I don't have a ton of experience with teens myself, but you know, like the whole training parameters will change, but generally speaking, like the older the person's training age. You know, the more complex, the more intense, the shorter the, the, the phases will be, the more variation between phases there will be. So somebody with a low training age, the variations from accumulation to intensification might just be 5%, but somebody really advanced, I might push it up to 15%. Because their nervous system needs this to create a stimulus or a response. But if you do the same thing with somebody with a low training age, then you're screwing them up because his body just cannot adapt properly to that huge change in intensity. But, but then you have to account the fact that after 35, 40 years of age, then endogenous hormone production is less, recovery is less, life stressors are more. So obviously total sets will be monitored, frequency will be monitored. So there's so many factors just outside of just age per se, but I always look at age and training age.

Yeah, yeah, both those are good considerations. I've now got a couple questions from my boss, Mark Ottobre.

Yes.

With your vast knowledge in the industry, was there anything that was taught at the Polycon Group or Paul Quinn in general that you didn't agree with on a personal level or from personal experience?

Things that I didn't agree— nah, I mean, not necessarily things that I did not agree with, but let's say things that I don't necessarily use in my own practice. There would be more of that than things I didn't agree with. So for instance, stretching. So stretching is part of the curriculum. Jazzbender loves stretching, so he teaches all the— he taught all the stretching component of it. That's great, but it's just not something that I highly believe in, simply because I think in order for stretching to be really efficient, you need to devote a lot of time to it. And when you're being paid hourly for training sessions, and you're doing your little 10-15 minutes stretching at the end, it's just nothing, nothing happens with that. So to me, you know, it's not I don't believe in it, I just don't really use it.

Yeah, what kind of stretching would you get your clients to do, if any?

Honestly, I don't really do it.

Yeah, no, that's cool.

I mean, I was fortunate with the chiropractor I worked with in St. Louis. He was one of only two in the US to be very proficient in dynamic neuromuscular stabilization at the time. And, you know, he was very quick to show me that range of motion is so related to the central nervous system that, you know, it's so much more complex than just doing a few myofascial release or, you know, static stretching. Like, if I was going to use stretching, you know, like, you know, something like PNF or PNF variations, like, you know, at least there's much, much more neural component to it. So I would do that. I know it sounds controversial what I'm saying nowadays, but it's just, it's just my own personal experience, uh, you know, with proper treatments and DNS and rebooting the nervous system, like, you don't really need stretching.

Yeah, so it's a case of training correctly in the first place, and then I guess getting soft tissue work done, uh, with— like, for myself, I see 3 different people for soft tissue work. So for me, I, I personally don't do a whole lot of stretching, but, um, like, in terms of activation work, so I'll do like, um some activation work before I start the workout just to get my joints warmed up, so to speak. But in terms of stretching, I don't sit there and stretch out my hamstrings or anything like that.

Yeah, I mean, again, like, the thing though, like, the, the rebuttal that I've had from some fellow coaches is that the average, the general pop, that don't move and sit all day, they're so stiff that they can't really do any movements properly. Yeah, maybe these guys stretching would help, but the problem is again, are they coming to you because they want to be more flexible, or are they paying you 3 times a week because they want to lose weight? So if they want to lose weight and you spend 45 minutes stretching, you know, are they going to stay with you?

I don't know.

It's, it's, it's a, it's a complex topic. But, you know, if you start training properly earlier on and you're careful in how you plan your training, I think you can, you know, get along with keeping stretching to a minimum.

Yeah, stretching is definitely specific to the person. And for us at Enterprise, we just show them through what they've got to do to warm up at the start, and we don't do it again with them unless obviously they don't understand it. But it's definitely not incorporated into the workout, so to speak.

Yeah. Otherwise, you know, it's pretty— I mean, yeah, Biosig, you know, there might be stuff here and there that, you know, I disagree with, or— but generally speaking, I mean, like I said earlier, I've been kind of involved with Polykin since 2001, so, and I've been using a lot of their techniques, so, you know, I've perfected them over time. I'm very analytical. That's how I improve. I did not necessarily improve by reading 1,200 books, you know. I really improved by coaching, analyzing, assessing, coaching, analyzing, assessing. And so that's how I came about improving program design.

Yeah. Have you fallen into any traps with like, say, doing too much remedial work in the past? Have you found that to be a problem?

No, I don't have— I don't think I've ever done too much remedial work, to be honest. I typically do— I train them 12 weeks and then I stay out of it except certain people There are certain people, if you don't do it at least once a week, they regress really, really quickly. So these, I might, you know, keep 2 or 3 sets here and there once a week or once every other phase to make sure they maintain. But, you know, you can, you can pretty much gauge, you can auto-regulate with their training if you, because, you know, you'll know it if it's time to incorporate more remedial work.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. His final question is, uh, in terms of like, for you being a go-to guy, um, in terms of periodization, what coach for you was the most paradigm shifting and what have you done differently since learning from them?

Yeah, I mean, I'm obviously like, for me it was, uh, Charles Poliquin because so I started training, I was 11 and I was, you know, reading books and magazines, and I read in 1997, that's the first time I read or heard about Charles Poliquin, and it was the Muscle Media 2000 with Shannon Sharp on the COVID and I was like, wow, like that thing is so different, it's cool, and then a year later in '98 I hired Larry Vanette to do my programs. And then I'm seeing the tempos and the A1, A2, and all that kind of stuff. And I'm like, hey, that's Charles stuff. How do you learn about it? And Charles, you know, like, he started his master's degree in Montreal. So at the time, in the early to mid-'90s, he had a big presence in Montreal. So Larry did a lot of courses with him at the time. So, so that's when I kind of got my, my peak for all that Charles, like, Poliquin stuff. So it stemmed from there, and like, it completely, completely changed the way I view and thought about training. So I became a trainer at 21, and I started using his stuff right off the bat. And like I said earlier, I didn't— I tried a bunch of stuff, but I always kind of stuck to it because to me it worked so well. And, uh, you know, So I can't— that for me was definitely the main guy for me in terms of strength coaches.

Yeah, and then everything else I guess has sort of been from in the trenches work, so to speak.

Yeah, exactly. I mean, I obviously have my, like, like everybody, we all have like authors that we like reading from, but as far as, you know, an actual coach that I've met and learned from specifically, it's definitely Charles.

I'm a huge fan of your ebook, Stephane, The 66 Strategies to Program Design. How can our listeners find this ebook?

Yes, so it's on Amazon, amazon.com, or even on the Australian, Canadian, UK store. You go into search engine, either write down my name or the title of the book, and you'll find it there.

It's a great book because it's very to the point.

Yeah, I mean, that was kind of my goal because personally, like, the thing about most training books is I find like it's always very general, but then like you're reading it, then you're like, okay, great, that's cool, but how do I put it in the training week? How do I put it in a 3-week, 3-month period? How do I incorporate this training with energy system work? So I kind of wanted to give like specific tidbits of all of this for people to kind of understand like my thought process basically on programming. So to me it was very different than from what was out there. That's why I was motivated to do it.

It's definitely an easy read and it's very, very educational.

Thank you.

You're welcome. What books have helped you the most? You said you haven't read a lot of books, but is there any—

I've read a lot of books, but what I meant by that is I'm not like— because a lot of coaches that I meet sometimes, it's like they're reading a new book every month as if because they're trying to find like the next best thing or their missing link. But that's not how I see it. So to me, my favorite authors are like Dietmar Schmidt-Bleicher, Harold Tuneman, Jurgen Hartmann, Vladimir Zatsiorsky, Gilles Kamedzi, He's only been translated— he's French. He's been translated in Italian, in Spanish. I've never seen anything in English, but, but, but to me, these guys, they're like, they go so deep in the actual physiology of weight training that my reasoning was, I don't want to read books to learn a cool new method. I want to read books to completely understand the physiology of exercise, of training. And I find that if you truly understand training and you, and you remember and apply the sound principles of strength and of strength training, you will get results and you will find ways yourself to, to come up with, with ideas like the, the, that program that I did. And that's me, that I did it for real. That was not Larry Vanette, but that the ascending velocity BodyKomp training that I wrote, you know, that was straight up just me using sound exercise physiology principles that I learned in these books and came up with the method. So that's— so whenever I do internship with the students, that's what I try to tell them. I'd rather you master 3 books almost to the point where you know it by heart than tell me that you've read 500 books on training.

Yeah, absolutely, because the more you know about the principles, the more you can sort of have an open mind as to, okay, this is what's happening to my client, why is this happening, and how do I make it happen more to keep them progressing, so to speak. Or if they're not progressing, how can I get them progressing?

Exactly.

When you get caught up in, say, a system, so to speak, it definitely shuts your mind off and puts some blinkers on so you can't actually think of ways to actually keep them progressing.

Yes, I see that. That's— I don't like that approach. Like, um, being people who are— who in their practice, they just use methods. It's like one month they're doing GBC, the month after GVT, the month after patient lifters, a month after— I mean, it's just, it doesn't work like that. You have to be more analytical and reactive to your client's progress in order to periodize. So, you know, if you understand training instead of knowing methods, I think you'd be better off as a strength coach.

That's definitely a good case in point to end on there, Stephane. I've got one last question for you.

Yes, sir.

Have you come out to Australia before?

I never have, no.

Oh, well, we'll have to see if we can arrange that to happen, if that's something that you're interested in.

No, yes, I am actually. You know, I've had a couple of requests from students to go towards their way, and this is definitely something I want to do. But right now, with my focus on Kilo and building the facility here in California, I can't see myself doing this until 2017, but that's definitely something I want to do.

That's great news. Thanks again, Stephane, for taking the time out to have a chat with us today. How can our listeners stay up to date with your tips and insights on strength and conditioning?

Yeah, so I mean, I have an Instagram page, @stephane.cazor. I have my Facebook page. There's the kilostrengthsociety.com website. I mean, it's not, it's not completely done and up to date now, but you can still access it. But it's mostly my social media right now, the best source.

Yeah, and just before you go, what would your ideal clientele be? Just so the listeners know, I guess, if they were to contact you, if they were the right fit for you.

I mean, my true love is strength. So if your goal is strength, you want to get stronger, you know, and you want to learn, because that's my favorite aspect. I want to give you a program, but I want you to ask me questions. I want you to understand it. I want you to get to a point where you can design your own training program. So that would— so like students for me, PICT students for me are great because of that. So that would be my ideal. I mean, I, I can try, you know, I train, I train clients in almost any sport or for any endeavor, but strength is definitely my, my passion.

Awesome. Thanks very much, Stephan. Enjoy the rest of your night.

Thank you. It was a pleasure.

I really, really, really hope you liked that podcast. Some great information about programming and design and all those good things that make up a good program to get people results. Stephan dropping truth bombs and Reece asking the great questions. Right from the cranium that is the great Rhys Adams. So updates on Enterprise Fitness, obviously Wolfpack is kicking along, going really, really well. We're up to seminar 3, we just finished seminar 3 of 5 in the Wolfpack. We had Bob Gill down, that was absolutely amazing, 4 days with Bob. He was just incredible amount of detail about functional health and supplementation and vitamins, minerals, amino acids, getting into the real nitty-gritty. We filmed all 5 days, because one of those days was obviously with me, and 4 days with Bob, and it was amazing. And you can expect that we will be doing it again. Again, for the Wolfpack, registrations have actually opened. You can leave your name on, check it out on either the Maximus Mark site or the Enterprise site for Wolfpack. 2017. You know, I only take 20 on, and it's intense, intense learning. So if you want more info on that, check us out. We've got internships coming up, we've got the How to Train the Female coming up. Also, Reece and I are going to Perth with the great Mike Thornton, who's having us down at Raw Fitness 24/7. That's going to be a cracker seminar with Reece and I teaching the How to Train the Female. But you know, if you're in Melbourne and you want to come to our studio at Enterprise Fitness, in Richmond, you know, hook us up. Let us know. We're running courses all of July, basically 3 courses in July. So, you know, it's going to be, going to be a lot of fun and quite a busy month for us. Hope you guys enjoyed this podcast. As I said before, if you want more info on Stefan, visit kilostrengthsociety.com or just look him up on Facebook. Easy enough to find. You can find links in the show notes or on this page where you probably downloaded this from. Please, please, please, please, please leave us a review on iTunes and on SoundCloud if you use SoundCloud as well. Share us on Facebook, absolutely feel free to share these podcasts. Let your friends know where the good information is at. Spread the word and spread the love. Till next time, supplement smart, eat well, and train hard.