Free Program to Use for Athletes or General Health
1x20 is a classic method of bringing blood flow and capilary density to each joint and muscle while preparing the body for intense exercise and promoting health and recovery
The first proponent and innovator of what is called the 1x20 method, is Dr. Michael Yessis, a sports scientist famous for researching and tutoring under the Soviet strength training innovators - Yuri Verkhoshansky and Anatoliy Bondarchuk. Among his most famous contributions is what is called the “1x20 method”.
The idea is very simple and obvious - it is using a single set of 20 reps. The value here lies in the understanding of why this is useful and thus when to use it.
In his book “The Revolutionary 1 x 20 RM Strength Training Program”, he details his thought process and his methods advantages. I won’t bore you with a long essay today, I will summarize his thoughts and my own experiences below.
Benefits/Purpose
Useful for the young/old/detrained
Yessis makes this point early and it is true and worth noting: When training either youth (12 or younger) athletes or those who are older/coming off of a long layoff or period of sedentary behavior - 1x20 is a strong investment. When untrained/detrained the body adapts very fast to any stimulus and lower intensity strength exercises will build up the fully structures of the body besides just muscle, like ligaments/tendons/other connective tissue support structures with lower chance of injury. In these cases, the body tends to adapt to a single set about as easily as it would several so it is fine to begin with one high effort set to start training with (as long as that set is very close to failure. Yessis also claims that the higher rep set build endurance AND strength due to its nature → 10-15th rep builds endurance and the high effort last several reps will build strength. Provided that the athlete is young or detrained/untrained, this is true. (An advanced athlete doesn’t apply to that)
This also helps avoid some of the mistakes that could be made by someone with no understanding of how strong they are relative to a certain weight (like young person or untrained man/woman) and prevents possible mistakes leading to injury - this method acclimates the user to training with resistance.
Another benefit is its simplicity and ease of practice can make it easy to motivate a beginning or anxious/hesitant trainee who is first starting to build a strength training habit.
Can use exercises that have direct carry-over to performance/Learning to train
Yessis claims that the criteria for specialized strength in sports is the following:
Must duplicate the sports movement (same neural pathway)
Must utilize the same range of motion (this is why we sometimes use partial ranges of motion when training strength)
Must be the same “type” of muscle contraction - i.e. high force, high speed, same muscles coordinate together, combination of isometric/concentric/eccentric, etc.
This method is meant to take your most sport specific movements and train them to be a little stronger and have your body tissue more prepared by using higher reps where a heavy rep set might ruin the biomechanics or be unwise in terms of joint health. The athlete gets the chance to practice the form of a specific movement with resistance to build strength/speed/resilience but under more submaximal-effort conditions.
For example: imitating a punch or step while sprinting can be done with a light 20 rep set but loading those exact movements in the 3-5 rep range would not work very well. This method allows the body to get a little extra boost or preparation for those movements in live practice according to Dr. Yessis.
This also allows a trainee to get used to the proper form of an exercise with adequate repetitions of practice. 20 is many more reps of learning than a set of 5. (Granted, it’s only a single set)
Tissue Prep/Healing
The body is more than muscle and bone. Your connective tissues and nervous system need to be built/improved and maintained as well. 1x20 is a method that improves blood flow and stimulation to the tissues in-between the muscle and bone and drives them to grow/heal from hard efforts that you have been placing them under. (20 reps is still in a practically valid hypertrophy range but also is a range with enough repetitions to get plenty of blood flow to a joint)
Using 1x20 for tissue health exercises or during a “deload” period of work can be of benefit to many. We often put many athletes on our version of the 1x20 system for about 2-3 weeks after a hard season before we begin a heavy training block.
Other benefits
With only 1 set, you can do a wide variety of helpful exercises and benefit from all of them. This allows a much more varied series of motions and joints/muscles on the body to be stimulated and trained without draining yourself or taking 4 hours to complete.
The nature of 20 rep sets also help build up capillary density in your tissue - this builds a healthier tissue that helps remove waste and brings nutrients to the muscle and joints during training in the future → this will also help grow the ligaments and tendons further in the joint which not only improves health and prevents injury but improves performance as well.
Yessis is also a proponent of the idea that a 1x20 system of approach allows for a very consistent and steady stimulus to improve the body that can be applied consistently over a long period of time without issues of overtraining. Because of this, strength and tissue gains will be slow and steady and in his belief, this makes them more lasting, as they are built with health and integrity of all components in mind. This is the concept that “strength build steadily and slowly is more lasting” - If you have read the foundational health posts (which is required reading here) then you will know this concept is congruent with our concept of maintaining our foundational health standards so training can be done frequently & and for a lifetime. (Explained more on the 3 foundation health posts - read here)
Hybrid Athletes 1x20 Method
Though I have been talking about Dr. Yessis and his observations - I will not be providing you his exact program as you can find that in his book. I will be providing you a modified program that we use which we believe is superior for technical and practical reasons.
I do not find it practical or very beneficial to do 20+ exercises despite Yessis’ views. Along with several other reasons - This is what we use:
3 days a week - “MWF”
*Unless indicated, all exercises are done with a dumbbell, but other implements are applicable as well provided they are loaded appropriately
The following exercises are done in the 15-20 rep range to about ~2 reps from technical failure (form breakdown):
Goblet Squat
RDL
The following exercises are done in the 18-22 rep range to 0-1 rep from failure:
Bulgarian Split Squat
Bench Press (Full ROM - Dbs held “vertical” relative to your eyes)
Bent-over row
Back extension
Lat Pulldown
Shoulder press - dbs held the same way as bench press, squeezing shoulder blades together while pressing
Hip Thrust or Glute Bridge
Facepull (using cables)
Hammer Curl
Calf Raise
Banded Side steps
Banded or Cable Paw Backs
Banded or Cable Knee Raise
Wrist curls in each direction (side to side, forward and back, and rotating)
Hanging/Lying Leg Raise
Dead hang for an accumulation of 1 minute
Recommendations for use
Useful times to implement this program are as follows:
You are deloading after several or many weeks of hard training - pain, inflammation, or general stress and body run down has accumulated. Take 1-3 weeks off and use this program to heal and rebuild tissue and re-sensitize your body for further gains.
You are coming back from an injury or period of layoff and need to reacclimate parts of the body to work - this will prevent reinjury and rebuild weak links that may have arisen which could cause another injury
You are a youth or beginner athlete - 12 years or under or have never before trained with weights. (If you are 15 or older and are weight training, start with this program for as long as you make gains from it or as little as 2 weeks)
You need to do something during travel times; often hotel gyms have the equipment for this, and it will help keep you fit and maintain your abilities while traveling.
Athletes coming off of a season or after competition of some sort; fighters/grapplers after competition or after playoffs/finals, etc. 2-3 weeks is plenty to rest up and be ready for full training with full rewards again.
If you have any questions, subscribers can ask below or during the q&a.
Also, 2 more spots are available for personal coaching programming or 30 minutes to 1-hour consults (see post for more info)