re: The Greyskull Methods- A Primer

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Thats damn good progress. As far as where to go on press, I would suggest starting over on the Z-Press with light weight and working your way back up on it. But I would enjoy 1 or 2 resets first on the press and set rep records.

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Thanks, I used to be really into it and did Wendler's 5/3/1 religiously for over a year after some other LP's and got pretty strong. This is probably the strongest I've been since I hurt my back 3 years ago though. I love LP's and the continuous progression, and it also helps keep me from getting side tracked/start screwing around.

I'll give the Z-press a shot here in a few months probably. I'm hoping that I can get a BW press in the next few months if I keep working at it, but we'll see.

Damn son, that's some gainz for your arse.

Thanks man. It is 100% because of this thread and GS. I’m 5’8. 200 lbs. 42 years old. Fat as frick but I actually have defined muscles now. I lifted at 135 in HS then life happened.

I dove into SL 5x5 a few times but got discouraged. Squating 3 days a week for strict numbers got really tiresome. Staring at a reset in that program was miserable.

This program is a game changer. First, I never thought I’d get past 115 on presses. The AMRAP set gave me the confidence to get me to real plates. Second, unlike other LPs, I’m not dreading stalls. To the contrary, I’m looking forward to dropping back on press and working on form and hitting numbers. shite, after I failed I did my DL then pressed 115x18.

Thank you for sharing this resource and your knowledge. My goal for the last 12 years has been to lose weight. My goal now is to hit the 1000 lb club by 2019. I feel better than I have since I can remember.

Yea resets are beautiful. And then after two resets, you just rotate the lift out for a varient and get strong as shite on it to. Once you have gone through 2 varients you just rotate the main lift back in. You will start lower but blow play your old rep maxes quickly doing this.

This allows sustained progress over years with an lp instead of weeks it having to move to more complicated programming for a long time.

Hello, so things are going well but I’m getting to the point where the 2x5, 1x5+ sets on the big 4 lifts are getting tough and I’m only getting 5-6 reps on the final set?? I have fractional plates and can add as little as 0.5 to 2lbs total to the bar. Should I keep doing that and only add maybe a 1lb to upper body and 2lbs to squat/deadlift and keep milking that? Or should I drop to 1x5, 1x5+ or 3x3 like John talks about for powerlifting option or skip to RPT set/rep scheme. What’s best way to keep milking the slow progression for this cycle? Thanks

Keep going with the basic 2.5lbs for upper body and 5 lbs for lower until you fail. Once you fail give your self one more try at that weight the next session to try and get the 5 reps. We do this because you will have good days and bad days, it happens.

Once you fail to reach the prescribed 5 reps, we perform a reset. To perform a reset remove 10-20% from the bar and you try to set rep records with that weight. You continue to add back in the 2.5 or 5 lbs incriments and bust your arse trying to best what you did at that weight last time.

We do 10% for upper body if your weights are pretty high up there in the advanced area and we do 10% on all lower body exercises if you are above 300lbs on the lift. If you upper body lifts aren't advanced we do 20%.

For example on press it might look like this over the course of 20 weeks and this is how we would perform a reset

105*8
107.5*8
110*6
112.5*6
115*5
120*5
125*4
125*5
127.5*5
130*3
130*4

Remove 20%

105*12
107.5*12
110*12
112.5*11
115*10
117.5*10
120*8
122.5*8
125*8
127.5*7
130*7
132.5*7
135*6
137.5*6
140*6
142.5*5
145*5
147.5*5
150*4
150*4

Perform another reset

So we set rep records at previous weights all the way up on the amrap set showing we have gotten much stronger and now have essentially add 40lbs to our working weight over the course of 20 weeks.

We would continue this until after 2 resets, then we would switch the lift out for a variant of the lift. Like for press we would go over prolly something like z-press or strict db overhead press touching the shoulders with the DB. We would continue the same pattern with the new lift until two rested are performed.

On the third exercise to be rotated in I usually like to rotate in either a speed of overload lift. For press this would be push press or top half pin press. Board or pin presses work great for bench also. We bust arse on this variant and once two resets are performed we go back to the main lift.


This time on the main lift you have a choice, you can repeat the process above(recommend for those that have less than 2 years or serious training. By serious I mean 2 consecutive years prior to starting gslp of following a progressive overload program) or you can run the rotation of lifts with one new or even 2 new variants. This is described in the original post as gslp with rotating lifts.

After we do this and push this performing resets and rotating lifts in after mutiple resets one may choose to move to either the the dependent version of reverse pyramid training as described here and here or we can move to the type of training described in the powerbuilding book here


Rpt works much better for a cut and you can even drop the last set of rpt as described in the gladiator programs.

Powerbuilding should be reserved for those looking to pack in mass. I would start with the mastadon program and move on to your own setup following the principles laid out in the on book.


Also if there is a specific area you want to bring up ask, I will design a template based on the basic gslp to bring that up. I linked the ones Johnny did him self for bringing up the arms and bringing up the back in the original post.

I would suggest staying on the current path until both bench and press need to hit a reset and then switch to the arms focus.

As far as putting bench and press in that program, I wouldn't. Focus on making high incline and close grip bench your bitch for 12 weeks then go back to press and bench if you want.

When you do go back you will just perform a reset from were you were previously and kick arse again. The extra strength gained in your triceps will allow you to blow past previous personal records.

LSU, that's the clearest explanation of the GSLP method I've ever read (and I own GSLP3). This is truly motivating.

I'm looking forward to your explanation of the Gladiator series. I know you suggest that people should train for performance so I'm not sure what the aim of that book is (currently can't afford to buy it).

Have you ever faced upper trap neck strain when overhead pressing and any advice on how to work around it?

Thanks for posting this program. This is awesome for me (detrained with the benefit of muscle memory). Making gains daily.

Thank you for the great resources and tips. I'll try and figure out which one it is and fix it.