Are You Being Tricked? The Short-Term Rush of Intensification Training

You love that sweaty, worn-out feeling after a workout, but is all that intensity actually making you stronger?

In this episode of Strong Principles, Larry, Rob, and Zach dive deep into intensification phases—the high-rep circuits, Metcons, and cluster sets that feel like you're getting an amazing workout. They break down the critical difference between accumulation (foundation building) and intensification (expressing the foundation). Learn why getting "tricked" by short-term stimulus is common, how living in an intense phase can lead to injury and plateaus, and what true long-term strength and movement quality really require.

If you’ve fallen in love with extreme workouts, this is the reality check you need to build a truly strong, resilient body.

Larry (00:00)
All right, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Strong Principles.

Rob (00:05)
We're back. I am Rob Dela Cruz.

Larry (00:07)
And I'm Larry Medina.

Zach (00:08)
And I'm Zack Bragg.

Larry (00:10)
And today, we're going to be talking about intensification.

Rob (00:12)
Yeah. And so we call them intensification phases. And so an intensification phase is your normal baseline work is five by fives, three sets of 10, that type of work there. Your big six fundamental movements, you're constantly doing intensification phases. Now you're going in, you're increasing the intensification. So what that means is you're adding. So for instance, there's a style called German body composition. And what it is, is it's circuits. So your normal five sets of five reps is you're going to go ahead and you can either do one movement or two movements, or you'll do one movement and then two movement, like whatever you're going to do. So let's say it's back squat. So you got five reps of five sets. So you're going to do your five at whatever percentage it is or whatever RPE, and you're going to rest a couple of minutes. And then you're going to do that and you progress that. Or it would be like a superset where there's two different opposing muscle groups. Seven reps here, seven reps there. And then you go ahead and rest a minute 30 to two minutes, possibly three. In intensification phase, a lot of times, the rest is less.

Rob (01:22)
It's much more intense. And sometimes the rep schemes are really high. So let's say, for instance, we just did what was German body composition, who Charles Pauliquin made it famous. It was three to six exercises with almost no rest in between the exercise, like 30 seconds to a minute between exercises, but no rest between sets. So it's a circuit. So you see a lot of franchise models and stuff be circuits. And CrossFit workouts, Metcons are circuits. They're very intense. You're constantly moving through them. Well, those are great. And we usually use stuff on phases. And then Sometimes we use it in individual workout. So it's an intensification. They're great. People like them. They're fun to do. You really feel like you got a great workout. One, they usually, to mostly, to all the time, don't build strength. They can maintain strength if they're programmed right. They usually do build a form of work capacity, your ability to be able to move through things for a period of time. And then they're not great for increasing and getting better movement mechanics.

Zach (02:34)
I think what you got to be careful of is a lot of times programs turn into just an intensification program because like Rob said, they're fun. You feel like you got a great workout after. So the basic way I explain it to a lot of clients is if you will look at it from two simple basic, we'll call it an accumulation phase, which in that phase you're building a foundation. So you're building better strength, maybe hypertrophy. You're building better movement patterns, you're building better conditioning. And so what intensification then does, it should be followed by an accumulation phase that just expresses that foundation that you've built. And so now you're building greater force, you're building greater speed. So it's like the peak, like the tip of the iceberg. It's not the foundation, it's not the bulk. So if you have not gone into an accumulation phase where you've built your foundation up, intensification phase is, they're not meant to be run for a long period of time. It's just a short phase that you that you'd go through. And there's lots of different examples of them. Like Rob brought out GBC, drop sets, cluster sets.

Zach (03:36)
Oftentimes you think of drop sets or cluster sets or GBC, not as much rest, but you're expressing that foundation that you've already built up and you're getting it better. You're making greater force, greater speed. And so you do see a lot of results from it, especially for somebody who's gone through an accumulation phase or like an athlete who has a really good base. And that's when it's really fun to train those types of guys because they already have such a good base. Then you see really the of the iceberg and how good of an athlete they are.

Larry (04:02)
Now, I think both you mentioned that a lot of times you'll have an intensification programming, and people think that, Oh, they get tricked almost, where it's a good... I'm building something, I'm getting something out of it rather than just burning calories. Why do you think we get tricked?

Rob (04:25)
Or how?

Larry (04:26)
How do you think we get tricked?

Rob (04:27)
There's a couple of things I'm going to get into on that. One is like, a lot of us fell for it. I've fallen for it, too. It's an effort. It could be the latest franchise models, CrossFit did it. They did a really good job at it, all those. You're testing things you've already built. It's really fun. You put a lot of effort. You feel like you've done a lot, and you feel like it's doing a lot for you. Now, if you already have a big base, you get more out of it. But they plateau really easy. They can cause really quick overuse injuries. And then a lot of times you'll go backwards with those. So what happens is someone doesn't. It's really fun, and they think and it feels like it's doing so much more. And so then that's what they think they should do all the time. And then instead of a workout once in a while or a small phase, you don't want... Those things are meant to intermediate test things and use for a little while and see a little bit of results. They're never meant to go ahead and live in them.

Zach (05:38)
Yeah. I think we're tricked by the short term stimulus that a lot of people get from them. And so you go through a very intense workout where you say you're in intensification phase and you go through one or two weeks of that and they're like, wow, I feel really good. I'm leaving the gym. I feel like I went really hard. And then they fall in love with that feeling. And trainers do, too, because especially a one on one trainer, you get a client that comes in, you want them to feel like they're getting the most for their money. So you want them to leave tired and worn out and beat up. But in reality, like Rob said, it's just a short term stimulus, and it's going to be a very short term game that can oftentimes have a negative effect if prolonged. And so what happens oftentimes, we go through GBC, for example, which GBC you move from upper to lower body. We did 20 pounds on a row. We did 50 pounds on a squat. And then you fall into that habit, you just stay there. All of a sudden, three months later, you're moving the same exact weights, or if not less, your body's a little bit more beat up.

Zach (06:33)
And it's like, okay, that short term stimulus that you got, that good feeling that you got, produced some very short term effects. And now you're not seeing a good prolonged progression like we want because you didn't work in an accumulation phase. You didn't work in more foundation work.

Rob (06:47)
And often what happened with people is they see results. And it's usually really quick, too. It's like a shorter workout a lot of times, and they see results really fast. But those results are short. They don't last that long.

Larry (07:05)
It's just following a semi-okay diet, right? You'll see quick results, and then it plateaus quickly.

Rob (07:12)
I would say more like following an extreme diet that you see an extreme result really quickly. And then your body is going to adapt to cutting the calories really bad and doing a ton of cardio with it. And then all of a sudden, it doesn't matter how much calories you cut and how much more you add to your movement, you don't lose any That's actually a great example.

Zach (07:31)
Yeah. It's really short, intense diet. All of a sudden, you see all this results real fast, but then your metabolism slows down.

Rob (07:37)
So then you try to go back to it.

Zach (07:38)
Yeah. And then you try to cut more calories. You try to go, and it's like, all right, my body's not changing anymore. And that's because You went way too intense, way too fast for too long.

Rob (07:47)
I mean, think about because you got a lot of experience in CrossFit. I mean, those Metcons are really potent. They're very potent. And so you get a lot of benefits, a lot of results in the beginning, and everything works in the beginning. But you do them for a long time. You're barely good at maintaining strength. They're not very good at getting better at movement mechanics. They're not very good at gaining strength.

Larry (08:13)
Yeah, no. I'll tell you, for me, with those, what ended up happening to me was... Yeah, I fell in love with it, right? I fell for the cult as a cult member, if you will. And we were basically... They were like, Don't bench. Okay, cool. Dumb. Don't curl. Okay, cool. I don't know why you wouldn't because there's so many little tendons that you want to work through. So a curl is hitting different tendons that you wouldn't hit with a pull-up. I get the functional fitness and all that other stuff. So it put light into a lot of things, in my opinion, but it did a lot of damage in the long run because even for me, it built a lot of imbalances. Yeah, 100 %. I could tell you, it definitely showed me my weaknesses later when I got injured.

Rob (09:06)
Yeah.

Zach (09:07)
Right?

Larry (09:08)
And if I would have went slower, more methodical, not just like, Oh, here's a wad. Okay, cool. We'll go ahead and do that. I'd be in a better spot.

Rob (09:20)
Yeah, not just to pick our cross, but any of the latest franchise models, we can go down the line or some boot camps. And what happens is you're being intense. You're a lot of movement. And the more you get fatigued, the more likelihood of something going wrong happens a lot of times. And also, you got to realize when that heart rate is up and that movement is high, that strength signal is low.

Larry (09:47)
Yeah, if your heart beats like 150, I don't know that you should be squatting 225 pounds.

Rob (09:53)
Yeah. I completely like and understand the ability to For people to have the ability to be able to operate under fatigue, I just don't think you should be there very often.

Zach (10:05)
Not all the time.

Rob (10:06)
No, not at all. But in an intensification case, there's something we use, too. It's called cluster sets. The cluster set would say, We're going to do 10 reps. But if I did all 10 reps and then rested, I would burn up and I can only use so much weight. The percentages of RP wouldn't be very high. But what if I did three reps with 15 to 20 second reps? Three reps, 15. So now I'm doing 10 reps, but my percentages are high. So I'm getting a lot of quality work in there. So that's a really good intensification method. Phase. Yeah, or phase method. But you don't want to sit there for very long. One, you burn up the nervous system really quick. Two is that's a lot of load over and over again. And that's a really good intensification method.

Zach (10:52)
I think where a lot of people got, when we were talking about, tricked or confused or fell in love with it, is the fact that And again, like Rob said, we're not trying to pick on CrossFit, but it's just a good example, is you had all these athletes on TV, and they got really good, really, really fast. And it's like you're looking at them, you're like, oh, they got in great shape by doing this. But what you didn't realize is that 90 % of them were in the gym for many years before that, following a traditional strength program, or many of them were football players, or firefighters, or a lot of them had a base already. A huge base. They were building up a base for all that period of time. Then when CrossFit came out, they were in this intensification phase, which expresses that base that you already have, and they got in great shape. It's like we talk about, you're going to see results from that. They were great athletes for that. But then you get somebody who's never been in a gym before who just walks in the gym, and it's like, Okay, I can do that.

Zach (11:42)
I need to do that. That's what's going to get me in shape. But you're missing that foundational piece that you need.

Larry (11:46)
Not only that, but what you missed that nobody ever talked about was the extra work that they put in. It wasn't just that hour. It was that hour plus their own programming, which is why they did a bunch of prehab work.

Zach (11:58)
They did a bunch of maybe strength training. They did a lot of other stuff. Oh, yeah.

Larry (12:02)
You're in there for about four hours.

Rob (12:04)
Especially when it comes to the crossfit. We even deal with it. We just came out of an intensification phase. We used German body composition. People love it. We did four weeks. I I want to do it. I was undecided if I was going to do three to four. We did four weeks. That's great. Our normal training phases are around six. Once in a while, we might go a little longer, but not much. We came out of it. And there are some people that I loved it. I felt like we were getting so much done. Why don't we do these all the time? Boom. That's what happens. Is you felt like you're doing so much, and you weren't getting some good results because it's a different stimulus. So your body reacts to that. But what you didn't realize is if we kept on doing that, one One, we're most likely going to see overuse issues. Two, your nervous system, you're going to feel fatigued too often. Three is that we're not going to see strength increases. We're going to see like, degradation of movement. So you run into those. That's why they're good to throw in in the mentally, in the small phase or in the workout once in a while, but you don't want to sit in them for long.

Larry (13:06)
So I know we're talking about intensification overall, but if I'm a normal person, what should be my end goal from a fitness perspective.

Rob (13:16)
Well, movement quality is always better movement quality. And then, like most people nowadays, for general population, always trying to increase their strength. And you're trying to increase your strength in your fundamental movement patterns, which would carry over most functional for you to be able to like everyday life. And that's what you're trying to do. And that's where most people need to be and most people need to sit. Now, there's a lot of different ways to make the classic training and your base-building a little more fun. And that's just by exercise, pair, how you set it up, what exercises are you using? You can definitely do that. Also, the thing is people think things... If you think something works really well, well, that's why you like it so much. But if you realize it's not working that well, you might not like it as much. And you might like something that you consider boring, but you're seeing such good results. You might get into it a little more.

Zach (14:09)
So that's where communication is so big with your clients, and especially in a one-on-one setting. And that's why it's so easy to fall in, too. If you're a one on one trainer, like I talked about earlier, you want your clients to feel like they're getting the most for their money. So a lot of trainers just end up beating up. Or maybe you have an athlete that came in who you got to start working with and they have a good base, and then you just fall in love with this intensification phase because they're seeing these great short term results. And so you keep going with it. But like Rob said, ultimately, you want to move better, you want to live a better life, you want to prevent injury as much as possible. All that comes from having a really good foundation, a really good accumulation phase. And it doesn't come from the intensification period. You should go through every now and again, but you got to have that good foundation.

Rob (14:52)
So I'll give you a scenario, too, is whenever we've gotten people in that are used to a boot camp or some franchise model that they're very all the time, they rarely move well, and they're rarely strong. So then when we first start working with them, the first thing you're going to do is like, Hey, you're doing five reps of this, whatever, bench press squad or whatever, and we're going to rest you minutes. They totally feel like they're not doing enough.

Zach (15:15)
I feel like they're not doing anything. Yeah.

Rob (15:16)
And they're not. And Larry, they're not at all because you're not very strong.

Zach (15:21)
Yeah, you're not strong enough.

Rob (15:22)
But you get a guy that can squat 400 pounds. When he does five reps, he wants his 2-3 minute rest. So We got to get you stronger. Because if we go and we do stuff in between, now we're blunting that signal. Once you're strong, everything becomes more potent, including your conditioning. So now you're strong. Now you use a lot of energy. Now, when you go to your conditioning, it's much more potent. You're using more energy. Much more effective. Yes.

Larry (15:53)
I didn't even think about that. As far as if you have more muscle, obviously, it's going to take up a lot more oxygen to work through whatever aerobic exercise you're doing. So in turn, you are burning more muscle. I'm sorry, burning more energy, burning more fat, burning more calories.

Zach (16:08)
You produce a lot more force. You're stronger, you produce a lot more force, you go faster, you're a lot stronger, you create a lot more intensity in a shorter period of time. But like Rob said, that is one thing that we do run into a lot is that people come off a certain program that was maybe just very intense all the time. Maybe it was a camp, whatever it was. And then you throw them into a workout that's like a strength workout, and they It could fly right through it because it's like, my heart rate never got up because you're set up for that. You've just done a bunch of intense working out for the past two years or however long.

Rob (16:38)
Loads are not very heavy. Yeah.

Zach (16:40)
And so that's, again, why communication is so important, explaining to them where they're at right now. And we have to change that over time in order to make you better.

Rob (16:52)
And also, Larry, I rarely see the people that come from those models, rarely. Sometimes, actually have A true work capacity, the ability to move through things over and over again, not just conditioning, but weights and everything else, a true work capacity. And then they wonder, I don't actually have that much endurance as I do.

Zach (17:15)
Because you never built it up. Correct. That makes sense. That makes sense. So it's a useful tool.

Rob (17:21)
Okay. Just don't be married to it.

Zach (17:22)
Yeah, just don't be married to it.

Larry (17:24)
For sure. All right. Well, thanks, everybody.

Zach (17:27)
How's it guys? It's been strong. Have a great day.