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Chalk

Guides to training, and answers about the watch.

The long arguments sit in the guides. The short answers sit underneath them. Everything here is a rule the engine actually follows, and the numbers in it come out of the real thing.

Guides

An argument about training, carried by a real engine run.

Gym with squat bars and other gym equipment Programs and splits

The upper/lower split, and why four days fits

Two sessions repeated, four days a week, and every muscle trained twice by Friday. The least fashionable split, and the one that fits most weeks.

Splits Barbell with plates stacked Programming

What progressive overload actually means

The demand has to keep rising or the body has no reason to change. That is the whole principle, and the weight on the bar is only one of the things that can rise.

Overload Runners training in a group Running

Strength training for runners

Runners are told to lift and the advice usually stops there. The research is more specific than that, and the part it is specific about is the load.

Endurance A commercial gym with bench bars and ropes Programs and splits

Push pull legs: the PPL split, three days to six

The split people mean when they say they are on a program. It decides where your sets go, which matters, and not much else, which is the part worth knowing.

Splits A woman loading a strength training app on a Garmin smartwatch On your watch

Garmin Strength Training: What Your Watch Can Do

Your Garmin is already a good strength training and weightlifting tracker. Recording sets, reps and weight was never the hard part. Deciding what you should lift next is.

The watch A steel tape measure and two rulers laid side by side on white, the tape marked in both inches and centimetres. How the engine thinks

How to take body measurements that tell you something

Body measurements answer the question a scale cannot. The scale gives you one number for two things that move independently. A tape says which one moved, and it only says it if you take it the same way every time.

Tracking Dumbbell rack in a commercial gym How the engine thinks

Two lifts, back to back

Pairing two lifts buys you time and costs you nothing you were using. Here is how to set one up, the five arrangements Reckoner refuses, and the one thing pairing changes about your next week.

Sessions Scrabble tiles spelling out one more rep How the engine thinks

What RPE actually measures

It is not how hard the set felt. It is how many reps you had left when you racked the bar, and it is the one number that decides what next week looks like.

Effort A man holding on to a barbell How the engine thinks

Why you are not progressing

A lift that has not moved in a month is not a willpower problem. Here is what a real stall looks like week by week, and the four things worth checking before you change anything.

Progression Woman holding a dumbbell How the engine thinks

The week you back off

A deload is not a week off, and here it is not a lighter bar either. Both versions run through the real engine, and the reason the load stays exactly where you put it.

Recovery A man in a gym sliding a fifteen kilo plate onto the end of a loaded barbell resting in a squat rack. How the engine thinks

How Reckoner decides to add weight

You do not decide when the bar goes up, and neither does the calendar. Your last session decides. Here is six weeks of one bench press, run through the real engine, with the reason beside every decision.

Progression

Answers

One question, answered in the first sentence.

  1. How many warm-up sets before a heavy lift? As many as it takes to arrive at your working weight having already lifted something close to it. The research does not name a number, and the numbers you are given are convention. Sessions · Warm-up A female lifter squatting with a barbell
  2. Does a Garmin track strength training? Yes. It records the session and counts your reps from your wrist once you have done at least four, and you add the weight when the set is over. On your watch · Recording Garmin Watch next to some dumbbells with Reckoner loaded on screen
  3. Can you get a lifting program on a Garmin watch? Yes. Garmin Connect can send a workout you built yourself, and Reckoner sends one it wrote from what you lifted last week. On your watch · The push A phone loading Garmin Connect
  4. What if I miss a month of measurements? Nothing. There is no catching up to do and no penalty to serve. Take the next reading on the next first of the month, and the one you missed simply is not there. How the engine thinks · Tracking Scissors cutting through a measuring tape
  5. Do my measurements change my training plan? No. Not one set, rep or load moves because a girth did. The four tape figures are recorded and drawn for you to read, and the part of Reckoner that writes your program never sees them. How the engine thinks · Tracking A man sitting and thinking
  6. Why did the bar not go up? Because the reps go up first. The bar only moves once you finish every set at the top of the rep range, and until then the target reps climb while the load holds. How the engine thinks · Progression weight machine with the pin inserted
  7. What happens when a lift stops moving? It repeats the week first, then takes the load down and builds back through it, and if the lift is still stuck after three weeks it offers you a different movement instead of a fourth identical week. How the engine thinks · Progression Man sitting down looking frustrated
  8. Does a week I did not train still count? No. A week with nothing logged in it moves nothing at all, so you come back to the week you left rather than to one you were not there for. How the engine thinks · Sessions A man holding a dumbbell looking confused

Everything, A to Z

19 pieces