Brandon Lilly’s Cube Method

I’ve been training with Brandon Lilly’s Cube method (the updated version, aka Cube Kingpin, aka Cube Boss, aka Cube 2.0, aka 365 Strong) for the past year and have made some really solid strength gains from it. I love it.

The book comes with an example program template and suggested percentages, but just like everything you may want to make adjustments on the weight based on how you feel that day.

Without going into details, each lift has it’s own day. They rotate, so that in one week one lift will have a heavy day, the other a speed day, and the other a rep day. So you’re never going heavy on two lifts in the same week. The forth training day is a “bodybuilding day” with some overhead press, curls, and working on weak points.

I’m not going to outline the whole program, because I don’t want to take money out of Lilly’s pocket. Go buy Brandon Lilly’s 365 Strong.

It’s only like $20 and the gains are well worth the money.

What I will do is show you how I modified the heavy days to be MUCH harder and have helped my strength gains a lot since I started it.

I’ve been using cluster sets for my heavy days for 2 training cycles now. It also makes training a little more fun, in a tortuous way, and keeps things super interesting.

A short note on cluster sets

So for those of you that are unfamiliar, cluster sets are when you do a handful of singles in a one “set”. You do a single, take 15-60 seconds rest, then do another single, and so on for the prescribed reps. And that’s a set.

OK back to my modification to the heavy day.

All of these percentages are based off of your training max (TM). Which is 95% of your actual max.

Each Wave I do 3 cluster sets of singles for the main movement. Then move onto one of the two variations (whatever addresses my weak point more... I only do one other variation on heavy days... trust me two is too much after the clusters) and then assistance work like normal.

Wave 1 Heavy Days

3 sets of 5 singles with 90-92.5% of my TM
15 seconds rest between each rep
5-6 mins between each “set”

Wave 2 Heavy Days

3 sets of 4 singles with 92.5-95% of my TM
30 seconds rest between each rep
5-6 mins between each set

Wave 3 Heavy Days

3 sets of 2-3 singles with 95-100% of my TM
45-60 seconds between each rep
6-8 mins between each set

Now, obviously these numbers are a guide. Just don’t lie to yourself about ur max and use the training max to get ur numbers off of. Adjust as needed to hit all the reps, and obviously if the first set is too easy, or it’s hard but you KNOW you can do more... add weight. Just don’t miss reps. I’d rather see you not take the last attempt, than fail on the last rep. Save the failed reps for your assistance work. These reps should be building confidence along with strength and your CNS.

Enjoy, and as always, go fuck yourselves.

-DfP