Volume/Intensity Weekly Split

A three-day intermediate programme that distributes volume, recovery, and intensity across the week. Monday is a high-volume day, Wednesday is a deliberately light recovery day, and Friday is an intensity day where you attempt a new five-rep PR on each main lift. Bench press and overhead press alternate on Monday and Friday across successive weeks.

Intermediate lifters who have exhausted session-to-session progression on a novice programme and want a weekly PR cadence to keep the lifts moving. Best when you can commit to three training days of 75+ minutes each and recover from heavy squatting twice a week.

Monday (Volume): squat 5×5 across, bench or overhead press 5×5 across, deadlift 1×5 — all at roughly 90% of your 5-rep max. Wednesday (Recovery): squat 2×5 at about 80% of Monday's weight, the press you did NOT do on Monday for 3×5 light, chin-ups for three sets to failure, and light back extensions. Friday (Intensity): squat 1×5 at a new 5-rep max, bench or overhead press 1×5 at a new 5-rep max, and power cleans 5×3.

Each Friday you take a single set of five at a weight you have never done five reps with. It is one set — not a set taken to failure — because the number that matters is the weight, not the rep count. When you hit it, Monday's volume weight moves up to about 90% of that new 5RM. Miss it and you repeat the week at the same weight; miss twice and you either cut Monday's volume (5×5 down to 4×5) or drop 10% and ramp back. Progress is weekly rather than session-by-session, which is what makes the programme sustainable once novice linear progression has run out.

The Texas Method came out of Glenn Pendlay's coaching at Mark Rippetoe's Wichita Falls Athletic Club and was first published by Rippetoe in *Practical Programming for Strength Training*; Justin Lascek later developed it at length. VALDA adapts the weekly V/R/I split and PR-driven progression for use inside the app, but does not claim authorship of the method.