Val Nasedkin Training Methods

Table of Contents
 A Long Lost Love
o Ze Goal
 The Performance Matrix
 Functional State
 Success’ Components
 Resistance training for hormonal adaptations
 Stato-dynamic resistance training
 High-Intensity Continuous Training
 Planning
 Training Kids
 Weekend Quotes (courtesy of Val, Roman, Charlie Weingroff, and Sam Gibbs)

A Long Lost Love
 Strength and conditioning is a guilty pleasure of mine. One I love to indulge in from time to
time.

There is something about the training process that excites me. So when I heard Val Nasedkin
was speaking in the US, I jumped on the opportunity.

Val is the brilliant mind behind the Omegawave, a device which I have been experimenting with
in my own training and hoped to learn more about.

I left with a greater appreciation not only for what Val’s system intends to do, but the way he
coaches and programs.

If you get a chance to hear Val or Roman Fomin speak, take up the opportunity. These guys are
both revolutionaries in their respective fields.

Here were a few of the big takeaways.

Ze Goal
Val created the Omegawave to provide a framework and determine appropriate timing for our
current performance methodologies.
Most training and rehabilitation processes are chosen based on results. focusing here, however,
neglects individual responses to inputs.

Great results can come at a great cost to an individual.

If biological cost of training can be measured, there is potential to maximize an individual’s

health, long term potential, and work capacity, while still achieving desired results.

That is what an Omegawave can do for you.

The Performance Matrix

Whether Val knew it or not, he drew many parallels to Melzack’s neuromatrix regarding how
performance occurs. I lo Like this profound statement…

“Every process [output] occurs for a good reason.” ~Val Nasedkin

Our expressions and behaviors insure our survival at a minimum, and performance at a
maximum.

Specific outputs depend on feedback received by the body’s regulatory systems (i.e. nervous
system). Positive feedback will lead to high performance, negative feedback will lead to
compensatory strategies that help an individual survive.

A negative feedback example – Reduced ATP production by the aerobic system will shift energy
production to less efficient glycolytic mechanisms.

A positive feedback example – Aerobic training done properly will lead to

increased mitochondrial density, which will lead to higher performance for particular tasks.

Functional State

The functional state is what Omegawave is attempting to measure via CNS, ANS, and
cardiovascular measures. It’s defined as…
  

-The physiological foundation for future activity.

The functional state reflects the body’s functional systems at a given period of time. This state
changes based on inputs the system receives.

The hope, with good training, is to take nonspecifically working systems and create specifically
coordinated adaptations to best perform a task. Measuring functional states helps pick desirable
times to train said adaptations.

Changing a specified functional system must be done carefully. Making a change, even if
potentially favorable, can negatively impact performance to the point where positive adaptation
may take too long to occur.

You wouldn’t attempt to change a sprinter’s mechanics during an Olympic year.

Success’ Components

Per Val, there are certain general adaptations found in all successful athletes. Generally these
adaptations include favorable hormonal adaptations, aerobically developed cardiopulmonary and
neuromuscular systems, parasympathetic activity, and CNS activity/synchronicity.

The aforementioned qualities are desirable because they have the largest room to improve. Other
adaptations, such as speed and power, top out at a much faster rate.

Val mentioned several methods to create these adaptations. Here were my favorite ones (Joel
Jamison’s book is a great further read for these qualities):

Resistance training for hormonal adaptations

 Need to create a hypoxic environment

 Max effort resistance to total failure within 4-8 rep range
 2 times per week; one hard day, one with 50% volume of previous hard day.

 
 Stato-dynamic resistance training

The goal is slow twitch muscle fiber hypertrophy and mitochondrial hyperplasia via a hypoxic
environment. This sounds counterintuitive because hypoxic environments destroy mitochondria.
However, slow twitch fibers naturally have large mitochondria amounts. Since hypoxic
environments increase muscle size, larger slow twitch fibers would increase mitochondrial
density.

How it’s done:

 30-50% 1-RM with slow velocity and no rest periods (don’t lock into joint extension)
 Use big muscle group exercises
 40-60 seconds work: rest ratios for 4-5 rounds.
 2 times per week.
 Done to screaming in pain failure, but should be able to breathe.

 Here’s a video of this courtesy of Mark McLaughlin, another cat you should probably check out:

High-Intensity Continuous Training

The goal here is to increase mitochondria density in fast twitch muscle fibers. Since type II fibers
are not normally mitochondria-rich, hypoxic environments are undesirable.

Here’s how you do it to increase myofibril oxidative capacity:

 20-40 minutes of low frequency, high to max resistance

My good friend Lance Goyke demonstrates this below:

If oxidation is needed in the sarcoplasmic reticulum, use plyometrics or resisted short sprints.

 <5 seconds at high intensity, recovery to 100 bpm or so

 Very high volume

Once these general qualities are achieved, more sport specific components can be targeted.
 

Planning

Putting all these components in a week can seem daunting, but applying a few smart rules can
maximize training adaptations.

The overall theme is to have few high intensity/volume days, and several low intensity/volume
days.

At most, there ought to be only two high intensity sessions per week, with the second one having
lower volume. These sessions ought to focus on an individual’s biological limiting factors.

The above may have some conflicts with traditional periodization; namely focusing on biological
limiting factors. For example, I ran collegiately, and every off-season involved aerobic base
work. This training aims to increase cardiac output. For some individuals, those adaptations may
already be present after a certain amount of training. Therefore, the “base” phase may not be
necessary for some. That is why measuring several biomarkers (and the Omegawave fits here)
may indicate which sessions ought to be best.

If the above sessions involve creating hypoxic environments, following sessions should
emphasize aerobic development. First destroy mitochondria, and then use aerobic exercise to
manage the damage.

A sample offseason week may look like this:

Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday Sun

High Low High

Low intensity Low intensity Low intensity Off
intensity intensity intensity

High High Moderate Moderate Moderate

Low Volume
Volume Volume Volume Volume Volume
  

The rules change if competition is in the mix. The main difference is timing your high intensity
sessions. Depending on the intensity of the competition, the high intensity and volume sessions
may be very early in the week, or even considered the competitive day.

For example, a high jumper that performs on Saturday may have his high intensity/volume day
on Monday. Whereas a basketball player may have his Saturday game be considered the high
intensity/volume day. Everything depends on the individual athlete.

Individualized templates will produce the best outcomes.

Training Kids

 This portion may have been my favorite lecture. Val was very much against heavy weight lifting
for children. Because children are undergoing several hormonal changes, high intensity
resistance training may have unforeseen effects on one’s endocrine system. This training
becomes more appropriate post-puberty.

Instead, take advantageous of a child’s rich nervous system. Teach basic movement patterns,
calisthenics, plyometrics, speed, shock training, quickness; anything that requires high neural
drive. Create fundamental movement patterns that individuals will be able to take with them
once more advanced methods can be applied.

Weekend Quotes (courtesy of Val, Roman, Charlie Weingroff, and Sam Gibbs)

 “How important is sensory-motor? I don’t care.”

 “They have like bullheart…It’s a term.”
 “Stretching is borderline absurd.”
 “Guiding by results does not lead to long term change.”
 “It’s not what you do, it’s when you do it.”
 “Yes, you can kill yourself once a week.”
 “Can’t use linear methods to solve nonlinear problems.”
 “You can’t squat heavy with poor ground contact.”
 “If you can’t change what other people do, change what you do.”

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 Dr. Viktor Seluyanov’s

Understanding Seluyanov: How to

Program for Competitive Athletes
WRITTEN BY AARON DAVIS
May 14, 2015
Updated April 11, 2018
Category: Fitness
Tags:Build Muscle
It’s been 2 years since I first heard of Dr. Viktor Seluyanov’s research and training
methods. I first stumbled upon them by way of Val Nasedkin via youtube.
Since then, I have been down the rabbit hole trying to learn as much as possible – even
finding a tennis coach (Alex Nikiti) in Prague to translate and discus much of
Seluyanov’s work — books and lectures (his contributions to my learning process have
been invaluable).

T his sounds silly, but my motivation at the time was finding an intelligent way to

train CrossFit athletes. I was already on the path to the “Less is More” philosophy
mainly brought on by reading the two volumes of Anatoliy Bondarchuk’s Transfer of
Training in Sports and I saw Seluyanov’s methods as a practical approach for
Competitive CrossFit athletes.
I know I lose my diehard Sports Performance colleagues once I reference CrossFit, but
bear with me and understand it’s all about knowing the processes that matter. Once you
understand the broad strokes, you can apply it to anything.

We have experimented and have had success with Olympic Weightlifters, Youth Sports
Performance Development, and Endurance athletes when blending Seluyanov’s
methods into our program design. So don’t worry. It’s not just a CrossFit thing. To be
honest, I am not a huge hit in the CrossFit world either from all of this. So let’s call a
truce and respect the fact that all is fair in Exercise Physiology and Biochemistry.
One of the main points with Seluyanov’s work is that training is not just for the muscles,
but all systems in the body (anatomy, histology, biochemistry, physiology,
endocrine, immune, etc). He even goes as far as creating a new field of scientific study
called “Sports Adaptology”.
With Sports Adaptology, he looks at the multiple systems and how it relates to
adaptation of the muscle fibers. Seluyanov classifies muscle fibers in two categories —
Oxidative and Glycolytic. In other words, muscle fibers that have mitochondria (slow
twitch) and muscles that don’t and produce hydrogen Ions and lactate (fast twitch).

In essence, if you want to build endurance, you need to have as much mitochondria
within all the muscle fibers as possible (fast and slow). This will limit the the production
of hydrogen ions and lactate – limiting time to fatigue (Peripheral Fatigue). He also
states that it’s not about lung volume, but more about the muscles using oxygen
efficiently.

The problem arises when training the specific fibers – oxidative and glycolytic fibers
need separate training and certain environments to thrive. For example long metcons,
matches, or races that induce high accumulation of hydrogen ions will kill mitochondria
built around the fast twitch muscle fibers.

Therefore every time an athlete participates in such an event the coach needs to
address this in the training process — stimulating mitochondrial growth in the fast twitch
fibers again before their next competition.

This is another point Seluyanov makes — there is no such thing as General Endurance,
Speed Endurance, and Strength Endurance. There is just the adaptation to the
myofibrils of the sport’s specific muscle groups. If myofibrils multiply (Hyperplasia) or
increase in size (Hypertrophy), they will increase force (or endurance through strength
reserve). If instead they increase mitochondria within the myofibrils, they will increase
endurance
 How to Program for Competitive Athlete

If we now look at the athlete under Seluyanov’s methods we need to assess:

 Muscle Groups used in Sport (Speed/Endurance)
 Volume of Fast, Slow and Intermediate Fibers (Sports Specific)
 Strength of the Fast, Slow and Intermediate Fibers
 Mitochondria Density of Fast, Slow and Intermediate Fibers
 Capillarization of Muscle Tissue (Sports Specific)
 Assess the Cardiovascular System
From there we can break the training down as follows…

Hypertrophy of Fast Twitch (Glycolytic Fibers)

Needed for synthesis of Myofibrils
 =Amino Acids, Free Creatine, Hormones, Hydrogen Ions
Intensity of Contraction

 50-100% (Fast)
Intensity of the Exercise

 10-100% (Heavy weights or Speed – Sprinting or Jumping)

Duration of Work

 Till Failure, 20-50 secs

1. Barbell: 6-12 reps
2. Sprinting: 12-15 secs
3. Jumping: 10-20 contacts
Sets

 3-9 for Developing Tissue

 1-3 for Maintaining Tissue
Rest b/t Sets

 5-10 mins Active Rest

Weekly Workouts

 1-3 sets you can perform 4-7x Week

 3-9 sets – 1 x Week
Increase Mitochondria in Fast Twitch (Glycolytic Fibers)
Needed for Synthesis of Myofibrils
 Active Cell, Amino Acids, Stress Hormones, Little to No Hydrogen Ions
Intensity of Contraction

 50-100% (Fast)
Intensity of the Exercise

 60-100%
Duration of Work

 3-50 secs
1. Barbell: 8-10 reps
2. Sprinting: 3-5 secs
3. Jumping: 10-20 contacts
4. Throws: 5-10
Sets

 10-30 for Developing

 5-10 for Maintaining
Rest b/t Sets

 1-3 mins Rest

Weekly Workouts

 1-2x Week Minimum

 3-5x Week Optimal
 Can Perform 2x a day
Hypertrophy of Slow Twitch (Oxidative Fibers)
Needed for Synthesis of Myofibrils
 Amino Acids, Free Creatine, Hormones, Hydrogen Ions
Intensity of Contraction

 Slow, no rapid movements. Create tension to increase hypoxia.

Intensity of the Exercise

 30-50%
Duration of Work

 Stato-dynamic, 30-50 secs

 Optimal 30:30 Work: Rest
Series

 Optimally used in series (Example 3x3x30:30)

Sets

 4-9 for Developing

 1-3 for Maintaining
Rest b/t Sets

 30-40 sec rest b/t sets 5-10 mins Active Rest b/t series
Weekly Workouts

 1-3 sets you can perform 2-4x Week

 4-9 sets – 1x Week
Hypertrophy of the Heart (Eccentric/ L- Hypertrophy)
Intensity

 120-150 bpm
Duration

 2-10 Hours (Total)

 Weekly Workouts

 2-7x Week
Hypertrophy of the Heart (Concentric/ D- Hypertrophy)
Intensity
 180+ bpm
Duration

 60 secs to reach 180 + 30 secs of work in the HR range

Sets

 10-40 sets
Weekly Workouts

 1 x Week

“Know, Think, Guess”

I will steal this line of thinking from Stuart McMillan — but like anything new we read or
study we need to compartmentalize it in regards to the training program for our
athletes. Many coaches read something new and make wholesale changes. This
usually ends in disaster.

Instead, stick with what you know (70%) – which has proven successful. Then apply
what you think (20%), which will be aspects to hopefully enhance your program and
lastly sprinkle in your best guess (10%) – these are usually aspects that won’t
necessarily hurt, but will pay off if they work.
The Know, Think, and Guess is filtered and sorted by reading and talking with
knowledgeable coaches. I don’t claim to be a genius as it pertains to exercise science,
but I trust in experimenting, reading voraciously, and remembering commonalities.
Simply, if I hear it often, I move it up the chain.
 Guess —> Think —> Know
As coaches we also need to think about all biomotor abilities and how they are affected
by the training plan in its entirety. This is why many of Seluyanov’s methods haven’t
been seen by our sprinters.

I have not yet figured out how to incorporate it without negative effects to coordination
or speed within the training process. This is also why we have to make adjustments
when training our Olympic Weightlifters and limiting rep volumes in the full competition
lifts while we hypertrophy fast twitch fibers within the squat.
I suppose I write this last little bit as a caution to young coaches. I have been hesitant
on writing about Seluyanov in detail, but I believe knowledge should be shared, and
Seluyanov’s methods are intriguing — so experiment, research, and come up with your
own conclusions.

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 speak Russian and have read a lot of Seluyanov's writings. His theory is somewhat
oversimplified and mechanistic - there is no endurance, there are only heart volume and
mitochondrias. If heart has enough hypertrophy and can pump enough oxygen to
muscles, then you don't need LISS training, you only need mitochondrias/myofibrils in
muscles, which are developed through many sets to failure and long rests between sets
or through interval training like hill sprints with long rests. In theory an athlete with
biggest heart/most mitochondrias will alway win. He came up with his theory in the 90s
as an opposite against "Train hard, train a lot and push harder to win" mentality, that
was popular and that destroyed many young athletes. It was important for that time. But
maybe there are many more factors (endocrinal, neurological, psychological, technical)
that play a role and this explains why there are no competitive endurance athlets like
cyclists/skiers/swimmers that train in Seluyanov's way, they all train in a way that should
destroy all their mitochondrias if Seluyanov is right. In reality they are succesfull and get
better.

For hypertrophy his approach sounds like tradional bodybuilding training, except for the
long rests.
Fast twitch fibers - 70%-85% RM, 5-10 sets to failure,7-10 days rest, 5-10m rest
between sets
Slow twitch fibers - 30-50% RM, 3-5 superseries, superserie is 3x(30s work / 30s rest)
to failure in last set,3-5 days rest, 5-10m rest between sets, partial reps - moving without
stopping
This method is used by some competitive powerlifters and is very effective.

Empirical studies have shown [6] that with increasing external resistance, the maximum
possible number of projectile rises or, as it is also called, repeated maximum (PM)
decreases. External resistance, which in a motor action can be overcome at most once, is
taken as an indicator of the maximum arbitrary strength (MPS) of a giveiven motor action.
If the MPS is taken as 100%, then wrelative value of the resistance and the repeated
maximum.

The increase in strength is associated either with the improvement of muscle activity control
processes, or with an increaseo an increase in the density of myofibrils in muscle fibers, and
then to an increase inoss section [1,14,18,22]. A change in the cross section can also be
associated with an increase in the mass of mitochondria [8.9], stocks of glycogen, and other
organelles [14.15]. However, we note that in a trained person, in the cross section of
muscle fiber, myofibrils and mitochondria occupy more than 90%, therefore, the main factor
of hypertrophy is an increase in the number of myofibrils in muscle fibers, which means an
increase in strength [14]. Thus, the goal of strength training is to increase the number of
myofibrils in muscle fibers. This process occurs when accelerating the synthesis and at the
same rate of protein breakdown. Recent studies have revealed four main factors that
determine accelerated protein synthesis in the cell:

1) Stock o the cell.

2) Increased concentration of anabolic hormones in the blood [3].

3) Increased concentration of free creatine in CF [4.24].

4) Increased concentration of hydrogen ions [10].

The second, third and fourth factors are directly related to the content of training exercises.

The mechanism of synthesis of organelles in a cell, in particular, myofibrils can be described

as follows. During the exercise, ATP energy is spent on the formation of actin-myosin
compounds, the performance of mechanical work. ATP resynthesis is due to creatine
phosphate (CRF) reserves. The appearance of free creatine (Cr) activates the activity of all
metabolic pathways associated with the formation of ATP, namely, glycolysis in the
cytoplasm, aerobic oxidation in mitochondria - myofibrillar, located in the nucleolus and on
the membranes of the sarcoplasmic reticulum (SPR). In fast muscle fibers (BMF), muscle
lactate dehydrogenase (M-LDH) predominates, therefore, pyruvate, formed at the entrance
of anaerobic glycolysis, is mainly transformed into lactate. During this process, hydrogen
(H) ions accumulate in the cell. The glycolysis power is less than the power of ATP costs,
therefore, Cp, N, lactate (La), ADP begin to accumulate in the cell.
Along with an important role in determining contractile properties in the regulation of
energy metabolism, the accumulation of free creatine in the sarcoplasmic space serves as a
powerful endogenous stimulus that stimulates protein synthesis in skeletal muscle. It is
shown that there is a strict correspondence between the content of contractile proteins and
the content of creatine. Free creatine apparently affects the synthesis of information
ribonucleic acids (i-RNAs), i.e. for transcription in the nucleoli of muscle fibers (MV) [4.24].

It is assumed that an increase in the concentration of hydrogen ions causes labilization of

the membranes (an increase in pore size in the membranes, this facilitates the penetration
of hormones into the cell), activates the action of enzymes, and facilitates the access of
hormones to hereditary information and DNA molecules [10]. In response to a simultaneous
increase in the concentration of Cr and H, RNA is formed more intensively. The life span of
i-RNA is short, a few seconds during a strength exercise plus five minutes in a rest pause.
Then, the molecules of i-RNA bind to polyribosomes and provide the synthesis of cell
organelles [1,3,5].

Theoretical analysis shows that when performing a strength exercise to failure, for example
10 squats with a barbell, at the rate of one squat for 3-5 s, the exercise lasts up to 50 s. In
the muscles at this time, a cyclic process is going on: lowering and lifting with a barbell of
1-2 s is performed due to ATP reserves; after 2-3 seconds, when the muscles become less
active (the load extends along the vertebral column and leg bones), ATP is being
synthesized from the reserves of KrF, and KrF is being synthesized due to aerobic processes
in the MMB and anaerobic glycolysis in the BMW. Due to the fact that the power of aerobic
and glycolytic processes is much lower than the rate of ATP consumption, the reserves of
KrF are gradually exhausted, the continuation of the exercise of a given power becomes
impossible - a failure occurs. Simultaneously with the development of anaerobic glycolysis,
lactic acid and hydrogen ions accumulate in the muscle (the validity of the statements can
be seen from the data from studies on NMR installations [19,21]).

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