How to run the P-Zero Full Body program

Who Is This Program For?

P-Zero is for the lifter who has outgrown a beginner program but is not ready for periodisation.

It suits you if:

• You have run GZCLP, Starting Strength or a similar linear progression and stalled
• You want to train four days a week, full body each time
• You want size and strength together rather than one at the expense of the other
• You want a rule that tells you what to do when you miss, rather than a table that assumes you never will

It leans more toward bodybuilding than GZCLP did: higher rep ranges, more exercises, more variety. If your only goal is a powerlifting total, a program built around percentages of a competition max will serve you better.

The Tier System

Those percentages are starting points. From session one the ladders move the weight, so what you enter on day one is a working weight rather than a percentage the app keeps recalculating.

Program Structure

4 Full Body Days

Read the first two columns down and the structure is obvious: every main lift appears twice a week, once as a T1 and once as a T2. The deadlift is heavy on A1 and light on A2; the bench is light on A1 and heavy on A2. That is what makes a full body program recoverable at four days a week.

Six exercises a session, 60 to 90 minutes. Run the four days in order with a rest day between them where you can.

The Three Ladders

Every exercise in this program is a stage ladder. There are three of them.

T1: 3 × 4 + 1 × 5+

Three straight sets, then one rep-out set at a higher rep count than the others. That last set is where the work is: the reps written are the minimum, and you keep going until your form changes or the bar slows.

T2: 4 × 12

Four straight sets, all reps completed, nothing open-ended. T2 is not meant to be hard in the first weeks and that is the point: it is what lets the same lift be trained twice a week.

T3: 4 × 15+

Every set is a rep-out. The reps written are a minimum on all four.

Another way the same tier is often described is "sixty total reps in four sets or fewer, dropping the target by fifteen when it takes more". That is the same thing counted differently: four sets of fifteen is sixty.

Progression: One Rule, Three Times

Complete every set at the stage you are on, and the weight goes up next time.

Fall short, and you drop a stage at the same weight. The sets get shorter, so the weight you could not quite handle for 3 × 4 becomes handleable for 3 × 3, and you keep making progress on it instead of stalling.

T1 at 100 kg, stage 1: 3 × 4 + 1 × 5+   -> completed -> 102.5 kg, still stage 1
T1 at 102.5 kg, stage 1                  -> missed    -> 102.5 kg, stage 2 (3 × 3 + 1 × 4+)
T1 at 102.5 kg, stage 2                  -> completed -> 105 kg, still stage 2

Increments: 2.5 kg / 5 lbs everywhere.

The Two Ends of the Ladder

T1 and T2 cycle back to the top when you miss at the bottom, at the same weight. Missing 3 × 2 + 1 × 3+ puts you back on 3 × 4 + 1 × 5+ without a cut. Nothing in this program ever reduces the weight on the bar; it reduces the reps instead.

T3 cycles back to the top when you SUCCEED at the bottom, with more weight. Clearing 3 × 10+ sends you back to 4 × 15+ at a heavier load. That is the difference between the accessory tier and the other two: it is a loop rather than a descent, which is what keeps the reps high on a tier whose whole job is volume.

Get Your Form Right First

Everything below assumes your form is already solid. Finding your working weight, adding weight, chasing reps, all of it only works if you can perform the lift correctly. While your form is not locked in, that is your only job. Make good form the goal of every set, not the weight on the bar. Drilling the movement with an empty bar beats loading plates onto a lift you cannot control yet.

To learn, don't hesitate to search Google and YouTube (there is a lot of good free material) and record yourself from the side to compare against a proper demonstration. In general, good form means a full controlled range of motion, a braced neutral spine, no bouncing or momentum, a consistent setup every rep, and ending the set when technique breaks down rather than grinding sloppy reps.

Finding Your Starting Weights

You enter working weights, not maxes, because the ladders move the weight from the first session and a percentage would be stale by the second.

Work them out once from your one rep max:

T1 = 1RM × 0.72
T2 = 1RM × 0.52
T3 = about half of the 1RM for that movement

Example:

Your squat 1RM is 140 kg / 310 lbs:
  T1 squat = 140 × 0.72 = 100 kg  /  310 × 0.72 = 223, round to 220 lbs
  T2 squat = 140 × 0.52 =  72.5 kg /  310 × 0.52 = 161, round to 160 lbs

For the accessories you will not have a one rep max, and you should not test one. Take a weight you can do for eighteen or twenty clean reps and start there. Stage 1 asks for four sets of fifteen or more, so a weight you can only just get fifteen reps with on a fresh set will not survive to the fourth.

Round down everywhere. The T1 rep-out set on the first week should give you two or three reps past the minimum. If it gives you exactly the minimum, the weight is too heavy and the ladder will spend its first month walking downhill.

Warming Up

The T1 is the only exercise in the session that needs a real ramp. Everything else is either warmed by it or at a rep count that warms itself.

Rest Times

Rest properly before the T1 rep-out set. It is the set that decides whether the whole session counts as complete, and rushing it costs you the stage.

When Things Go Wrong

Missing is part of the program. Dropping a stage is not a failure, it is the mechanism. A program with no way to miss is a program that stalls.

If you drop through all three stages of a lift twice in a row, your starting weight was too high. Cut that lift 10% and start again at stage 1.

If a T3 is collapsing to single figures by the fourth set, the weight is too heavy for the tier. Cut it 10%.

If your sessions are running past ninety minutes, cut a T3. Four accessories a day is the design, three is fine, and a session you do not finish is worth less than a shorter one you do.

If you feel wrecked rather than tired, take a light week: same sessions, two thirds of the weight, no rep-out set taken near failure. Then resume at the stage you were on.

Program Duration

There is no block length and no scheduled deload. P-Zero runs until it stops working, which for most people is several months.

Take a light week when several lifts drop stages at once. When a lift has cycled through all three stages more than twice without the weight moving, that lift needs a reset rather than another cycle.

Access the Original Program

P-Zero is described in Cody LeFever's book and on his blog:

Swole at Every Height