Ben Johnson Coaching

WORK WITH EBS🚀

EBS is a health and fitness company, founded in November 2020, by Ben Johnson.

EBS online coaching has helped hundreds of lifters worldwide to gain muscle, add kg’s to their lifts and crush their goals.

We’re bringing together a growing community of lifters in 10+ countries and quickly expanding!

If you are interested in joining the team, please send us a DM or click the link on our profile bio📲

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👨🏻‍💻www.evidencebasedstrength.com
📩[email protected]

ABOUT ME👋🏻

I’m a powerlifter and strength coach

I have been coaching in some capacity since ~2016.

I started out studying football performance at Hartpury College, with the goal of maximising sports performance on the pitch.

I then spent 4 years studying at University, earning both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Sport and Exercise Science. During which, I conducted primary scientific research and gained education on programming, sports psychology, nutrition, behaviour change, biomechanics & more.

Alongside my studies, I coached in-person for many years at a commercial gym and University Sports Centre. I worked with a wide range of clients; including complete beginners to experienced athletes.

To date, I have coached 100+ lifters in 10+ countries. I specialise in strength training, primarily helping powerlifters improve their squat, bench press & deadlift, in preparation for competition.

I also compete in powerlifting myself, in the IPF as an U105kg lifter. My current best lifts are a 235kg (518lb) squat, 157.5kg (347lb) bench press and 300kg (661lb) deadlift.

If you are interested in working with me, send me a DM!📲

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👨🏻‍💻www.evidencebasedstrength.com
📩[email protected]

Competition day tomorrow🫡

My debut as an U105kg lifter, weighing in at a huge 95-96kg😂

Feeling pretty good for this one, it’s been a better prep than usual. Squats haven’t been feeling great, but bench & deads are in a good place.

If you want to tune in:
🗓️WM Spring Championship - Saturday 6th April
🕒Lift off at 3pm - flight C
📽️Live stream available YouTube channel

Appreciate anyone who has offered support🙏🏻

Let’s go hit a pr total😤

When it comes to strength training, lifters and coaches often fall into 2 main camps:

Camp 1👇🏻
No exercise variation at all. If it isn’t the competition lift, it’s useless.

Camp 2👇🏻
Conjugate style training. Let’s do some reverse band, close grip, paused, tempo, spoto bench press!

I am of the opinion that somewhere in-between these two camps is probably the most effective way to go, for long term strength development.

To be clear, in accordance with the principle of specificity, if we want to get stronger in the SBD, we need to focus the majority of our training on the SBD, no doubt about it.

However, there are very real benefits to using movement variation, some of which I think many lifters don’t understand or recognise.

First of all, from an athletic development standpoint, the evidence suggests that including movement variation in a training program improves motor learning. Essentially, if we focus on a very limited number of movement patterns, the rate and quality of motor learning tends to be less efficient.

By introducing greater movement variability, the neuromuscular system gets to explore different solutions to a range of movement problems. This is why you’ll notice that many great powerlifters often come from a diverse sporting background.

Additionally, exercise variations also give the lifter an opportunity to self organise their technique, to improve efficiency. Not everyone responds to cueing, some lifters need to experience technique errors and correct them in real time - e.g. correcting a chest fall pattern with a pin squat or paused squat.

Furthermore, variations can also improve psychological enjoyment of training, leading to improved adherence. Those who tend to be more consistent with their training undoubtedly become stronger, compared to those who don’t.

Finally, movement variability can also be useful for load management and reducing the likelihood of overuse injuries. As a practical example, consider the utility of load-constrained movements like tempo, paused and beltless variants and their impact on fatigue generated.

Interested to hear your thoughts below!⬇️

Post meet blues🥲

*cue dramatic music*

I never really see this talked about on social media, but I know a lot of lifters who have experienced this phenomenon.

It makes sense right…

Weeks and months of high pressure training, lots of hype, competitive mindset, all culminating in one long and intense day of lifting.

Then after the meets done, meh.

All that high energy prior to comp, followed by a sudden drop.

You go from your peak strength, feeling sharp, weights moving fast…
…to detrained, weak and feeling beat up.

Your body feels exhausted and the realisation sets in that you have to spend months building all over again until you hit another pr…

I experienced this last week, after competing. For the week afterwards, I felt exhausted, no motivation to go to the gym, general feelings of low mood, poor appetite and sleep disturbances.

Here are a few things that may help:
👉🏻Lower pressure to go to the gym the week after comp
👉🏻If you do train, have some fun with it and include more variation
👉🏻Set some clear goals and outline a plan going forward
👉🏻Focus on other tasks/hobbies outside of the gym

Ultimately, if you consistently feel like s**t the week after a competition, I would plan ahead for it:

Take a look at your peaking/tapering strategy prior to the meet and consider taking more of a minimal taper approach, so you don’t detrain so significantly.

After the comp, don’t force yourself to jump straight back into an intense training block or to hit your macros perfectly. Go in and do some bodybuilding work a couple times, eat with a bit more freedom and enjoy some more downtime.

After the weeks up, get a plan written, outline some goals and get back to chasing them🎯

Have you ever experienced ‘post meet blues’? Let me know below⬇️

WM Winter Cup - 26/11/2023

220/150/300

These pictures came out so clean! 🙏🏻

On to Nationals🫡

Manchester Open 2023

Client - Alex Martin

Squat - 235kg (15kg pr)
Bench - 147.5kg (17.5kg pr)
Deadlift - 280kg (missed 300 on 3rd)

Absolutely brilliant day for Alex, only thing missing was the third attempt deadlift.

Best believe he’s going to lock it out in the next one🫡

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Ready to join the team and hit some pr’s too?

Join a growing community of lifters , all working together to be the best athletes they can be🙏🏻

📩[email protected]
👨🏻‍💻www.evidencebasedstrength.com
📲Or send me a DM!

Just before I saw John Wick 4, 4/10 would not recommend lol🫠

What to do when progress stalls⬇️

My own training has been absolutely terrible lately, so I thought it might be helpful to provide an insight into how I manage programming when progress stalls.

Assuming external factors are producing an environment conducive to making progress in the gym, a lack of progress can usually be narrowed down to 2 major causes:

1. Too much fatigue
2. Not enough stimulus

If you are constantly sore, tired, rating session RPE's >8, perceive a high training load and motivation is decreasing, it is likely that fatigue is too high. In this case, we can adjust variables such as training volume, intensity, frequency and exercise selection to lower the overall training stress.

Conversely, if you consistently experience no soreness, feel fresh, are motivated to train, rate session RPE's

All of the best recovery tools are free.

Focus on:
✅Sleeping 7-9 hours per night
✅Managing life stress
✅Eating properly
✅Running an intelligent training program
✅Making time to relax

That’s it. You don’t need to spend any money to recover more.

If you’ve got the basics in check and you want to foam roll, stretch or get a massage, feel free.

But get your basics in check first.

Throughout my years of coaching and training, I have observed that many powerlifters deadlifts are under developed, relative to their squat and bench press.

One of the main reasons for this, in my opinion, is because many lifters train the deadlift far too hard, too heavy and too close to failure.

To be clear, I don’t think the deadlift is uniquely fatiguing or difficult, but I can’t think of many examples where I have seen positive results from increasing a clients deadlift intensity or having them deadlift closer to failure.

Here are some things that HAVE helped myself and my clients build stronger deadlifts:

✅Regular exposure to sub maximal singles (1 rep -8).

✅Performing the bulk of the deadlift volume at lower percentages, ~70% e1RM (RPE6 and below).

✅Keeping secondary deadlift days light, with moderate to high volumes. Higher repetition ranges seem to work well here (~6-8 reps) to limit bar load, although some individuals may need a heavier top set exposure.

✅Closely monitoring accessory work that fatigues the lower back (heavy rows, standing presses, etc).

✅Stimulating the hip extensors without fatiguing the lower back - e.g. favouring isolation work like hamstring curls over RDL’s, SLDL, etc.

Interested to hear everyones thoughts and experiences with the deadlift below⬇️