Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy program – 12 week review

Done. 12 weeks of the Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy program is in the books.

I’ve returned to the Fit3D for a spin, and the results are in. Some muscle was gained. And some fat. I learned a thing or 2, and decided to never do face pulls again. My left calf is pulling away from my right one, and I now have so many semi-naked selfies on my phone I can’t let people scroll through my pics unattended. This post is part review part results wrap.

A 12-week review of the Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy program.

Warning: ‘Tis quite a long read.

What is this blog?

The Journey is… a 30-something year old man trying to get in tip-top shape before 40. Ideally, better shape at 40 than he was at 20 (40>20). The goal? Improve strength, increase muscle mass, learn, and put in place nutrition and training strategies that will support the goal. And the focus is on the home (gym and kitchen that is).

Baseline stats

Start Date: 5th September 2020

Weight: 71.2 kg

Height: 176 cm

% Body fat: 20.29% (eah!?)

Fat mass: 14.4 kg

Lean mass: 56.7 kg

Baseline stats – Fit3D Assessment, week zero – smile, you’re not that outta shape

What is Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy?

“…the primary goal of The Fundamentals Hypertrophy Program is to establish a solid strength base with specifically selected foundational exercises.”

The program consists of 3 separate 8-week training programs (Note: I ran it for 12 weeks).

The full body routine (3 days per week) <- I did this one
The upper/lower routine (4 days per week)
The body part split routine (5 days per week).

Volume across the week is similar for each program so it’s really a matter of preference. I enjoy full-body training and I only want to train 3 times per week. I wrote more about my goals here.

Briefly, workouts in this program consist of:

• 7 exercises per session
• 3 sets for each exercise
• Reps of 5 – 15
• Specified rest periods and RPEs (rate of perceived exertion)

 

Each program comes with printable tables to record your progress. The workout tables also include some useful tips/ cues for each exercise. The pdf is 90+ pages long and packed with useful info for the beginner/ intermediate. There is an anatomy section and Jeff covers fundamental principles like volume, progressive overload, and rate of perceived exertion.

What isn’t Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy?

The program is ultimately about building a foundation of strength and understanding.

“This Fundamentals Training Program manual is not intended to be an all-inclusive resource for all things training related… [it] isn’t intended to teach or instruct you on basic lifting technique and assumes you already have a basic understanding of how to perform the exercises included with proper form.”

Why I chose this program

I fall somewhere just north of beginner as far as resistance training goes so I was looking for a program that put a lot of emphasis on the fundamentals. I wanted to do the basics right, and set a solid foundation for a long-term approach to training.

Broadly speaking, my goals are:

• Develop good technique in major lifts
• Minimise the risk of injury (I’m an old chunk of coal at 36y/o)
• Gain muscle
• Improve strength
• Ensure I get the most out of my efforts in the gym (be efficient)
• Learn more about the core principles of hypertrophy and strength training
• Find a program I could do with a pretty simple home gym

Results

I put on more muscle than I expected (but it cost me slightly more fat than I budgeted for).
Warning – shirtless man photos below.

Fit3D results

[table id=1 /]

* A P-ratio refers to the proportion of weight that is gained as fat-free mass, relative to the total change in weight. Change in fat-free mass ÷ change in total body mass = p-ratio.

Bod Pod results

For anyone that’s interested, I also took Bod Pod measurements. I’ve mostly focused on the Fit3D numbers because it gives you more data. Both are accurate enough, so ultimately being consistent with how you measure body composition is what really matters.

Fit3D body part breakdown

[table id=2 /]

Chest

4cms on the chest! Get in there chest. The old t-shirt is really starting to hug my upper torso like a true gym goer. Sure it’s probably 2.5cms of fat, but whatever.

Hips

I have to make a shout out to the mighty hip thrust here. Jeff seems to love this exercise and I am definitely a convert.

Thighs

I thought I would have bigger gains here. I didn’t push this component of the training too hard though (dodgy back), so that could account for it. Or perhaps the ratio of fat to muscle gained here was more favourable in the muscle category? In other words, the numbers for the chest look really good but fat accumulation here is higher than on the thighs.

Discussion

Is Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy good for the home gym enthusiast?

Can you do it at home? I have a pretty basic setup, so this was actually a bit of a concern going into it.

Result? You need a bit of gear, but this is definitely a program you can do in the ol’ home gym. One of the most helpful aspects of the program is that Jeff has included a bunch of substitution exercises. In other words, if you don’t have a particular piece of kit, you can switch out that exercise. This was also very useful for me as I’m coming off a looooong back injury and was a little worried about performing the squat and deadlift.

My Substitutions

Sub: Barbell back Squat for Belt squat with loading pin
One of my goals was to get back under the bar (and I achieved that goal in the later stages of the program). The belt squat is something I’ve dabbled with to take the weight off my lower back, transfer it to the hips, and still get a sound leg workout. This is clearly not a perfect substitution, but it’s a compromise I’m willing to make, and it worked well for this program.

Sub: Bent over rows for single arm landmine rows
The bent over barbell row is another exercise I LOVE but can’t really do. Again, for the same lower back related reason as above. Again, not a perfect sub, but a pretty good one. I’m also a massive fan of the Landmine for the home gym. Versatile, compact, and you can shoot fireworks out of it.

Sub: Deadlift for Romanian deadlift
If Romanians are famous for anything, it’s their excellent deadlift variation, and Dracula. The deadlift movement is so good for my back, but if I try to lift heavy, things go bad. So, I do a Romanian deadlift instead. I aim for a higher rep range and keep the weight down. Again – not a perfect sub by any means, but works for me.

Sub: Lat pull downs for Pull ups (close grip and wide)
As I’m operating with a ‘free-weight’ style setup, I didn’t have the machine to do lat pulldowns. Even if I did, I would’ve sub’d in pull ups here. I absolutely suck at pull ups and wanted to work on this. Made a bit of progress. Still suck.

A note on substitutions

Substitutions highlight an important point about training (and nutrition for that matter). I’m looking to implement fundamental principles of training to form a scientifically sound foundation for achieving my goals. Beyond that, it’s mostly about personal preference. Everyone is different, so some n=1 experimentation is going to play a role in how you train and eat. If the plan is too prescriptive, you probably won’t stick to it and adherence is crucial to long-term success. Brad Schoenfeld (researcher, fitness expert, hypertrophy guru, legend) put it perfectly.

“Once you understand the scientifically-established guidelines of exercise program design, it’s essential to treat yourself as an n=1 experiment. People respond differently to training, and prescription therefore must be tailored to your own individual response to optimize results.”

Supersets and the 1 hour workout

I super-setted the whole goddamn thing. As I said in a previous post, I don’t want to spend much more than 3 hours in the gym per week so the superset is a useful hack. My goal of 1 hour sessions (x3) didn’t quite pan out however, as once you factor in the warm up (the program includes an excellent warm up) and sufficient rest periods, I was looking at more like 1 hour and… 20 mins.

Why superset

I know the arguments against the superset. I know the cost. But the benefit outweighs the cost for me in this case. Also, Jeff said it was cool, see ↓

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6QIGfxN6b0&ab_channel=JeffNippard

A note on fatigue

Things can get a little dicey as far as fatigue goes when doing super sets. I found that if I wasn’t feeling primed for a session, the super set system killed me. I felt it placed even more importance on the need to be ready to go when you enter the gym. Sleep, and to a lesser extent meal timing, became crucial. If I didn’t sleep well, I pushed the session back a day.

A note on Nutrition

I should mention here that this is clearly not the full story – the other side of the weight plate is of course nutrition. I didn’t simply buy the program, hammer it out for 12 weeks, and hope for the best. Getting my nutrition right according to my goals was crucial. I will go into detail about what I did regarding nutrition during this experiment in another post.

But briefly…

• I measured my maintenance calories (Fit3D gave me this data – but I went with the Carbon diet app).
• I ate in a 10% caloric surplus
• I ate (roughly) 2.2g protein per kg of lean body mass
• I tracked my calories using the Carbon – Smart Diet Coach app

My diet wasn’t perfect, but I did enough to ensure I was moving in the right direction. As I’ve covered in a previous post, I see tracking calories as a very useful nuisance. It’s an investment in time that pays off in the long run. Anyway, more to come on nutrition in a later post. Because we need more people talking about nutrition on the internet, right?

Cons

Not a lot to complain about. I enjoyed it, it worked really well (based on my goals), and delivered on the promises it made.

The most obvious thing that I think is lacking (from a beginner’s point of view) is emphasis on technique. Jeff is very clear that the program assumes a certain level of proficiency when it comes to technique, and he provides links to videos of other people completing the movements.

But, some properly made, detailed Jeff Nippard technique clips associated with every movement would take this program to another level. I supplemented my learning with additional technique videos, and I think I needed to do this to get the most out of the program.

Final thoughts

So, there you have it. 12 weeks of the Jeff Nippard Fundamentals Hypertrophy program in the books. It was surprisingly manageable in terms of volume and I really enjoyable it. Putting on muscle takes time. Getting in shape takes time. An incredible amount of discipline over many, many years is required to achieve a physique like Jeff Nippard’s. It’s not my goal to reach that point (if it’s yours, power to ya), but learning from science-based pros that have done it (and no doubt made plenty of mistakes along the way) is a good place to start. And that’s what this program is. A place to start and a very good one at that.

Thanks Jeff Nippard! I really liked your program mate.

Heave-ho!