In powerlifting and Olympic weightlifting, the competition movements are fixed. You know exactly what your client will be asked to do on the platform. Strongman is different. The event list varies by competition, and it's often announced only a few weeks before the show. Programming a strongman competitor means building an athlete who is broadly capable and then sharpening toward whatever specific events are announced.
The event pool is large and variable
Any given strongman competition might include a log press, an axle deadlift, a yoke walk, farmer's carries, a tire flip, a loading medley with stones or kegs, a car deadlift, a sandbag carry, or a Viking press. Regional promoters design their own events. Nationals and international shows tend toward more standardized formats, but even those shift year to year.
This means a strongman competitor needs to be competent — not necessarily expert — across a wide range of strength and power expressions: overhead pressing, picking and carrying odd objects, walking with heavy loads, loading implements to height, and sustaining effort across multiple short-duration maximal or near-maximal events within a single competition day.
That breadth shapes the off-season. When a competition is not imminent, the training program should build general strength and work capacity across the major event categories. When the event list is confirmed, the program shifts to emphasize the specific implements and movement patterns that will appear on competition day.
The atlas stone deserves its own programming consideration
The atlas stone is to strongman what the snatch is to Olympic weightlifting: technically demanding, physically unique, and the event that often separates competitors when the competition is close. Loading a spherical stone from the floor to a platform requires a specific technique — breaking the stone from the floor in a stiff-leg position, lapping it against the torso, getting hips through and driving upright — that can't be fully replicated without the stone itself.
The problem is that atlas stones are hard on the body. The repeated loading of the arms, the compression against the forearms and chest, and the eccentric demand of the stiff-leg pull from the floor adds up quickly. Most experienced coaches train stones no more than twice a month in the general preparation phase and increase frequency only in the specific preparation and competition phases. Accessory work — stiff-leg deadlifts for the pull, stone simulator exercises for grip and chest loading, deficit deadlifts for the hip and back strength needed off the floor — fills the gap in between.
Event training and strength training need to coexist without crushing recovery
This is the core programming challenge in strongman. The base of a program looks somewhat like powerlifting — deadlifts, squats, pressing — but layered on top of that foundation is event-specific training that adds significant additional volume and metabolic demand.
A yoke walk after a heavy squat session is not the same as a second squat session. The yoke taxes the upper back, core, and hip flexors in ways a squat doesn't. Farmer's carries add grip and trap fatigue. A log press session the day after heavy pressing is a very different recovery equation than a bench accessory day. The trainer's job is to map the total demand of the week — not just the barbell work — and schedule it so the athlete is able to train hard throughout without accumulating so much fatigue that the quality of each session deteriorates.
Separating heavy event work from heavy barbell sessions by at least 24 to 48 hours is a reasonable starting point for most intermediate competitors. More experienced athletes may tolerate more overlap. The client profile and session notes tell you how well this particular athlete recovers — that data should inform the schedule more than any generic weekly template.
Equipment access shapes the program from the start
A client training at a dedicated strongman gym has access to logs, yokes, stones, farmers handles, and loaded implements. That client can train events directly and frequently. A client at a commercial gym needs more creative programming — axle bar work for the pressing and pulling adaptations, trap bar carries for farmers walk approximations, sandbag loading for stone mechanics, belt squat walks for yoke conditioning.
The substitutions are legitimate and effective when applied thoughtfully, but they're not the same as training the events directly. A client using substitutions should get access to actual implements — through a strongman-specific gym, an outdoor training session, or a training partner with equipment — at least occasionally in the competition preparation phase. You can build the capacity with substitutes; you still need some direct practice with the real thing.
Competition prep requires knowing the specific event list
The moment event announcements drop, the program should shift. Four to six weeks is a reasonable competition prep window for most athletes — enough time to accumulate specific event practice, sharpen conditioning, and taper volume before the show.
In that phase, the events themselves take priority. The base strength work gets reduced in volume, intensity is managed carefully, and the sessions are structured to simulate competition demands: performing events under fatigue, practicing transitions between implements, and building the specific work capacity needed for the format that's been announced. If it's a max log press followed by a yoke medley, those two movements need to appear together in training in the final weeks. If it's a five-stone loading race, stone volume and pacing practice have to go up.
What the client profile needs to capture
A strongman client profile should include current maxes on the major barbell movements, known event strengths and weaknesses, equipment access, competition history, the upcoming competition schedule, and any injury history particularly in the lower back, biceps (stone work and deadlifts carry significant bicep injury risk), and shoulders.
Personal trAIner PRO holds all of that in the client profile and uses it to inform session generation and training roadmaps. When the event list drops and you need to pivot the final six weeks of prep, the profile, the benchmarks, and the session history are all there — so the adjustment takes minutes, not hours.
Strongman athletes tend to be intensely committed to the sport. They deserve programming that's as thoughtful as the effort they put in.