Last November-ish I had a Brown Recluse bite in my armpit that got infected. I ended up needing a minor surgical procedure and about 3 weeks off from lifting.
I was going for 250x5 when I had to stop.
It’s 3 months later, and my bench has been stuck at about 220x5 and refuses to go up. I don’t have any pain and the doctor said I was healed perfectly, but I can’t get over this hump. It’s starting to get to the point where I get to my presses on my Madcow 5x5 and I feel embarrassed or don’t even want to try without a few minutes trying to pump myself up for them. Things go great until the last set, then I just bomb and the frustration builds.
are you getting any pain or tightness in that area that may be limiting your ROM or otherwise making you tentative about pressing?
how have your other upper body presses and pulls progressed since November? if you are doing any other direct tricep or shoulder work, how has that progressed?
Make sure you actually know how to bench press with good form?
It’s not hard to get into the low-mid 2’s with shit form, but it’s pretty hard to get into the numbers that are actually considered a strong bench unless you have solid form.
you could try to deload for a week or two cutting on volume or you could give up the bench for a bit and substitute with a different exercise. Or again you could change your set and reps. Plateau happen every now and then. it’s absolutely normal
Well, I’m a big fatty lol. I’m 6’0 shoeless, ~340 pounds. I drink a gallon of milk a day, not because I’m trying to do GOMAD, but because it’s fucking delicious and goes so good with Myofusion and ON whey, and is itself a cheap protein. I’m kinda poor and going to college so I don’t have too much money for food, so I eat dirty. Lots of ground beef from a hot pan. I try to get at least 270+ grams of protein a day by any means available.
All of my presses have slowed a lot, but bench is just going down, I’ve done resets of 10 and 20% of the weight and worked back up, but I stall in the same spots. My pulls are on a reset but my bent over row topped out at 205x5.
My left shoulder hurts when I try pull-ups/pulldowns. It generally doesn’t hurt from pressing.
I was thinking about changing the Bench, but the most common response is “don’t fuck with the program”. I figured I’d stick with it till I wrap up Madcow, but lately my squats have been going so much better (I took a break from Madcow to do the RSR and now my squat feels like it’s going up like when I first started 5x5), I want to ride it out a bit more before I switch to WS4SB or 5/3/1.
If you’ve tried a deload with no luck, focus on these:
Increasing your overhead press
Increasing your external rotation strength (DB external rotations)
Perform exercises to work the Lower Trap (trap 3 raise)
Work on reverse curls (yes curls can help you get past a bench plateau)
Perform incline bench presses
Brown recluse bite kills muscle tissue (among other things) - as in, the flesh is gone. It’s hard to build new muscle tissue. Probably takes longer than a few months.
you could try to switch to dumbbells for a while and see what happens. Considering the press is going backwards it would be stupid to continue. Ideally though you’re right, don’t mess with the program.
Well I’ve been thinking of subbing in the Dumbbell bench for a little while, I think my left arm is a little weaker than my right and holding me back a bit, which is weird because I’m left handed.
I guess for my next bench workout I’ll use the dumbbells in sets of 5 reps and climb up till my form starts to degrade and start from just below that.
I’m sure everyone is familiar with the Madcow 5x5 setup, so I don’t think I need to post it. The only variation I’ve made is I was told to alternate the standing military press and incline bench whenever I stall out, reset, and stall again, unless significant progress was made. I’m thinking of just using dumbbells for all my presses for a few weeks.
Also, does anyone have any feedback on if should I move on to 5/3/1 or WS4SBs after my Squats stop progressing? I may be getting a redshirt freshman year at my local college for football.
[quote]Experiment1 wrote:
Well I’ve been thinking of subbing in the Dumbbell bench for a little while, I think my left arm is a little weaker than my right and holding me back a bit, which is weird because I’m left handed.
I guess for my next bench workout I’ll use the dumbbells in sets of 5 reps and climb up till my form starts to degrade and start from just below that.
I’m sure everyone is familiar with the Madcow 5x5 setup, so I don’t think I need to post it. The only variation I’ve made is I was told to alternate the standing military press and incline bench whenever I stall out, reset, and stall again, unless significant progress was made. I’m thinking of just using dumbbells for all my presses for a few weeks.
Also, does anyone have any feedback on if should I move on to 5/3/1 or WS4SBs after my Squats stop progressing? I may be getting a redshirt freshman year at my local college for football.[/quote]
The thing is that in theory you could stick to the madcow for years and have great gains. You would only have to figure out every now and then how to get out of plateaus (just like any other program). Ultimately is really a judgement call you have to make if not only to have a break psychologically and have fun with something new.
