Decent session today. Cable rows feel like I’m on a cheat code at the moment since reconnecting to scapular depression. I’ve gone from toying around 70-75kg x 10-15 for ages with shitty grindy cheaty shruggy reps whilst feeling pain every week… to today hitting 80kg 3 x 16 with no pain at all, much cleaner reps, no momentum. I’m chuffed by that.
Seated OHP - 55kg x 7, 57kg x 6, 57kg x 6.
My goal has been to be back with the 60kg as a minimum standard to feel “strong again”. Not far from it.
Sadly though my bench is still in poverty. Every week my form is getting “slightly” better but I still have days where I just fall apart. Chest collapses, head tilts up and back rubbish. Been banging around the same numbers for a while but today I DID feel my chest staying up throughout the whole set so hopefully see some progression now because all my other lifts are climbing.
Armpit tendon injury had me avoiding vertical pulls for ages, recurring pec strains had me “compensating” and sleeping on my back on a super soft mattress completely messed me up. Shoulders rolled forward, thoracic spine immobile etc. I’m very deep into “the mend” now though.
Today was the first time I managed to cue my chest to the bar properly and not shrug so I’m desperately hoping this is the end. Fingers crossed. I’m also doing 4 sets instead of 3 now so I don’t put pressure on myself to progress but just focus on doing the movement properly instead of that “get more reps, go back to shit compensated form”.
Given myself the weekend off for my birthday. I’m trying to avoid week-long deloads these days and autoregulate more as my overall volume isn’t as high, and I’m not as regimented as I used to be.
The way I see it is making a 4 day week a 3 day week every few weeks and then the odd extra day or two off if I’ve got too much stuff on or have a bit of a tweak is the equivalent over time anyway. I’m not doing bodybuilding marathons or trying to squat and/or deadlift twice a week anymore so I believe I can get away with that.
Felt light, and I’ve gone up a notch on the belt but feel it’s from torso thickness rather than body fat which is cool. I’ve never done this sort of volume before with these weights.
Sadly, felt something on warm-ups on cable rows with just 65kg in my lat/teres/armpit area. There’s these two lovely women that come in the gym I talk to, which is fine, but sometime it’s breaks my concentration and I must not have set my shoulders properly as I unracked. I went on to continue to do 80kg x 15, 82kg x 15, 82kg x 15 without pain which is “good”. I also did curls 3x12 with 20kg but felt a couple of twinges in that area on a few reps. I skipped facepulls because the area was hurting by then.
I’m sure it’s just something really minor that clears up in a couple of days. I hope I wasn’t silly to carry on. Sometimes I build minor niggles like this up in my head but I want to hit my goal of 150kg 4x8 nextweek!
Training is so strange these days. I can have a shit session, everything just feels wrong and then the next day everything feels so right. My pragmatic brain says “you’ve just come off a block of training where you went from that much weight to this much weight”, it’s bank holiday weekend this weekend, give yourself 4 days off then re-enter a new block fresh". Then I have a good session and my neandrethal brain is like “fuck that shit, yeah, lets goooooo”.
I’m going on a short holiday at end of the next month so the smart thing to do is enjoy the bank holiday (probably go in Saturday and do a much lighter Upper to stay active outside of walking) and then come back Tuesday and smash 3-4 weeks of a block with excitement.
Random thought:
I used to think most people don’t anything more compex than double–progression. BUT it also feels like, there comes a point where you can’t just keep adding an extra rep every week without burying yourself - on the main lifts especially.
On a heavy lift like a deadlift variation, building up to a certain weight for a certain amount of sets + reps (3-4x8), taking 10kg off, and then building back up with a 3-4x9 just feels more predictable, more recoverable and more joint friendly. Once you hit the 3-4x9 at the top weight, go back down again and build back up with sets of 10’s. This basic kind of wave double-progression also works as an autoregulated deload because that first week of the new block is always going to feel easier despite it actually being a volume PR. Yeah it might be slower, but that’s the whole point - because if there’s anything I learned from reading Jim Wendler it’s “don’t look at what you’re doing next week, imagine where you could be in 6 months.”
I saw something on line the other day about wave loading.
It went:
Week 1 - 3 sets of 8 reps
Week 2 - 4 sets of 6 reps (with a 5% increase from the week 1 weight)
Week 3 - 5 sets of 5 reps (with a 5% increase from week 2 weight)
Each week its a total increase in volume and looks quite good.
Although my concerns with something like this is your first set can’t be near failure if you only hit (week 1) 8 reps with a weight and then are expected to hit the same weight/ reps for two more sets.
Depending on programming (and overall volume), then it’s not overly common that you hit too close to failure on your first set anyway. As we both know, there are a million different ways to do this but a typical “3 HARD SETS” usually goes like first set 2 in the tank, second set 1 in the tank, third set probably no chance of getting an extra rep. You’re right in the implication that if you go to close to failure you’re gonna see a rep drop in the next sets (which is fine depending on programming strategy). Years ago I heard “take at least one set to max safe reps” and I try to stick to that. The first and second sets can feel just as hard though for a number of reasons. Wave loading like our examples don’t rely on any of this though.
Wave loading kind of programming isn’t about proximity to failure in the same way we learn about hypertrophy training. It’s about increasing intensity or volume over a training block so that you can progress more predictably and sustainably over longer time periods. This is exactly why 5/3/1 style programmers always say to start with a lower “training max” - it gives you a longer run way before you hit walls. Wave loading works by pragmatic progression, not heroic efforts. The reason I want to do it on RDLs is because I’m playing with weights not far from double my bodyweight. Double-progression toying close to failure quite simply doesn’t feel safe every single week, I start to dread my sessions, and I feel it takes away more than it gives. I’m 37 now and I want to feel good aswell as be strong.
I quite like my current progression using 5-8 reps as a guide and then using the same weight for each set. I drop reps on each set but that’s fine as long as i stay in the range. When my first set reaches the top of the range i add weight. I quite like it but haven’t been running it over an extended period to fairly review it yet.
Last year i ran the first set 5-8 reps and second set 8-12 with a 10%-20% reduction in weight (think i stole it from Jordan Peters). They worked really well in my bulk and cut. i constantly added strength and progressed really well. The only reason i changed it is i got bored and needed something fresh.
Yeah your first paragraph is pretty much how I train most exercises. Sometimes I might get 10, 8, 7 and add weight next session. Sometimes I might get 10, 9, 10. I don’t think about it too much as long as I add weight over time. As long as you’re in the rep range you aiming for, it’s all cool.
I did the Jordan Peters stuff for a while too. I progressed fast but also ran into a brick wall fast, abandoned form fast, picked up niggles fast. With two sets it was like DO OR DIE and every set just became a MUST PROGRESS mission. With what you and I do now, there’s at least 3 chances to get a bit of progression - and that makes me enjoy the gym more. If I didn’t give it all on a JP set I’d feel like I’d failed myself. With 3 sets if I left one or two in the tank or made a mistake or whatever, so what? I’ve got 3 chances to build quality volume and tension.