im not sure why, but my deadlift numbers are not going ANYWHERE. in fact, they just went down today quite a bit, given that i took 2 weeks off.
little bit of background, i am 5"10, 195 lbs. been lifting a few years now. i started deadlifting about 2 years ago, but because i had no fucking clue what i was doing, threw out some discs in my lower back, but i was able to pull about 350ish at 5x5. i just started doing deadlifts again about 2 months ago after many many hours of watching proper technique and starting with very low weights to make sure i am doing them correctly.
anyway, i went from, doing 5x5, 205 to 295 on a couple of days, then back to 285 and was stuck there for several weeks. nothing great i know. but after my 2 week break, today i had to drop the weight to 255 and couldnt even lift 275. whats the deal? i hit my legs very hard on leg days, quads and hamstrings especially since my lower body and lower back are extremely weak from my previous injuries. my diet is very in check. let me know what you guys think, thanks in advance
You might have to use different programming. I would think it would be very difficult to recover from 5x5 on a regular basis. I personally like the way Sheiko programming waves the volume and intensity.
You probably aren’t getting weaker so much as you are underrecovering between workouts.
jimmy
it’s not unusual to have an off day when you can’t hit even weights well within your max range. it could be due to lots of things: your focus or intensity was off, technique was off, whatever chalk it up to just having a bad day. Now if you’re missing lifts that you normally pull repeatedly then i’d say you have to examine more thoroughly where the prob lies.
if you’re going for max lifts you gotta fuel the bod, so too much dieting (restricting carbs, protein)could be one problem.
What are your other lifts doing? I would put a lot of effort into squatting and stiff leg deadlifts for a couple months and then come back to the conventional deadlift and see where it is.
overtraining,undereating,insufficient recovery. take a month off from deadlifting ( you won’t destroy the strength ), then decide for a program to run, for instance a powerlifting program.
personally i only pull heavy every other week. for a long time i pulled twice a week because my body could handle it. I would pull heavy on my ME day and then do speed pulls for 5-8 singles on my DE day. But then my DL stalled. For my current cycle I’m only pulling on my ME day. One week ill pull >95% and the next week ill pull for speed. my deadlift shot up again. I was stuck at 415 for about 4 months and then this past monday i pulled 445 with gas left in the tank. i know its tempting to pull hard every week because you feel the strength will dissipate, but it wont.
and i agree with bergeron, i would pull with less volumes. More singles, less sets of 5.
I can only pull 1 time/week. I had great success with the Coan/Phillipi program. Warm-up, 1 heavy set, then a few sets of no more than 3 reps seems to be my sweet spot.
Best of luck to you and hope you find what works best for you.
I like 3x2 heavy 5X2 60 LBS lighter with 90 sec rests on the lower sets. Also instead of jumping up weight graduate 5 to 10 lbs a week for 8 to 12 weeks then go bak to 5X5 for 8-12 week and repeat using sets of two or three reps. Each time you cycle you will gain.
if you threw your back out deadin’ then you might want to work on more single leg stuff and hip movements (db swings, pull thrus etc) as accessories to your deadlift work
as far as why your numbers have stalled: it could be a number of things. nutrition, sleep, training. eat more, sleep more and maybe try these for training.
add bands
add chains
do some rack pulls (focus on squeezing glutes)
try some explosive work like cleans, hang cleans.
make sure you warm up proper. that means more then starting with 135lbs.
do mobility work, maybe even a few overhead squats to get the body moving in the right direction.
i know you just took time off so i won’t suggest a “deload” week or anything but keep that in mind for the future.
don’t let this one time fool you. step back and see the forest through the trees my friend.
Deadlift gains are elusive. The deadlift itself is not necessarily to be the best exercise to make your deadlift go up.
Deadlifting is very psychological. A heavy pull requires a certain amount of reckless abandon and confidence. After an injury, sometimes you think that confidence is back but it may not be.
[quote]HBergeron wrote:
5x5 may be too much volume for deadlifts. Try doing fewer sets, and see where that takes you.[/quote]
I agree it sounds like too much volume. But I would back off the reps not sets. Iâ??ll do as many as 8 sets of deadlifts but rarely pull for more than 3 reps on a working set.
[quote]Pinto wrote:
stallion wrote:
As a side note, I’ve always focused mostly on the squat, and the deadlift have always followed.
Now- why does it not surprise me that you would advise him to squat more?[/quote]
Well it worked for me… my squat went from 180kg x3 with wraps to 207.5kg x4 in a belt and my deadlift went from 250kg to 250kg. So obviously squatting’s the best way to improve your deadlift.
[quote]Hanley wrote:
Pinto wrote:
stallion wrote:
As a side note, I’ve always focused mostly on the squat, and the deadlift have always followed.
Now- why does it not surprise me that you would advise him to squat more?
Well it worked for me… my squat went from 180kg x3 with wraps to 207.5kg x4 in a belt and my deadlift went from 250kg to 250kg. So obviously squatting’s the best way to improve your deadlift.[/quote]
Haha same happened to me!
Anyway, a 5x5 as a measure of your true deadlift strength doesn’t seem very good to me. Reps with deadlift differ from day to day for me, and a lot of people I’ve seen. If you specifically trying to get a stronger pull, you should probably reevaluate your training.
