okay rawdog since you have been training for roughly 2 years one thing to do is technique technique technique for every lift not only bench.
Tips benchwise:
I’m not sure if you do this but if you don’t but I would start filming my bench form on everyday I bench. You will know exactly where your weakpoint is, and see things you don’t notice while your benching.
I do recommend a sort of light or speed day once a week where you pay more attention to your technique, during these days you would be doing easy reps between 3-6,chalk the center of the bar up and wear a darker shirt so after each set you can see if the bar is landing in the same path everytime I have heard this from dave tate and a big bencher I know.
Here’s a cool pointer I learned it deals with weakpoints. If you are having trouble getting the bar off your chest when benching, to determine if it is your shoulders or your lats that are weak do a near max single on incline if it is very close to your regular bench your lats are weak—this is because when benching on an incline your lats aren’t involved at all in the movement.
Another technique tip if you stall at the bottom of bench, try pushing your hands inward immediately after you start pushing of the chest— it recruits more deltoid activity which could make the difference in getting past the first couple of inches or dying right at them. Note: this needs to be practiced with lighter weights first and some lifters it helps others it doesn’t everyone is different.
Another technique tip: if you are have a problem trying to lockout the last few inches start rotating your elbows outward (like you are giving the thumbs down sign) this makes your 'bows lockout the weight if done right but again you have to practice it first w/lighter weight
Training wise I would say what ever lift your want to improve the most train it the most. I have trained my bench and pushing movements up to 3-4 time a week and have made some great progress as a result. Then again my body adapts to movements too quickly so I have to change ever two weeks- this is why train a movement 3-4 times a week.
Well I hope this stuff helps Rawdog. This is all the stuff I can think of off the top of my head. I would be more than happy to go into detail about my training if your are interested.
p.s. I will be posting more later regarding supplement etc.
[quote]marlboroman wrote:
dan81 wrote:
I’m a raw lifter from Australia, where PL isn’t really a big name sport sadly. I’m a PL at heart although my lifts are hardly impressive. I have trained Westside raw several years ago for just over 1 yr. I remember my deadlift jumping about 30kg shortly after starting box squats for DE lower body days.
glad to hear that . I was a bit apprehensive about learning this lift . didnt wanna waste time on a useless lift . I like the way it hits the lower back when done beltless .
Back then I thought I was invincible, never deloaded, never did any stretching and lo and behold some nagging injuries started to creep in - nothing serious, just some soft tissue issues in the shoulders and lower back that thankfully some chiropractic treatment has solved. I’m planning to get back into the Westside saddle again and these days I make sure I stretch religiously and do my facepulls and rotator work.
I just started deloading recently . actually , this week is my first real deload week . when I started lifting 2 years ago , I started with a dude whose quite accomplished . he strictly uses 8 to 10 week peaking cycles .sometimes about 6 weeks into a cycle I would start to feel pretty bad ; ususlly a great week , and then 2 weeks later I would crash . it took over a year to notice this pattern .
so I’m hoping the regular deloads prevents this in the future . I should mention that I was 42 when I started , with ZERO athletic history up 'till then . I was trying so damn hard to keep up with HIS program , I wouldnt pay attention to what my body was saying. needless to say…you know the rest of that sentence.
cheers
[/quote]
By deload, I mean just throttle back on the main movement, say 20-30% intensity and 20-30% less volume. I’ve been doing this since getting back into heavy lifting after just doing bodybuilding training for the past 12 mths. When I was Westside training back in '03 to '05 my CNS was severely overtrained although I didn’t realise at the time. I just kept hammering away until my shoulders and lower back got to the point that I couldn’t do anything above 80% 1RM. Shortly after I became fed up with going nowhere and basically quit lifting for 6mths - I mean zero lifting as in not even seeing the inside of a gym during that time.
Oh yeah, if I didn’t say so before, I was box-squatting with no gear also (no belt even). Just make sure you follow the guidelines in Lou Simmon’s articles - sitting back, knees out, momentary relaxation of hip flexors on box etc.
[quote]I’mCharming wrote:
okay rawdog since you have been training for roughly 2 years one thing to do is technique technique technique for every lift not only bench.
Tips benchwise:
I’m not sure if you do this but if you don’t but I would start filming my bench form on everyday I bench. You will know exactly where your weakpoint is, and see things you don’t notice while your benching.
I do recommend a sort of light or speed day once a week where you pay more attention to your technique, during these days you would be doing easy reps between 3-6,chalk the center of the bar up and wear a darker shirt so after each set you can see if the bar is landing in the same path everytime I have heard this from dave tate and a big bencher I know.
Here’s a cool pointer I learned it deals with weakpoints. If you are having trouble getting the bar off your chest when benching, to determine if it is your shoulders or your lats that are weak do a near max single on incline if it is very close to your regular bench your lats are weak—this is because when benching on an incline your lats aren’t involved at all in the movement.
Another technique tip if you stall at the bottom of bench, try pushing your hands inward immediately after you start pushing of the chest— it recruits more deltoid activity which could make the difference in getting past the first couple of inches or dying right at them. Note: this needs to be practiced with lighter weights first and some lifters it helps others it doesn’t everyone is different.
Another technique tip: if you are have a problem trying to lockout the last few inches start rotating your elbows outward (like you are giving the thumbs down sign) this makes your 'bows lockout the weight if done right but again you have to practice it first w/lighter weight
Training wise I would say what ever lift your want to improve the most train it the most. I have trained my bench and pushing movements up to 3-4 time a week and have made some great progress as a result. Then again my body adapts to movements too quickly so I have to change ever two weeks- this is why train a movement 3-4 times a week.
Well I hope this stuff helps Rawdog. This is all the stuff I can think of off the top of my head. I would be more than happy to go into detail about my training if your are interested.
p.s. I will be posting more later regarding supplement etc.[/quote]
nice to have a raw thread, I tried getting into gear but it just wasn’t me.
Im using bastardized westside. Main difference ive made is DE work now revolves around using 80% 85% and 90% for 3RM 2RM and 1RM doing as many sets within 20 minutes over 3 weeks then (average around 11-14 sets) then one week RE, I found this kind of work has done wonders for my motor skill refinement.
I competed at 198 and my best competiton lifts were:(RAW) squat 352, bench 280 and DL 425. (that was eight years ago!) You dont have to find a meet that specifically caters to raw lifters just show up and compete. I know the numbers aren’t that impressive but for me they were PRs. For those lifts my training was pretty simple. I followed the 3 X 3 program by Germany’s Stephan Korte. Its still up on the deepsquatter website under archives.
I’ve been competing raw (242-275) for a year and a half now. I consider raw to mean whatever equipment your federation will allow and still be considered raw.
If they want to let you use wrist wraps, knee sleeves and a belt, then that’s what I’m going to use, and if it’s belt only, then that is how I’ll train leading up to the meet.
Best lifts in competition so far:
Squat:502
Bench:365
DL:605
I’ve been experimenting with some stuff lately, but I had my best success with a modified Westside template. During which I trained my full ROM lifts for 2-3 weeks in a row working down from triples on week 1 to singles on week 3, and then would take 2-3 weeks and work on partial ROM stuff (board presses, rack pulls, high box squats, etc.)
I kept my assistance work fairly close to Westside, but did my chins/rows on my Lower day instead of my upper day.
The other change I made was alternating DE for two weeks with RE for two weeks, and on my DE work I’d use bands for the first two week cycle and chains for the second two week cycle.
I also found that during my last training cycle, I really didn’t pull from the floor much, and as such my Deadlift didn’t really progress.
I decided that I needed to Deadlift more often in order to see progress, so I took it to the other end of the spectrum and did the Coan/Philippi DL Cycle which has you doing Deads, Speed Deads, SLDL’s, BOR’s and GM’s every week.
I stalled hard at week 7, and just came off a deload. I’ll try to pick back up where I left off, but in reality I probably need to find a happy medium between barely pulling at all and pulling heavy every week. Live and learn.
Modi - nice numbers, thanks for the informative posts. When you did the RE days in place of the DE days, were you taking the sets to fatigue, so in essence you had two “hard” days a week? Or did you just use lighter weight with more reps but still not super intense?
[quote]Tim Henriques wrote:
Modi - nice numbers, thanks for the informative posts. When you did the RE days in place of the DE days, were you taking the sets to fatigue, so in essence you had two “hard” days a week? Or did you just use lighter weight with more reps but still not super intense?[/quote]
Thanks Tim.
I actually did a little of both depending on how I felt. First, I never try to train to failure, I’d rather grind out that last rep, and stop there but sometimes you think you have one more in you, and you don’t.
There were times where I would pyramid the weight up, but go very close to failure on each set. Something like a 10,8,6 scheme, and then other times where I would do 8x3 (repsxsets), 6x4, 5x5, etc. with straight weight, where it was only the last set or two that were hard.
One thing that I always tried to do was walk away with a PR every single time I entered the gym. If I had a bad day and didn’t hit one on my ME/RE movement, then I would still go for a Rep or Weight PR on one of my accessory movements.
Can any of the more experienced lifters out there comment on going to your absolute max effort on ME day? Or hitting your PR, cashing it in, then move on? If say you hit a 2.5kg or 5lb PR in your movement and feel you have a little left in you, do you shut it down or keep going until you fail?
Thanks for the compliment Tim! I have made bench such a piority that I always learn something new! I do have a few more tips for all the raw benchers and raw dog.
take 3 deep breaths before starting(the last one should be the largest) This helps with expanding the your chest and shortening the ROM every little helps
-Dig the webbing between your thumb and forefinger into the bar to ensure a very solid and tight grip
-When lowering the bar push your head down into the bench(this might cause your chest/gut to rise and thus shortening your stroke)
-When attempting a max single, after unracking the bar let the bar sink down into you(don’t bend your elbows! This may shorten your stroke also)
-if you have a problem keeping your ass on the bench spread out your legs wide or squeeze the bench with your legs.
-Find the indicators for your indicators, this sounds a bit odd but if you know what an indicator is for a lift it is a certain accessory or supplemental or ME movement that if you increase it will carry to one of your big three. So now if you know what your indicators are try to dig a little deeper and find what your indicators indcators are this is what will produce the greatest gains in a lift. For example when my 2&3board bench go up so does my regular bench, now if I hit elbows out extensions hard I hit big PR’s with 2&3board and as a result I hit big PR’s with bench, the elbow out extensions themselves do not increase my bench I have found that out through trial and error. Sounds simple but it is hard to do.
Record everything you do in your workouts, all the supplemental lifts etc. because this will give you a better understanding of your indicators and possibly your indicator’s indicators, this will also give you a better look into progress as well.
This is a no brainer but you should continue work your strong points, if you just focus on your weak points and neglect strong points overtime you can very well turn thos strong points into weak points (Talk about irony, this actually happened to me). Jim Wendler put it best in saying TRAIN LIKE EVERYTHING IS WEAK!
Okay I know I have long ass post but I feel that I to contribute everything I have or I am short changing people otherwise.
Alright Rawdog this is the supplement part!
Personally I have never been one for having to include supplements as a part of training. There are two types of people that take supplements: those who work even harder and push themselves even more when using supps, and those who think the supp will do all the work for them and get pissed in the end. Supps are meant to allow you to work harder or recover better so you can gain more with your lifts, it is the person that adds to their lifts not the supplement.
The few supps i do take regularly are weight gainer and bcaa’s and creatine depending on the volume of my training sessions.
Depending on your goals I recommend certain supps. This is assuming you still want to gain strength with each goal.
Maintaining weight: Regular protein and cycle creatine.
Losing weight: Protein and BCAA’s(BCAA’s will prevent catabolism if taken correctly)
Gaining weight: Creatine, weight gainer, protein
Increasing Recovery: Creatine and BCAA’s(BCAA’s should be taken during training session) I recommend taking these supps especially when you are increasing the volume of your training or are using high volume training.
Here you go rawdog my two cents, give me a PM if you want to talk about more about RAW training and what not, infact anyone can PM me if they want to talk more about RAW training, I will only be able to help mostly with benching though.
[quote]dan81 wrote:
Can any of the more experienced lifters out there comment on going to your absolute max effort on ME day? Or hitting your PR, cashing it in, then move on? If say you hit a 2.5kg or 5lb PR in your movement and feel you have a little left in you, do you shut it down or keep going until you fail?[/quote]
I used to “go for the gravy” every time. I missed a lot and that really messed with my recovery. I make a point to try and not miss weight anymore. If I feel really good on a particular day then I might chose to go for 10lbs instead of of 5. If a 5lb PR was really easy then I sometimes will shoot for a triple PR rather then going for more weight. On very rare occasions I will go for more weight.
[quote]Pemdas wrote:
dan81 wrote:
Can any of the more experienced lifters out there comment on going to your absolute max effort on ME day? Or hitting your PR, cashing it in, then move on? If say you hit a 2.5kg or 5lb PR in your movement and feel you have a little left in you, do you shut it down or keep going until you fail?
I used to “go for the gravy” every time. I missed a lot and that really messed with my recovery. I make a point to try and not miss weight anymore. If I feel really good on a particular day then I might chose to go for 10lbs instead of of 5. If a 5lb PR was really easy then I sometimes will shoot for a triple PR rather then going for more weight. On very rare occasions I will go for more weight.[/quote]
I don’t do as good of a job as Pemdas does with this. I tend to go for the gravy every time. If I hit a PR and think I’ve got more, I’ll go for it again, and I’ve missed some lifts because of it. It’s also an easy way to end up overtrained, so that’s why I take a deload week as needed.
It takes a lot of discipline to know when to hold back and when to push. I do agree that if you get a PR and it wasn’t a strain that you should take another PR attempt, but missing lifts definitely messes with your confidence.
I compete raw. I was mainly competing in gear and got burnt out. I have done four raw meets. Two were NASA meets, one was an unsanctioned push/pull and my last was USAPL. I will be competing at the USAPL Raw Nationals the 27th of this month. I will be competing in the 242lbs class. My best raw lifts are:
551lbs squat
385lbs bench press
650lbs deadlift
When I first started powerlifting in '84 bench shirts had just come out and nobody was using them. The squat suits didn’t give you much support and there were no deadlift suits. I got tired of excessive gear and I am taking a break from it.