A while back, I wrote a post on your thread here regarding slavery, and this is sorta a revisit of it.
Whenever you say you can’t do something, you’ll be right. The same often holds true when you say you can.
Don’t accept that you just think or behave a certain way; it’s all within your control. And the better you control it, the more effective you can implement it. Being driven is great, being angry can be useful, etc etc, but being those things when you NEED to be those things is the most effective.
Personally I used to struggle with the same issue with feeling like there is more in the tank and wanting to push harder. I always wanted to test my limits. Until I heard a very simple quote. Brian Shaw said something along the lines of “If I don’t fail in training, I have no limit come competition time”. For me that changed a lot mindset wise. I don’t think I’ll ever plan for failure or coming close to in my training.
It also changed my motivation in the sense that anytime I fail a prescribed rep/set, it pisses me off and gives me fuel for my next heavier/harder training session to push hard enough that I feel like I have 1 or 2 more in the tank, simply for the sake of not knowing where I stand. That type of unknown excites me.
So maybe that can give you a different perspective on the workouts that feel “easier”
I wasn’t referring to training to failure though. I believe training to failure is silly and unnecessary for progress. (I think failure on isolation movements can be beneficial) i was saying instead of a set of squats having 4 more reps in the tank, pushing myself more so that two is left in the tank.
todays training
Worthless. don’t even know whats happening but my shoulder strength has regressed. Every week its getting worse. Also my push press form is absolute shit. Everythings getting stronger except for my shoulders. Today i was doing seated dumbell presses and even the 15kg dumbells were hard but then i picked them up after a set and started curling them. Wtf. Something is very wrong. I’m going to have to rethink my shoulder training because what I’m doing is far from working. I’ll probably take a couple of week break from shoulder work. Maybe they’re over trained or some shit
Remember that fatigue masks fitness; your ability to perform will regress as you begin to overreach, but the amount of strength you actually have may not decrease. Take some time off from shoulder work (say, a week or so) and within a couple of sessions you should be all good again. (Given that you don’t overcompensate by increasing the volume of other pressing you are doing)
Also, if you’ve been using neurally draining methods like rest pause for a tad too long it’s no wonder your ability to perform has gone down for a while.
In a few year you will be a prime candidate for westside style training. Once you learn the discipline side of lifting. Right now you are in the exploratory figure it out stage. It’s a great place to be in and a ton of fun.
Nothing, not amount of advice, can replace time in the gym and making mistakes and experiences under the bar.
Pressing seems to be tricky for just about everyone. I haven’t seen any of the folks I follow on here say that their pressing strength improves quickly. I’ve seen many people improve damn near everything but their OHP, myself included.
It’s a strange beast. Just keep playing with different methods. You’re in good company.
The first time I ran SGSS I failed to get 170 overhead. A couple weeks later I hit 165 for 3. It made no sense. It still makes no sense lol
My overhead went from 135x3 to 175x3 doing 5/3/1. Then to 195x1, back down to 185×1, back up to 195x1 but only 175x2. Now it’s at 200x1, but the stars need to be aligned to get it. It will never make sense, always 2 steps forward 3 back, then 4 forward then 2 back, then another 2, then 8 forward.
I’ll second maier and Cams thought on ohp.
That is the most miserable lift ever to improve.
I would suggest that you instead of going for PR’s every time you went for volume, I know a lot of Wendler guys have improved their OHP doing 10 sets of 5 reps with about 60% of 1RM done as backoff after the main set of 85 - 95%.
You could take a look at prilepins chart and figure out some rep ranges at different %.
like doing 16 - 20 total reps with 75% of your 1RM 3 x 6 or 5 x 4 as an example.
It’s damn boring to do things like that when you really don’t know if you’re getting stronger, but trust me you will.
Don’t worry about going too light. Get it light and do tempo reps with perfect form. Having a weight where you can nail the form pause it at any position in the lift up or down, can make a huge difference in form quality. OHP is very form dependent on getting a heavy lift.
I’ve been thinking about Brian’s bracing videos and how he said your legs are strong enough for the lift but your core is holding you back. He’s 100% correct. I was able to do 225 for a fairly easy single on RFESS at the end of my second round of SGSS, but I still can’t squat 4 plates. The only thing I can think of is that my core/body is able to handle 225 much easier than 405 (duh). But clearly my legs have the strength. The strength/power must be leaking from my core when I try to squat.
And on that note, I’m not sure if I’ll go back to barbell squatting or not. I can build strong and impressive legs with the new hack squat at the gym and possibly save my hips and low back.
Back to my original point, our core is probably the problem with OHP.
@Frank_C@mortdk the core is the key link to all big lifts. I would even say bench strength is dependent on the strength of the core to transfer power from leg drive and stabilize a big bench.
Core stability is obvious on OHP and Squat. Less so on Deadlift but is required to maintain back angle. Core is the weak link for us all
I’m fortunate to have a sting core from the years of construction work lifting pipe, pulling wire, working overhead, cutting wood…etc. I think that is why I’ve been able to hit some of the things I did my first year.
I’ve noticed the importance of core bracing more and more as the plates add up on the bar…