The video answered my question, thank you though.
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Nice set man, doing some good work here.
Looking at the video I need to ask you something though. Doesn’t your low back really hurt during and after those 1-2 very grindy reps? I know mine aches a lot after heavy sets to failure. Just wondering if it’s normal or I’m doing something wrong with the bracing.
Zero pain whatsoever. My upperback is where more of the bending is occurring. I brace very hard, but along with that, track that, though the bar is moving upward, it’s really moving FORWARD on those reps, as I’m effectively leaning back and trying to incline bench the weight. This will upset some purist on the press, but it means that the force isn’t going straight into my curved back, but instead moving forward away from that point. I imagine I’d feel pain if my back was bent in that manner while the bar was actually over my head.
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Do you see anything wrong with my positioning in the video? I probably had more pain after the pr set but unfortunately I haven’t caught that on camera.
Positioning looked ok. I’m not a fan of bracing AFTER unracking the bar. I don’t think you can brace as strong at that position as you can during the initial unrack. Could be part of the issue.
Now, I DO run into the issue of blacking out and wanting to go to sleep when I press in that manner, but it also means a very tight brace.
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Dude this is awesome advice. I’ve been holding it and it definitely wears me down! Thanks for posting this!!
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Deadlift
106.5 kg x 5
120.7 kg x 3
134.9 kg x 11
139.5 kg x 3
144.5 kg x 3
149.5 kg x 3 (330 lb Deadlift finally!)
106.5 kg x 5
Leg press 160 kg x 12, 180 kg x 12, 220 kg x 13
Joker set @ 330
Great work on the Deadlift. Pushed the pr set to the limit and I finally got to 150 kg / 3 330 lb with that last joker! The only upsetting thing is that the shitty plates and bar at my gym only added up to 149.5 kg in this case, so this was truthfully a 329 lb Deadlift. Meh.
I didn’t have much time and the FSL felt very hard from the first set so I opted to give my low back a break as it was fried and call it a day as far as supplemental.
I decided to use those 10 minutes I had left to do some leg pressing and I worked up to 485 lb x 13 on my last set, which is a pr too.
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That’s interesting. I’m trying to imagine Coke and coffee flavors combined and it’s not coming on as appealing haha.
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It’s actually pretty good. At first it tastes much like regular diet coke but you feel there is something more to it.
Then you get a really strong aftertaste of coffee. The only disappointing thing is that this is marketed as a high caffeine product, whereas apparently a 250 ml (8.4 fl oz) can only contains 40 mg, which is way too little for me to feel any effect at all.
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Bench
66 kg x 5
74.8 kg x 3
82 kg x 7
84.5 kg x 3
87 kg x 3
89.5 kg x 2
66 kg x 5 x 5
Db row 1 x 15, 1 x 10,6,4 R/P
Chest Press Machine 60 kg x 25, 70 kg x 10
Every bench workout humbles me. I always feel like I’m a total noob at the movement and super weak.
So 3 weeks of dieting have almost passed by and I lost around 6.5 lbs so far, still looking pretty soft
Squat
100 kg x 5
112 kg x 3
126 kg x 4
So this workout was a disaster. I was hoping to hit at least 8 reps on the last set, but the weights started to feel really heavy from the very first set. My pr set felt ungodly heavy and I didn’t try to go past 4 reps because my form was already feeling iffy.
@T3hPwnisher sorry if I’ve been tagging you often recently. If this bothers you just tell me and I’ll stop.
What do you do when you have a session like this? I was feeling pretty bad and even psychologically I’d just had a tough afternoon so I pussed out and left the gym like that. Even FSL work would have felt really heavy. I thought this was a clear sign that I wasn’t recovering properly due to the diet so I thought adding extra work on top of that wouldn’t do me good.
So to sum up this cycle, I got, on my pr sets on the 5/3/1 week:
Press - 8 reps
Deadlift - 11
Bench - 7
Squat - 4
So I’m thinking of doing this with my TM:
Press -5 lb
Deadlift unchanged
Bench -7.5 lb
Squat -10 lb
for the next cycle. Are these maybe too small decrements and I should decrease it by more than that?
I’m also debating whether I should start with my 5’s week or go 3/5/1 again since the weights are already going to be lower due to TM decrements. What do you think?
Why are you dropping training maxes on movements you got more than 5 reps with, and not changing a movement you got 11 reps with?
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Probably you missed it, but earlier last week @T3hPwnisher and I were talking about dropping the TM during a dieting period, to allow beating rep pr’s while keeping the weights still manageable despite the strength drop due to the diet (think FSL work).
So since apparently I have failed to hit my rep goals for most movements or I barely hit them, and I’ll probably get weaker over the course of the next three week since I’ll still be dieting, I thought I’d decrease the TM’s. The Deadlift is the only lift that has kept going really well, but I’m not sure about increasing the TM so I thought maybe I’d leave it like it is now.
Also @danteism I’d love it if I had some time and wanted to catch up on my last posts here.
Basically training has gotten tough lately due to being in a calorie deficit and I’m starting again with the feeling skinny thing that happens when I diet down. Later today or maybe tomorrow I’ll also make another post because I want to discuss some things I’ve had on my mind recently about mass building, as well as what my plan is specifically for when I get off the diet, which will be over in 3 weeks.
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Why not leave the TM as is, and attempt to maintain or surpass these current numbers?
Because I feel like I’m already working at the limit of my effort and it was already hard as hell to get the reps I got. And since I’m dieting, I don’t think I have much room to get stronger (read: handle heavier absolute weights), so I’m thinking of being proactive so I don’t end up getting 2-3 reps or failing the weight altogether.
Lowering the TM and increasing the reps seem to be popular advice when things get tough.
Fair enough, but I would suggest to only lower the squat.
Those bench and press numbers are still pretty solid man, well into the rep-range you should be at for that third week. You’d just be handling the same absolute weights again.
This happened on my last mat pull workout with my squat workout afterwards. You’ll see that, in these situations, I quickly abandon the plan and use some sort of combination of drop sets and rest pausing to make the workout as brutal as possible while keeping the weight light. Operating theory is that I’m training the body to STILL perform even on the days when it’s weak. I don’t want to just abandon a workout when it’s not going well, because then I condition the body to expect mercy on weak days, which will promote continual weak performances.
And that may sound psychotic, but it’s honestly what I do and what I think. Helps me walk away knowing I still got in a productive session.
I always liked 5/3/1 vs 3/5/1, but I have to admit that my 1s week was always better when I did 3/5/1.
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