Trouble With My 5x5 Program

Bigger Stronger Leaner Competitive Bodybuilding
1

I have recently started a personalized 5x5 split program, after mainly doing upper-lower, and even full body training. The first two weeks I felt great, but today I had to lower the weights significantly to finish the rep schemes.

My program looks something like this: 2 heavy 5x5 lifts followed by a higher rep isolation exercise (ex. 8-12 reps X 2-3 sets)

…
DAY 1: Breast & Back

  • Flat bench 5X5

  • Incline bench 5X5

  • Isolation exercise

  • Pulldown/chins 5X5

  • Bent-over row 5X5

  • Isolation exercise

Day 2: Legs & Shoulders

  • Deadlifts if I’m in the mood (low rep)

  • Squats 5X5

  • Isolation exercises for quads and hamstrings.

  • DB shoulder press 5 X 5 or barbell behind back.

  • Lateral raises 8-12 X 2-3.

Day 3: Triceps & Biceps

  • Skull crushers (switch between decline/incline) 5X5.

  • Triceps lockout 3-5 X 4-5.

  • Isolation exercise.

  • Barbell curls 5X5

  • Incline curls 8-12 X 2-4

  • Cable curls 8-12 X 2-4

(Sometimes I add in cleans, snatches etc)
…

The biggest struggle is benching and pulling in Day 1, after doing the arm work in Day 3. The soreness is just killing me. I tend to train every second day, f.ex. mon-wed-fri-sun. Since I have little experience doing 5X5-type programs, I’m probably doing some obvious mistake(s). The first thing that comes to mind is too much volume, or maybe the arrangement itself.

Other than that, I try to eat reasonably clean. Using yesterday as an example, a typical day is:

  • 300-400 grams of cottage cheese together with kesam (a norwegian speciality), cereal and a nice disgusting sip of cod liver oil.

  • Assorted nuts, 200-300 grams.

  • Salad with lots of chicken.

  • Protein bar/shake.

  • Another salad with whatever is sold in the college cantine.

  • 16 pieces of sushi.

  • Entrecote/sirloin steak.

  • Cottage chesse with yoghurt/kesam.

As for supplements, I drink fish oil and take multivitamines. That’s about it.

Thanks in advance, hope this is readable!

2

You have way too much volume on Day 1. I don’t advise four exercises with the 5x5 set/rep scheme.

Not only that, but then you’re hardly doing anything good for your leg workout, and then you’re doing more upper body work on that day.

Then you focus on arms and more upper body work on the third day.

WAY TOO MUCH VOLUME…and it’s not a good plan. Your lack of true leg movements (besides the deadlifts) is definitely keeping your whole routine out of balance.

Go read some of the articles on here about 5x5. Dan John has one, Joel Marion has one, and there are some others.

3

[quote]Nate Dogg wrote:
You have way too much volume on Day 1. I don’t advise four exercises with the 5x5 set/rep scheme.

Not only that, but then you’re hardly doing anything good for your leg workout, and then you’re doing more upper body work on that day.

Then you focus on arms and more upper body work on the third day.

WAY TOO MUCH VOLUME…and it’s not a good plan. Your lack of true leg movements (besides the deadlifts) is definitely keeping your whole routine out of balance.

Go read some of the articles on here about 5x5. Dan John has one, Joel Marion has one, and there are some others.[/quote]

Thanks for the reply. I’m not sure exactly what you mean by lacking true leg movements, since I do both deadlifts and squats, but I get your point about legs not being prioritized enough.

4

I don’t think deadlifts and squats on the same day is very advisable, especially when you did a back workout the day before.

5

Oh yeah, you’re not eating enough either!

6

To play devil’s advocate to Nate’s advice: I’m finishing up my first ever run through a 5x5 program and have made excellent gains, particularly strength gains, with a similar amount of volume to that described above.

My program looked like this:

Day 1:
Bench Press 5x5
Incline Dumbbell Press 5x5
Cable Crossovers or Machine Pec Decs or Dumbbell Flyes 5x5
Seated Cable Row 5x5
Lat Pulls 5x5
Barbell Bent Row or T-Bar Row 5x5
Optional arm work if I?m not too tired

Day 2:
Deadlift 3x8 (every other 2nd day)
Hack Squat 5x5
Leg Press 5x5
Single Leg Curls 5x5
Single Leg Extensions 5x5
Arm work if I didn?t do it on Day 1

Day 3:
Arnold Press or Dumbbell Military Press 5x5
Barbell or Universal Military Press 5x5
Dumbbell side laterals 3x10-ish
Machine side laterals 3x10-ish
Face Pulls 3x10-ish
Rear Delt Flyes 3x10-ish

Day 4:
Off

Obviously that, like every other program, isn’t sustainable over the long run but it took me 12 weeks to hit a wall on it and simply taking Day 5 off every second or third cycle is extending its life for me a bit more while I think about what to do next. That said when I hit the wall it was exactly what eraserhead described: it became a struggle to make 5 reps on the last couple of sets of some exercises. I took that as a sign that it’s about time for a new and different program.

Caveats: I’m 6 months back into the gym after a few sedentary years but when I trained previously I spent several moderately unproductive years training with an intensity that puts my current program to shame (and yes I hit the point of diminishing returns quickly but kept at it for a very long time in spite of not making the gains I was after).

Thus I might just be experiencing those sweet beginner’s gains and/or I may have some residual capacity to avoid frying my nervous system with this sort of volume, I honestly have no idea. YMMV but I don’t think it’s necessarily an absolute truism that the first post in this thread describes a program that has too much volume to even consider.

7

[quote]BackForMore wrote:
To play devil?s advocate to Nate?s advice: I?m finishing up my first ever run through a 5x5 program and have made excellent gains, particularly strength gains, with a similar amount of volume to that described above.

My program looked like this:

Day 1:
Bench Press 5x5
Incline Dumbbell Press 5x5
Cable Crossovers or Machine Pec Decs or Dumbbell Flyes 5x5
Seated Cable Row 5x5
Lat Pulls 5x5
Barbell Bent Row or T-Bar Row 5x5
Optional arm work if I?m not too tired

Day 2:
Deadlift 3x8 (every other 2nd day)
Hack Squat 5x5
Leg Press 5x5
Single Leg Curls 5x5
Single Leg Extensions 5x5
Arm work if I didn?t do it on Day 1

Day 3:
Arnold Press or Dumbbell Military Press 5x5
Barbell or Universal Military Press 5x5
Dumbbell side laterals 3x10-ish
Machine side laterals 3x10-ish
Face Pulls 3x10-ish
Rear Delt Flyes 3x10-ish

Day 4:
Off

Obviously that, like every other program, isn?t sustainable over the long run but it took me 12 weeks to hit a wall on it and simply taking Day 5 off every second or third cycle is extending its life for me a bit more while I think about what to do next. That said when I hit the wall it was exactly what eraserhead described: it became a struggle to make 5 reps on the last couple of sets of some exercises. I took that as a sign that it?s about time for a new and different program.

Caveats: I?m 6 months back into the gym after a few sedentary years but when I trained previously I spent several moderately unproductive years training with an intensity that puts my current program to shame (and yes I hit the point of diminishing returns quickly but kept at it for a very long time in spite of not making the gains I was after). Thus I might just be experiencing those sweet beginner?s gains and/or I may have some residual capacity to avoid frying my nervous system with this sort of volume, I honestly have no idea. YMMV but I don’t think it’s necessarily an absolute truism that the first post in this thread describes a program that has too much volume to even consider.
[/quote]

just because you could handle a lot of volume, does that mean the OP can handle it too. there are too many variables to consider, biological and dietwise to say that just because you could handle the volume, that everyone else can.

8

[quote]That One Guy wrote:
just because you could handle a lot of volume, does that mean the OP can handle it too. there are too many variables to consider, biological and dietwise to say that just because you could handle the volume, that everyone else can.[/quote]

When a writing begins by referring to its position as being from the perspective of the devil’s advocate it’s a signal to the reader that the position being advocated by the writer is not necessarily the one he favors but is instead an alternative to what has been said before.

What was said before was, “WAY TOO MUCH VOLUME,” implying that the routine described in the first post in this thread was unsuitable for a 5x5 scheme because it contained too much volume.

I offered an example to the contrary, nothing more and nothing less. I didn’t suggest to anyone that they should try what I’ve had success with and, if you’ll reread my post, you’ll note that I went out of my way to note that it might just be dumb luck that I had any success with it at all.

Further I rarely post in these threads because if there’s a way to do something wrong I’ve probably done it that way … for a significant length of time. I’m a far better reference for what not to do than what to do.

I replied here because, as of time at which I began composing this response, 160 people have viewed this thread and at least a few of them will latch onto the idea that eraserhead’s program is simply too much volume for anyone doing a 5x5 scheme. There’s really no need to set artificial limits like that, the best plan is for everyone to try out their programs and see how they work out.

As for there being many variables you’re absolutely correct. For example if I were to try my current program with one minute rest between sets rather than my current two I’d probably die … or start a thread here complaining that I was missing reps on my later sets. Just a thought.

9

[quote]BackForMore wrote:
That One Guy wrote:
just because you could handle a lot of volume, does that mean the OP can handle it too. there are too many variables to consider, biological and dietwise to say that just because you could handle the volume, that everyone else can.

When a writing begins by referring to its position as being from the perspective of the devil’s advocate it’s a signal to the reader that the position being advocated by the writer is not necessarily the one he favors but is instead an alternative to what has been said before.

What was said before was, “WAY TOO MUCH VOLUME,” implying that the routine described in the first post in this thread was unsuitable for a 5x5 scheme because it contained too much volume.

I offered an example to the contrary, nothing more and nothing less. I didn’t suggest to anyone that they should try what I’ve had success with and, if you’ll reread my post, you’ll note that I went out of my way to note that it might just be dumb luck that I had any success with it at all.

Further I rarely post in these threads because if there’s a way to do something wrong I’ve probably done it that way … for a significant length of time. I’m a far better reference for what not to do than what to do.

I replied here because, as of time at which I began composing this response, 160 people have viewed this thread and at least a few of them will latch onto the idea that eraserhead’s program is simply too much volume for anyone doing a 5x5 scheme. There’s really no need to set artificial limits like that, the best plan is for everyone to try out their programs and see how they work out.

As for there being many variables you’re absolutely correct. For example if I were to try my current program with one minute rest between sets rather than my current two I’d probably die … or start a thread here complaining that I was missing reps on my later sets. Just a thought.[/quote]

Your program looks pretty similar to mine. Since the major struggle I’m having is Day 1, maybe some small adjustments will help me pull it off. Btw, how much time do you have between each day?

Thanks for your opinion!

10

Eraser and BFM,

You both seem like you would benefit from just doing M-W-F and taking weekends off.

Eraser: First you might try dropping the Lockouts on Friday, they could be throwing your bench off. You could move them to Monday and alternate with the Inclines or isolation exercise.

Your alternate would be to do Bench 5x5 one week and Inclines 5x5 the next. Most 5x5 programs only have one major pressing movement done 5x5.

BFM: You were definitely riding a beginner’s high there for a while. You will probably have to drop back to 2 exercises per BP as your weights increase.

Mon:
Bench Press or Incl DB 5x5
Cable Crossovers or Machine Pec Decs or Dumbbell Flyes 3x10
Seated Cable OR T-Bar Rows 5x5
Lat Pulls OR Barbell Bent Row 3x10
Forearm Work

Wed:
Deadlift 3x8 (every other 2nd day)
Hack Squat OR Leg Press 5x5
Single Leg Curls 5x5
Single Leg Extensions 5x5
Calf Work

Fri:
Arnold Press OR DB Military Press 2x10
Barbell or Universal Military Press 5x3
(Your alternative here is to pick ONE pressing movement done 5x5, BB or DB)
DB or Machine laterals 2-3x8-10
Face Pulls OR Rear Delt 2-3x8-10
Put Your Upper Arm Work Here

Switch which exercises are 5x5 and 3x10 from time to time or even workout to workout.

You should see more sustainable gains for the long run, by stepping back just a bit.

Good Luck,
Scott

11

[quote]simon-hecubus wrote:
Eraser and BFM,

You both seem like you would benefit from just doing M-W-F and taking weekends off.

Eraser: First you might try dropping the Lockouts on Friday, they could be throwing your bench off. You could move them to Monday and alternate with the Inclines or isolation exercise.

Your alternate would be to do Bench 5x5 one week and Inclines 5x5 the next. Most 5x5 programs only have one major pressing movement done 5x5.

BFM: You were definitely riding a beginner’s high there for a while. You will probably have to drop back to 2 exercises per BP as your weights increase.

Mon:
Bench Press or Incl DB 5x5
Cable Crossovers or Machine Pec Decs or Dumbbell Flyes 3x10
Seated Cable OR T-Bar Rows 5x5
Lat Pulls OR Barbell Bent Row 3x10
Forearm Work

Wed:
Deadlift 3x8 (every other 2nd day)
Hack Squat OR Leg Press 5x5
Single Leg Curls 5x5
Single Leg Extensions 5x5
Calf Work

Fri:
Arnold Press OR DB Military Press 2x10
Barbell or Universal Military Press 5x3
(Your alternative here is to pick ONE pressing movement done 5x5, BB or DB)
DB or Machine laterals 2-3x8-10
Face Pulls OR Rear Delt 2-3x8-10
Put Your Upper Arm Work Here

Switch which exercises are 5x5 and 3x10 from time to time or even workout to workout.

You should see more sustainable gains for the long run, by stepping back just a bit.

Good Luck,
Scott[/quote]

Dude, thanks alot for taking the time to help, really appreciate it. I will definately try what you suggested.

12

Eraser - I do that workout on three consecutive days then take a day off. Once in a while when I’m feeling a bit fatigued I take two days off rather than one.

A couple of things you might try if you’re not doing them already: up your rest between sets a bit and, particularly on day one, alternate sets for bodyparts (e.g., chest / back / chest / back / etc.). If all else fails and you really want to stick with that program you can always just back the weights off a little as well.

Scott - Many thanks for taking the time to reply. Just for my own edification: you feel that three days per week is optimal no matter what my goals, training history, work capacity, and personal recovery abilities are? It appears that you’re advocating working each body part once per week with no more than 6-8 sets, correct? Would you vary that advice if the goal were: hypertropy, strength, endurance, etc.?

Re: Sustainable Gains - Having now been a rank beginner on a few occasions I have a somewhat different view than the one you expressed above. It doesn’t make sense to me to voluntarily dial back in an attempt to intentionally slow my progress as you’ve suggested. In my view the first year or so back in the gym after a long layoff is a superb opportunity to experience something like newbie gains while applying hard-won knowledge and experience to maximize whatever gains one’s body is capable of making.

Gains will come more slowly soon enough, why intentionally waste the last few months of an opportunity to progress rapidly? But that’s just me and I freely admit that I’m probably the most ignorant poster here.

13

[quote]BackForMore wrote:
Scott - Many thanks for taking the time to reply. Just for my own edification: you feel that three days per week is optimal no matter what my goals, training history, work capacity, and personal recovery abilities are? It appears that you’re advocating working each body part once per week with no more than 6-8 sets, correct? Would you vary that advice if the goal were: hypertropy, strength, endurance, etc.?[/quote]

Based on your volume, I thought the M-W-F was a good call. It might allow you to go longer before hitting that point of missed reps you wrote about. The actual frequency of stimulation may be higher than you think, as i’ll get to in a bit.

For hypertrophy, I myself prefer less volume per muscle per workout, but more frequency per muscle per week. I usually do more of a whole-body approach or at the very least, some facet of upper AND lower body in each workout.

Let’s get one thing clear, even with the split above, you are NOT working any muscle once per week:
Shoulders are worked with chest & back
Back is worked with back and deads
Arms are worked w/ chesy , delts, and back
Hams are worked on leg day and with Bent-Over or T-Bar rows.
The only exception may be your Quads

There’s at least 5-6 good strength philosophies out there. You’ll have to find what works for you. I am NOT a strength guy, so I won’t pretend to have any answers there.

Same thing with endurance. I don’t know how to work for endurance except with higher reps. Conditioning is more of an idea with which I’m familar and you will want to move towards shorter and shorter rest periods for that particular goal. Both of these concepts may be part of a hypertrophy program too (at least periodiocally).

[quote]Re: Sustainable Gains - Having now been a rank beginner on a few occasions I have a somewhat different view than the one you expressed above. It doesn’t make sense to me to voluntarily dial back in an attempt to intentionally slow my progress as you’ve suggested. In my view the first year or so back in the gym after a long layoff is a superb opportunity to experience something like newbie gains while applying hard-won knowledge and experience to maximize whatever gains one’s body is capable of making.

Gains will come more slowly soon enough, why intentionally waste the last few months of an opportunity to progress rapidly? But that’s just me and I freely admit that I’m probably the most ignorant poster here. [/quote]

You have an excellent point about the opportunity to apply experience and knowledge to a receptive semi-newbie physiology. If you think you can sustain this pace, then go for it.

My own concern was that instead of 12 weeks, you’d hit your wall at 10 weeks the next time and then 9 weeks. etc etc You could prove me wrong, though I’ve never had a layoff of more than a few months.

Keep us posted on how things turn out.

Later,
Scott