[quote]wolfen6920 wrote:
Have been doing front squats and I missed reps on my 5 week. Now, I missed my overhead on my 3 week. So i guess my question is two fold, should I just call it on all of them and deload, or do I push through this cycle and then take a few steps back max wise? I just don’t know what to do in the middle of the cycle.[/quote]
Jim has said that front Squats are not acceptable as a replacement for back squats as a main lift in the 5/3/1 program. Do your back squats. Maybe my assistance was bad but I got weaker by that omission.[/quote]
I do back squats for my main lift on squat day but am currently doing front squats for my BBB assistance work. I’m still very sore today and my squat day was monday so I suppose be careful about what weight you use for them.
Can’t beat the back squat for the main lift though.
In other news: I took a 1RM of 130kg for my squat before starting this cycle(I thought I had 140KG in me but alas it was not to be) but I still felt I had 135KG at least. Staying with ‘starting too light’ though I just took 130KG as my 1RM and used 90% of that. Yet I’m having great difficulty with my squats(example, today was my first week of my second cycle and I only managed 7 reps when I feel I should’ve been getting alot more. Same story with my bench press. I’ve done 85KG before for about 8 or 9 reps but yesterday I managed 6 reps(no spotter, slight psychological annoyance) with 82.5KG.
I’m still getting at least my presecribed reps and to be fair, yesterday I felt fairly under the weather and overall drained. However my assistance work went very well.
Should I lighten the weight a bit or keep going seeing as the prescribed reps are still being made? I have a feeling it could be lack of sufficient warm-up on these days considering that my worksets feel slow and difficult but my assistance work is going well?
I’m pretty happy with my deadlift and press though.
Also just FTR, depsite being pretty good at GHR’s, I did leg curls on monday as I had no access to a GHR bench at the time and man do I suck at them. Some major work needed there.
In other news: I took a 1RM of 130kg for my squat before starting this cycle(I thought I had 140KG in me but alas it was not to be) but I still felt I had 135KG at least. Staying with ‘starting too light’ though I just took 130KG as my 1RM and used 90% of that. Yet I’m having great difficulty with my squats(example, today was my first week of my second cycle and I only managed 7 reps when I feel I should’ve been getting alot more. Same story with my bench press. I’ve done 85KG before for about 8 or 9 reps but yesterday I managed 6 reps(no spotter, slight psychological annoyance) with 82.5KG.
I’m still getting at least my presecribed reps and to be fair, yesterday I felt fairly under the weather and overall drained. However my assistance work went very well.
Should I lighten the weight a bit or keep going seeing as the prescribed reps are still being made? I have a feeling it could be lack of sufficient warm-up on these days considering that my worksets feel slow and difficult but my assistance work is going well?
I’m pretty happy with my deadlift and press though.
Also just FTR, depsite being pretty good at GHR’s, I did leg curls on monday as I had no access to a GHR bench at the time and man do I suck at them. Some major work needed there.[/quote]
7 reps on a 5 day seems normal to me. Also, having a spotter just standing there not touching the weight makes me stronger (psychology). Literally, I get extra reps with a spotter who never even touches the weight. So not having one makes a difference for me. Always properly warm-up mentally in addition to the physical warm-up.
In other news: I took a 1RM of 130kg for my squat before starting this cycle(I thought I had 140KG in me but alas it was not to be) but I still felt I had 135KG at least. Staying with ‘starting too light’ though I just took 130KG as my 1RM and used 90% of that. Yet I’m having great difficulty with my squats(example, today was my first week of my second cycle and I only managed 7 reps when I feel I should’ve been getting alot more. Same story with my bench press. I’ve done 85KG before for about 8 or 9 reps but yesterday I managed 6 reps(no spotter, slight psychological annoyance) with 82.5KG.
I’m still getting at least my presecribed reps and to be fair, yesterday I felt fairly under the weather and overall drained. However my assistance work went very well.
Should I lighten the weight a bit or keep going seeing as the prescribed reps are still being made? I have a feeling it could be lack of sufficient warm-up on these days considering that my worksets feel slow and difficult but my assistance work is going well?
I’m pretty happy with my deadlift and press though.
Also just FTR, depsite being pretty good at GHR’s, I did leg curls on monday as I had no access to a GHR bench at the time and man do I suck at them. Some major work needed there.[/quote]
7 reps on a 5 day seems normal to me. Also, having a spotter just standing there not touching the weight makes me stronger (psychology). Literally, I get extra reps with a spotter who never even touches the weight. So not having one makes a difference for me. Always properly warm-up mentally in addition to the physical warm-up.[/quote]
Definitely agree with the last part. Get in the zone for the lift and make sure you warm up well, both make a TON of difference!
[quote]wolfen6920 wrote:
yeah i was doing front squats before i read that. but no help on the other part of my question about stalling halfway through your cycle[/quote]
Grind through it. Then take Jim’s advise and knock the 1RM back a little bit.
[quote]wolfen6920 wrote:
Have been doing front squats and I missed reps on my 5 week. Now, I missed my overhead on my 3 week. So i guess my question is two fold, should I just call it on all of them and deload, or do I push through this cycle and then take a few steps back max wise? I just don’t know what to do in the middle of the cycle.[/quote]
Jim has said that front Squats are not acceptable as a replacement for back squats as a main lift in the 5/3/1 program. Do your back squats. Maybe my assistance was bad but I got weaker by that omission.[/quote]
I do back squats for my main lift on squat day but am currently doing front squats for my BBB assistance work. I’m still very sore today and my squat day was monday so I suppose be careful about what weight you use for them.
Can’t beat the back squat for the main lift though.
In other news: I took a 1RM of 130kg for my squat before starting this cycle(I thought I had 140KG in me but alas it was not to be) but I still felt I had 135KG at least. Staying with ‘starting too light’ though I just took 130KG as my 1RM and used 90% of that. Yet I’m having great difficulty with my squats(example, today was my first week of my second cycle and I only managed 7 reps when I feel I should’ve been getting alot more. Same story with my bench press. I’ve done 85KG before for about 8 or 9 reps but yesterday I managed 6 reps(no spotter, slight psychological annoyance) with 82.5KG.
I’m still getting at least my presecribed reps and to be fair, yesterday I felt fairly under the weather and overall drained. However my assistance work went very well.
Should I lighten the weight a bit or keep going seeing as the prescribed reps are still being made? I have a feeling it could be lack of sufficient warm-up on these days considering that my worksets feel slow and difficult but my assistance work is going well?
I’m pretty happy with my deadlift and press though.
Also just FTR, depsite being pretty good at GHR’s, I did leg curls on monday as I had no access to a GHR bench at the time and man do I suck at them. Some major work needed there.[/quote]
If you are feeling run down and beat up, you may want to try to just get the prescribed reps for a cycle or two.
[quote]bABoon wrote:
BBB seems to be the overwhelming favorite for assistance. Who else uses the Triumvirate? [/quote]
I’m a triumvirate man.
Here’s the set up:
MP, Chins, weighted dips
DL, Pull throughs, Ab circuit (after reading the Nick Tuminello “Unconventional Ab Workout” article a couple of months back. It’s made my posture far better, and I can highly recommend the article.)
Bench, Chins, Incline DB press
Squats, cleans, one legged split squats
[quote]bABoon wrote:
BBB seems to be the overwhelming favorite for assistance. Who else uses the Triumvirate? [/quote]
I don’t know what you’d label what I do but this is it:
MP: wide grip pull ups (between work sets); dips, face pulls; pushups if I feel like it
Squat: GM, split squats, abs
Bench: close grip chins between sets; kroc rows, DB MP
Deadlift: either front squats (from pins last week) or hack squats; GHR (at the moment), abs
Conditioning just about every day: tire, prowler, jump rope, sledgehammering… I USED to have an awesome mofo of a hill to run but then moved to Iowa. LOL.
Man, I had my 5 day for my 2nd cycle of bench yesterday - I hope it was just an off day after coming back from the deload. I got 11 with 5lbs less than I got 12 with on my 3 day last cycle. It was hot as shit in my garage; maybe that played a factor. I felt good going into it and all through warmups, but damn, that was tough. I guess I got my reps, so that’s all that matters. I won’t worry about tweaking anything until I start to stall; I just hope this doesn’t start a trend
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Man, I had my 5 day for my 2nd cycle of bench yesterday - I hope it was just an off day after coming back from the deload. I got 11 with 5lbs less than I got 12 with on my 3 day last cycle. It was hot as shit in my garage; maybe that played a factor. I felt good going into it and all through warmups, but damn, that was tough. I guess I got my reps, so that’s all that matters. I won’t worry about tweaking anything until I start to stall; I just hope this doesn’t start a trend[/quote]
I wouldn’t worry about it, 11 is still way beyond the prescribed #. You aren’t gonna be at your strongest and setting PRs in the gym every day
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
In other news, I’ve been supersetting my pressing accessory movements with chinups…that shit kills me. My heart rate skyrockets. I’ve also been pausing my reps on bench for BBB to make it harder.
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
.[/quote]
I’m like that too, I get overly pissed off every time I don’t see some type of improvement or if my reps go down or whatever
Then I read an article by Dave Tate on Elite FTS about lifting depression and how you have to accept that ‘off’ days are a part of the sport.
It was a really good read and it made me feel better about my shitty deadlifting day.
I have been stricken with the flu and two of my fingers on my right hand cannot be used so I’m taking a break until monday. I’m just going to start my second cycle from there again.
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Man, I had my 5 day for my 2nd cycle of bench yesterday - I hope it was just an off day after coming back from the deload. I got 11 with 5lbs less than I got 12 with on my 3 day last cycle. It was hot as shit in my garage; maybe that played a factor. I felt good going into it and all through warmups, but damn, that was tough. I guess I got my reps, so that’s all that matters. I won’t worry about tweaking anything until I start to stall; I just hope this doesn’t start a trend[/quote]
I wouldn’t worry about it, 11 is still way beyond the prescribed #. You aren’t gonna be at your strongest and setting PRs in the gym every day[/quote]
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
.[/quote]
I’m like that too, I get overly pissed off every time I don’t see some type of improvement or if my reps go down or whatever
Then I read an article by Dave Tate on Elite FTS about lifting depression and how you have to accept that ‘off’ days are a part of the sport.
It was a really good read and it made me feel better about my shitty deadlifting day. [/quote]
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
.[/quote]
I’m like that too, I get overly pissed off every time I don’t see some type of improvement or if my reps go down or whatever
Then I read an article by Dave Tate on Elite FTS about lifting depression and how you have to accept that ‘off’ days are a part of the sport.
It was a really good read and it made me feel better about my shitty deadlifting day. [/quote]
I’m going to transfer my feelings from my bench day to my deadlift today and use the agression. I’m going for at least 15 reps today
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
.[/quote]
I’m like that too, I get overly pissed off every time I don’t see some type of improvement or if my reps go down or whatever
Then I read an article by Dave Tate on Elite FTS about lifting depression and how you have to accept that ‘off’ days are a part of the sport.
It was a really good read and it made me feel better about my shitty deadlifting day. [/quote]
[quote]METAL VIPER wrote:
Yeah man; I know in the long run, a bad day is inevitable and you just got to keep on plugging. I guess I just use this thread to vent when I have a bad day.
.[/quote]
I’m like that too, I get overly pissed off every time I don’t see some type of improvement or if my reps go down or whatever
Then I read an article by Dave Tate on Elite FTS about lifting depression and how you have to accept that ‘off’ days are a part of the sport.
It was a really good read and it made me feel better about my shitty deadlifting day. [/quote]
I’m sick at the moment and while I’d love to train, I know from past experiences it will just worsen my recovery time. So if I have to skip a session, how do I go about doing it?
