Boilerman Wants It All

Kind of a weird situation this time with my 5/3/1 week. Did my shit for bench ohp and heads last week, and squat today. I was out of town for the weekend and just got home. Visiting family 6 hrs away and partied it up all weekend. I was expecting my lifts today to suffer pretty badly but it actually went really, really well.

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Deloading this week and starting a mon, Tues, Thurs, Fri schedule next week. Things have been so sporadic and random the past few weeks so getting back to an actual schedule will be nice. First deload in a few months. Still trying to figure out what kind of deload actually works for me so I’m expecting to come back a little weaker and build back up again… we’ll see.

Thrice- To be Everywhere is to be Nowhere (one of my fav albums of the past decade).

Not sure what’s customary around here but I’m going to be tracking my deloads as well due to the fact that I still have no idea what I’m doing.

OHP

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Berried Alive- Fools Gold

I find that I don’t take very many planned deloads anymore, because life tends to throw deloads at me every month or so anyway. some weeks I only get in maybe 2 gym sessions, or have to take 5 days in a row off due to life circumstances, and that’s as good as a deload IMO. Plus, 3 days/week training gives me more recovery time anyway right now.

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Thanks othsteve, I’ve found after the very few deloads I’ve done I’ve come back a bit weaker and it takes me a few weeks to get back in the groove. I started a topic a few months ago asking about this and got a few suggestions, so I’m trying one out. I also rarely take deloads, and since I seem to have this issue of “losing” strength I try to not have to take them. I’d personally rather continue on with the program without deloads, but after a week or two of re-establishing my strength I basically always get stronger if that makes any sense at all.

I don’t remember if I responded to that thread or not. Don’t forget that there’s more than one way to deload. When I first started with 5/3/1 I stuck straight with the Wendler-recommended deload %'s. I later modified to doing 2 workouts on deload weeks, one press/squat and one bench/deadlift. Then I started doing a deload every other cycle. You can deload any or all of the training variables. You can keep weight heavy and just do less total work, lower rep sets. You can reduce weight and do the same sets you would do on a normal week. You can reduce your training frequency on a deload week but keep the other variables the same. All of these methods will give your body a chance to recover. I’d suggest playing around with the variables and see what works best for you.

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Great thanks for the advice. I’m currently just working up to my tm, hitting it for 5 then stopping the main work. Doing small isolation stuff like biceps for assistance but cutting the sets in half, so 2-3 sets of 10 for all assistance stuff. Basically I’m just doing assistance work for fun.

Bench deload

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Thrice- Palms

Deadlift deload

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Misery Signals- Controller

194# this morning.

Squat deload

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Misery Signals- Absent Light

Can’t wait to get back to + sets… might start my week early tomorrow… Hmm…

Forgot to update over the weekend, did ohp after work on Saturday and bench today. Woke up Saturday with a weird pain in my neck. Felt like I slept in a weird position and I’m still feeling it today… didn’t seem to impact the workouts though. Didn’t make it worse and directly after today’s workout it feels better than it had the past few days.

OHP on sat

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Bench

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Today’s tunes were provided by Berried Alive- Bearies Alive.

Edit: forgot to add in that I actually am beginning to feel pretty confident in my benching ability. The form has always felt sort of off and strange since I started lifting but today actually felt pretty good. Struggled a little bit on #15, but was able to put it up without a sacrifice to proper form. I think I start to lose tightness when the weight gets up around the 160 mark because I kind of freak myself out and over prepare or something. Just kind of rolled with it and concentrated on staying as tight as possible and the weight flew up.

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Weighed in at 196# this morning before work. Deadlift day.

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Deadlift hasn’t stopped going up. By far my best lift as far as I can tell.

I, the Breather- These are my Sins

Going out of town again on Friday to work on getting running water at my parents cabin. Yet another party weekend and short 5’s week due to leaving Friday morning. Going to take tomorrow off and hit squats Thursday after work.

Squat day, assistance was cut short due to a service call but all the main work was completed.

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High rep squats are KILLER but in such a good way. My legs felt like rubber bands after the + set. Love it.

August Burns Red- Messengers

Nice work

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Back from the weekend trip, bench day didn’t go so well.

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Seems like every time I get to 160# I just can’t get past that 10 rep plateau. Keep grinding away at it though.

Job for a Cowboy- Doom

Yet again deadlift comes and saves the week right on schedule. I don’t understand how it could still be going up, and bench is not.

I’ll take it though.

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He is Legend- It Hates You

Didn’t weigh myself this morning, but just by how I feel I can tell I still haven’t gained any weight. Prob sitting around 195-197 still.

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As I suspected… weighed in at 193.5 this morning.

Hey Boilerman awesome consistency going on in here :slight_smile:
A good 531 log is always nice to follow.
In regards to the bench - DL in my experience DL is capable of so much more progress than the press movements.
DL - squat is best for improvement, then bench and OHP is such a stalling way before anything.

Regarding to the deload if you can do 5 reps with your TM without burying yourself that would be good.
Jim talks about working up to a single with TM weight.
But as @OTHSteve said it’s all about being able to walk away from the week feeling like your body did a little less than normal.

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Thanks @mortdk I appreciate the advice and good words.

I guess after thinking about it a little bit you’re right- it only makes sense that bench and ohp go up more slowly. That’s the reason why Jim only has you go up by 5# on upper lifts.

I guess I just feel like I’m getting to a point where I’ll be stalling soon and am really not sure what to do. I’ve read a few articles online (from Jim’s site and a few other places) to get ideas on how to prevent stalling/increase the lift, but I can feel it coming soon. I’ve always wanted to at least be decent at bench due to having a horribly weak and weak looking upper body, so it kind of brings my feeling of progress towards my goal to a halt.

Squat day

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Leprous- Live at Rockefeller

I’m sure no one cares about the albums I post but for any musician/ prog rock fan, this is an absolute must if you’ve never heard them.

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That is culprit to most of us, me included. The dreaded “How much do ya bench bro” question.

But you’re good man, as I read it you did 10 reps on your +set on the 531 day.
You’ve got a lot of cycles to go before you’ll stall.
As the weight increase yes the reps on the lift goes down, but as long as you’re doing 5 reps on the 531 week you’re more than good. Doing another cycle or two until you reach only 3 reps on the 531 week wouldn’t harm. Then it’s time to rethink.
Jim loves the leader/anchor cycles so when you stall out that could be a way.

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