I’ve been on 5/3/1 for almost 7 cycles now and have seen good progress. I only started the BBB challenge in the last cycle and I discovered that I can get through 5 x 10 sets on Bench, Squat, and DL no problem at 50% of TM.
Shoulder press however, confuses me as I cannot even finish 4 sets of 10 at 50% of TM for two weeks straight. My shoulder fatigue (along with reduced mobility as a pump develops) seems to be limiting my work capacity. Is this normal? Or might there be another underlying problem I might have?
I do find my shoulders fatigue faster than other muscle groups. I think this is fairly common with others as well. Also keep in mind this is a CHALLENGE, it is not suppose to be easy.
[quote]Camm wrote:
I cant complete 5x10 either at 50% on press.
I just do an extra set to make it up to 50 reps total.[/quote]
That actually makes a lot of sense in terms of getting in all your reps. It’s just odd how the other lifts are so much easier to complete. Can’t image going to 60% on presses in a month. I’ll carry on and see what happens.
I’m currently in week 8 of the 13-week challenge (from Beyond 5/3/1), and once I hit week two of 5x10 @ 60%, I couldn’t complete them all either. But I just added on extra sets until I hit 50 total reps, and tried to use fewer total sets each week. This seemed to work just fine, in that my overhead press is still progressing, though I’ll have to wait until I finish the challenge to know for sure.
And for what it’s worth, much like the others here, I only had this problem on the OH press - I’ve been able to do the BBB work as written for my bench, squat, and deadlift.