So I’ve been doing smolov and I was doing pretty well uptill my 10 day break which was the day after the 3rd day of the 4th week. note that I even calculated the program based on a Rmax +10 pounds of my actual Rmax And at week 4 I used a 20 pound increment that I manged to handle quite fairly. The problem is today 10 days after my successfull 75 I went ahead to do the 103 and it was horrible…
I was struggling with every rep until it came to a quick end where i failed in the 3rd set… I even tried to continue with -20 pounds and I failed the 5th set so I quite and tried doing some dead lifts instead where I only did 11 reps with a weight a 100 pounds less than a weight I usually manage to do 12 reps with…
So In conclusion my question is should I eat well and sleep well for the upcoming couple of days then try the d4 of W4 as I’m obviously generally worn out as shown by the DL or should I redo W4 as whole or should I rest and peak for a Rmax and start the cycle all over again
I don’t think it would be a good idea to continue. You’re not supposed to take 10 days off in the middle of the program (I assume week 4 is actually week 2 of the base cycle). A slight adjustment of a day or two probably doesn’t matter but 10 days certainly will. The purpose of this DUP program is to manipulate intensity and volume to promote supercompensation in a short period of time.
Within a given week the intensity increases while volume across sessions stay about the same. The following week the intensity drops at the beginning, making the work feel easier (but the volume increases) and the progression is repeated. Taking that much time off probably lead to deconditioning. I wouldn’t take more than 2 days off between sessions (3 if absolutely unavoidable). If I couldn’t stick to that frequency then I would do another program. Just let it go and remember next time not to take so much time off in the middle of the cycle.
Also, I’m not sure why you programmed based on 10lbs above your predicted max. Stick to your actual max. It’s more important to complete the entire program and do all that volume work rather than struggle to get through, miss reps and train bad form.
Edit: Trying to repeat week 4 will be pointless. You might be disappointed by peaking for a rep max too because I doubt you gained much strength by partially completing the program and taking so much time off. I would suggest to restart the program with the old predicted max (don’t go above that), doing the introductory cycle to get you back into shape for Smolov as you’ve done before. Forget about what happened in the last workout because you were deconditioned.
On a side note, whenever taking a long break (a week or longer) I always plan to complete a training cycle just before that break to recover. It could mean slightly compressing a training cycle to finish it in time. That way it has minimal impact on training.
So this means 4 weeks have been laid to waste… then tomorrow I’ll try the 4th day again and i hopr it’ll work out…
Btw If it didn’t would it be wise to do smolov again or do I have better option’s?
Note: in the 7*5 I was on 92.7% of my true 1rm and I succeed with good form and good depth.
If you really want you can try starting off with week 1 of the base cycle starting tomorrow. If it’s tough then do week 2 of the intro cycle. If it isn’t bad then you can just continue from there. IMO it isn’t worth it to waste time starting halfway through the cycle since you won’t get the same training effect but it’s your call.
I did try the 103 again and I succeed in all sets and succeed in the 49 of week 5 so I guess I’ll carry on with it since I only have 3 days left (I’m only doing 1st block) then I’ll check what were the fruits of my 5 week Labour
[quote]Smolov101 wrote:
I did try the 103 again and I succeed in all sets and succeed in the 49 of week 5 so I guess I’ll carry on with it since I only have 3 days left (I’m only doing 1st block) then I’ll check what were the fruits of my 5 week Labour[/quote]
Keep us posted with the progress. I’m curious how it’ll turn out if you’re essentially only doing the final week.
[quote]Smolov101 wrote:
So this means 4 weeks have been laid to waste…[/quote]
Don’t think about it this way. You trained so you should have improved in some way no matter what kind of break you take. Unless you fucked something up (in which case running the program to completion would also be a waste).