DE day and working up.

Is it necessary to work up on de day after speed work? Since I am doing a three day plan I combined my de days together. Today after speed benches using 60% (135) I tried working up for a few doubles but 185 felt really heavy and slow and then 205 felt like 300 pounds and went up so slow I left it at a single…did I work up to high, 205 is a little over 90% for me should work ups stay below 90%?

If you feel good take a higher weight after your work sets but dont let it affect your ME day which going to 90% will do. Go to about 80% (that is a guideline only) or until you feel speed is decreasing. Hope that helps.

It should feel heavy, that is the whole point of the exercise. The DE with short rests is to tire out the fast twitch fibres which forces you to use more fibres than you normally would with such a light weight. By the time you get to the heavier weights, you have pre-fatigued your muscles. You won’t be as strong as on ME day, but it will teach your muscles to recruit more fibres during a future max. effort. Just work up to a weight that is heavy, don’t try to break any PR’s after DE. Also, don’t use this method all the time.

Is that full bench you are doing? I wouldn’t feel the need to train heavy with a full range movement after dynamic benches, like to leave that for ME day.
I stick to 3+board press or rack lockouts as supplementals for triceps.

Yeah that helps I was just a little unclear on what the working up was for…I just work up slower and lighter next time and pay more attention to speed.

I would state that not only is it necessary, but extremely important.

The thing is, you have to have a plan. I don’t really agree with the whole, “if you feel good, do it,” approach.

Sometimes your opener feels like it’s gonna smash you. How you “feel” has nothing to do with getting weight up, it can quickly become how you think (or don’t).

Having said that,here is what has been working for us.

9 week cycle broken into 3 week increments.

Week 1-3:
Straight Weight:

  1. 50x8x3
  2. 55x8x3
  3. 60x5x3
    followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Weeks 4-6
Bands:
4. 40% 8x3
5. 45% 8x4
6. 50% 5x3
followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Weeks 7-9
Chain:
7. 50% 8x3
8. 55% 8x3
9. 60% 8x3
followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Obviously, if I feel anihiliated on the work-up week, I will back off. Ultimately you have to listen to your body to stay in one piece.

Keep playing around until you figure out what works for you.

Correction as noted below…been a long day.

Week 1-3:
Straight Weight:

  1. 50% 8x2
  2. 55% 8x2
  3. 60% 5x2
    followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Weeks 4-6
Bands:
4. 40% 8x2
5. 45% 8x2
6. 50% 5x2
followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Weeks 7-9
Chain:
7. 50% 8x2
8. 55% 8x2
9. 60% 8x2
followed by three sets of singles (incremental weight increase) working to a strain. (target 5-10# PR)

Sorry for any confusion.

Thanks for the input guys…apwsearch, unfortunately training at a commercial gym I dont have access to bands or chains…hopefully in the future…but for now I will have to stick with some sort of straight cycle so I will think about giving the first block a try…

Just to make sure I am being clear, we work up to a strain every third week of the minicycle over a course of three sets. So lets say I want to work up to 550 on straight weight day. I would go 60%x5x2 followed by 405x1, 480x1, 550x1.

The 8x3 on the last week of chain sets is a misprint and should be 5x3 like the others.

By strain you mean a near max, like say work up to a single with a heavy triple? Is that also why the volume on week 3 is lower?

Not sure what you mean by “work up to a single with a heavy triple.”

Basically, what we do is perform our normal speed sets, but instead of going 8 sets of two like in the previous two weeks, we go 5 sets of two with our normal one minute rest intervals.

Then we move right into three sets of singles, incrementally increasing weight until we strain. We rest two minutes b/t the work up sets.

So per my last example, I would rest 2 minutes after my last speed set, then single 405, rest 2 minutes, single 480, rest 2 minutes, then single 550.

This would be based on maybe a 540 or 545 strain the last mini-cycle, b/c I am going to push for a PR.

The first time you do this, you will have to determine the top weight, then work from there in the following cycles.

Does that make sense?