Barbell Starting out lighter?
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william bad butt
Level 7 Valued Member
Start light, stay light, and end light. That's my motto.
william bad butt
Level 7 Valued Member
I usually start at 50% of max.
Example... a 300 lb max deadlift, lifting twice per week, 3x5, using linear progression for someone relatively new to the lift..
Day 1 50% of 300 = 150lb 3sx5r
Day 2 160 lb 3x5
Day 3 170 lb 3x5
Day 4 180 lb 3x5
Etc...
Day 10 240 lb 3x5 - this is very hard!
Day 11 250 lb 5, 4, 3... Couldnt do 3sx5r
Day 12 260 lb 3x3
Day 13 270 lb 2x2 - Heavy... Remember your theoretical max is about 300 lb. There is no point in continuing. Adding more weight and doing a max is just feeding the ego, not training.
Day 14 - no lifting... break
Day 15 - no lifting.. break
~2 months has passed...
Then start over and repeat this cycle a few times. Each time you do it you should aim to get 10 lb further. Eventually, after running this multiple times, you will hit a wall and require something else (waving the loads, etc...). More complex periodization...
I hope this example makes sense. Dont stay at Day 10-12 or you will burn out.
Regards
Eric
Example... a 300 lb max deadlift, lifting twice per week, 3x5, using linear progression for someone relatively new to the lift..
Day 1 50% of 300 = 150lb 3sx5r
Day 2 160 lb 3x5
Day 3 170 lb 3x5
Day 4 180 lb 3x5
Etc...
Day 10 240 lb 3x5 - this is very hard!
Day 11 250 lb 5, 4, 3... Couldnt do 3sx5r
Day 12 260 lb 3x3
Day 13 270 lb 2x2 - Heavy... Remember your theoretical max is about 300 lb. There is no point in continuing. Adding more weight and doing a max is just feeding the ego, not training.
Day 14 - no lifting... break
Day 15 - no lifting.. break
~2 months has passed...
Then start over and repeat this cycle a few times. Each time you do it you should aim to get 10 lb further. Eventually, after running this multiple times, you will hit a wall and require something else (waving the loads, etc...). More complex periodization...
I hope this example makes sense. Dont stay at Day 10-12 or you will burn out.
Regards
Eric
Steve W.
Level 8 Valued Member
A couple of relevant Dan John principles (especially for non-powerlifters who just want to steadily get stronger):
- Don't focus on your max. Focus on nudging up your 80% weight over time.
- "Train today like you are going to try for a new PR tomorrow. Then train the same way tomorrow."
It depends on what type of progression are you using to go ahead from there.
Technically it shouldnt but you don't want to train too much at a lighter weight as you will undertrain and as you discovered going too heavy you end up overtraining.
Could you share your numbers you're supposed to use and what your 1rm is if possible?
LukeV
Level 7 Valued Member
The shorter the cycle of the program the less relevant the commencing weight is, so you can definitely err on the side of going light. You will make up for any sub-optimal weight very quickly. But for a program with long cycles, getting the commencing weight right is more important. For example, who cares what weight you commence with under PTTP? You easily adjust the weight as you go, up and down, within the daily or weekly wave program. But Plan Strong, on the other hand, is an eight week program based around 75% of your 1RM. You don’t want to commence ‘light’ on Plan Strong because eight weeks is a long time to spin your wheels because you selected a weight that ended up being sub-optimal.
Steve W.
Level 8 Valued Member
No. Many people do because they get satisfaction from meeting or exceeding their past maxes, which is a perfectly legitimate reason to do it. And for relative beginners this can come fairly frequently. For aspiring powerlifters (either as an actual competitor or just informally competing with yourself), there is a skill to lifting max and near max weights that requires experience. And there's a challenge to testing your limits that can be very appealing.
But it's also fine to back off well before that. You can "PR without maxing." In other words, eventually surpassing your old max, but at a submaximal level of effort. On PTTP, I always found it extremely satisfying to hit a weight as an easy 90% back off set that was a tough top set earlier in the cycle or in a previous cycle.
LukeV
Level 7 Valued Member
If I understand your question correctly, it’s a cycle for a reason and ideally you’ll be doing something different at the end of it than you were at the beginning. Whether that’s a new max may depend on your experience level as a lifter - a beginner should be progressing their personal best regularly, even within a cycle, while an advanced lifter may take more than one or even many cycles depending on the program.
william bad butt
Level 7 Valued Member
"Maxing" is time spent not building g strength.
Antti
Level 10 Valued Member
So the Westside max effort days are all in vain? How did they ever get that far while wasting half of their training. Not to say the other half is strength focused at all, but focused on speed, at least by their definitions ö.
Or the science saying the maximal effort method (we must be careful not to equate this with Westside) is the best way to train for strength?
william bad butt
Level 7 Valued Member
Touche'
A part of me wants to discuss if "maximal effort" is the same thing as lifting at ones true maximum on a main competition lift? I would say "NO". But this isn't really my area and isnt my place to discuss a training methodology I've only read about and never really tried (except for the Joe DeFranco Westside for Skinnny Basards a long time ago)...
If Jeff's "cycle" is just a few weeks and he is changing excersises (front squat vs back squat for example) every few weeks, "maxing" might be appropriate.
Eric
Antti
Level 10 Valued Member
If we consider the Westside ME method, they infamously rarely do the competition lift outside of competition. I understand Simmons sees that repeating the same exercise in ME leads to detraining in some weeks.
My main point with maximal effort or maximal lifts is that it's great but they're not sustainable throughout the year. But there's no reason to train in a manner which you could do year round since that too isn't optimal. We must consider the ebb and flow of training, a time and place for every method, maximal, submaximal, repetitive and dynamic.
Alan Mackey
Level 7 Valued Member
This!
If I need…
- To warm up before lifting with anything more than a couple of minutes of gentle mobility exercises.
- To use a Valsalva maneuver.
- To rest more than five minutes to repeat all the day’s lifting if I was so inclined.
Then I’m going either too heavy or too hard.
Wow, you're leaving a lot of strength gains on the table if you reign yourself in this much.
Why not warm up properly and see what your muscles can do?
Valsalva is the normal reflexive that people do when they lift something heavy. It's not a weird trick or cheat or anything like that.
Some sessions should be really hard in order to build strength.
william bad butt
Level 7 Valued Member
My "dont lift heavy" comment is more me being cute than anything else. I tend to lift in the 50- 85%, typically. I rarely go heavier. But I do, from time to time. And I do max at least once per year. I'm not just referring to barbell lifts. I do think though, that many people max out eay too often. It isnt necessary (maybe there are programs like Westside that are contrary to this).
In terms of valsava and rest... I am quite the opposite. I always use valsava, even for ultra light weights. I sometimes use valsava to pick up a pencil off the floor. I practice Pavels teachings here... Remember his CD player, speakers, volume control knob analogy? I'm always pushing and willing myself to make the lift. I'm always trying very hard and using perfect form with every lift. The only difference between 50% and 100% intensity is my volume knob, aka, my intra-abdominal pressure, everything else is basically the same. The intensity of my valsava contraction is how I dial in my strength.
Rest... Sometimes I take long Rests. Sometimes 10 min between sets. Even a simple 5x5 of moderately heavy squats, with warmup, could take almost 1 hr. I make sure I am completely fresh for each set. I have the advantage of a home gym so while resting sometimes I'm multi-tasking. I know I would struggle with this of I went to a commercial gym. In fact, during my weekly Planet Fitness workouts, I have no rest. Literally from set to set from machine to machine. My only rest is when it's my wife's turn between sets. But this is very different. I'm lifting very submaximal and this is almost an aerobic excersise for me.
I just wanted to clear the air... I am a lazy lifter... In that I lift at lower percentages of max than most. But I also realize that it is necessary to produce STRESS (aka train harder) to force an ADAPTATION, aka get stronger...
Regards,
Eric
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Yeah, me too... I've been able to do so much more this past year and a half in my home gym as compared to what I could do at the base gym I used to use. Everything is close, everything is as I left it, everything is available when I need it, everything is in reliable condition, there is so much less distraction... It really gives me a lot more bandwidth to focus on lifting.
Alan Mackey
Level 7 Valued Member
Many, many, many moons ago I already attained my 500/400/300/200 goals.
But, since I’m a martial artist first and foremost and a trail runner a distant second, strength training is basically GPP for me.
I’ve spent more than a decade following a myriad of PttP/ES/5x5x5/DDD programs. So far, so good.
My strength goal is not lifting a significant amount of weight anymore, but being able to lift a semi-decent amount of weight quite easily for a fair amount of beautiful, perfect reps.
As long as I can move between 125% and 150% of my bodyweight front squatting, snatch grip RDLing, incline pressing, incline rowing, and doing both dips and pull ups I’m way more than satisfied.
I try to follow a Maffetonesque approach to lifting, which, coincidentally, seems to align with both Dan’s and Pavel’s works.
There is nothing wrong with chasing maximal strength. Been there, done that.
But now I’m way more interested in making a 130 kg. front squat so, so, so easy that I won’t need to use a Valsalva or even warm up.
Notice I didn’t say I won’t do it, because I will probably end up doing both things, but not because I have to (if you know what I mean).
I’m fully aware I’m an odd duck, so that’s why I don’t recommend my approach to anyone.
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