Stopped Lifting, lost it all; what's the best way to get strength back?

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pennyantics

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Hi everyone, this is my first post here. A brief bio before I go into detail about the post. I've been lifting for about 5 years now with varying intensity, although I would say that I've averaged about 3 gym visits per week even including my intermittent short resting breaks. From January to June I was working 9-5 and I got in a very consistent working out rhythm. I would go to the gym 4 times a week with a 2 day split (bench/tri and back/shoulder/bi). Every day I would play 2-3 hours of basketball. By the end of June I may have been in the best shape of my life. I weighed in at 195lbs (I'm 6'4'') and I had theoretical or real maxes of 260 on bench, 330 on squat and 205 on military. I was dunking on regulation hoops with ease. It's worth noting that at this point I was supplementing regularly with creatine and caffeine preworkout (animal pump) and whey protein (bsn products typically)

In mid to late-august of this year I pretty much stopped going to the gym altogether. So, I have missed about 3 months. I went to the gym today because it was obvious that this was taking a toll on my body. I weighed in at 190. I was winded after 3 games of basketball and I moved to the track. I hit my wall after 1/3 of a mile. I went to the weight room to see just how bad it had gotten. I started with skullcrushers and I felt at about 60% of where I was three months ago. I warmed up after that with two high rep sets on the bench then I benched 165x2 and the third rep was a failure. So quantitatively speaking, in terms of pure lifting capability, I lost just under half of my strength.

So I'm wondering how I should approach getting back in shape. Let me start with my goals and then pose a few questions that I have for anyone who has experienced this before or has any recommendations.

Goals:
Get back to the same strength I was at back in June. In otherwords I want to regain my lost strength. I've heard from a few places there are shortcuts that make this easier than getting strength for the first time. What are they? I also would like to be in better athletic shape than I was in June. This is my main progressive goal.

Questions:
Should I start with a focus on athletic or strength training?
Should I supplement now or later?
 
pennyantics said:
Hi everyone, this is my first post here. A brief bio before I go into detail about the post. I've been lifting for about 5 years now with varying intensity, although I would say that I've averaged about 3 gym visits per week even including my intermittent short resting breaks. From January to June I was working 9-5 and I got in a very consistent working out rhythm. I would go to the gym 4 times a week with a 2 day split (bench/tri and back/shoulder/bi). Every day I would play 2-3 hours of basketball. By the end of June I may have been in the best shape of my life. I weighed in at 195lbs (I'm 6'4'') and I had theoretical or real maxes of 260 on bench, 330 on squat and 205 on military. I was dunking on regulation hoops with ease. It's worth noting that at this point I was supplementing regularly with creatine and caffeine preworkout (animal pump) and whey protein (bsn products typically)

In mid to late-august of this year I pretty much stopped going to the gym altogether. So, I have missed about 3 months. I went to the gym today because it was obvious that this was taking a toll on my body. I weighed in at 190. I was winded after 3 games of basketball and I moved to the track. I hit my wall after 1/3 of a mile. I went to the weight room to see just how bad it had gotten. I started with skullcrushers and I felt at about 60% of where I was three months ago. I warmed up after that with two high rep sets on the bench then I benched 165x2 and the third rep was a failure. So quantitatively speaking, in terms of pure lifting capability, I lost just under half of my strength.

So I'm wondering how I should approach getting back in shape. Let me start with my goals and then pose a few questions that I have for anyone who has experienced this before or has any recommendations.

Goals:
Get back to the same strength I was at back in June. In otherwords I want to regain my lost strength. I've heard from a few places there are shortcuts that make this easier than getting strength for the first time. What are they? I also would like to be in better athletic shape than I was in June. This is my main progressive goal.

Questions:
Should I start with a focus on athletic or strength training?
Should I supplement now or later?
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First off, welcome to the forums! I'm also pretty new here but I think I have some advice for you. As for your first question, athletic and strength training can be one in the same thing. A lot of times, when athletes are training (like myself) the workouts we do consists of both strength training and what my coach likes to call "functional training". Athletic and strength training really work hand in hand. Now, body building is a different story so we're going to stay away from that. To answer your first question, I think you should do a combo of both because of the kind of activities you do. If you really were to follow a pretty strict routine like you once did, I believe you would be able to obtain your results without a problem. I don't know of any short cuts unless you want to take an illegal route to things but one thing you do have is more knowledge. You have more experience and this will translate into better workouts and more efficient training. For your second question, I think you can start with a protein supplement right off the bat. I don't have any experience with creatine but if I'm not mistaken you might want to wait a few weeks for your muscles and body to get back into the swing of working out before you do cycles. And then of course there's your vitamins, minerals, and such and those really depend on your diet. If you lack in an area, a supplement will help or even if you feel that you may not be getting as much of something as needed then supplements are nice additives. I know all this stuff is pretty general information but if you have questions about a workout routine, exercises, or etc., feel free to fire away. That's what we're here for. lol :D
 
I'm thinking that the endurance you lost over those 3 months also had an impact on your performance. If you went to the gym after 3 games of basketball and running you must've been pretty fatigued. I'd be willing to bet you didn't lose quite as much strength as you think
 
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