plataued bill starr

K

Karky

2
okay, i dont gain as much anymore, bench and rows are completley stopped, not that i had much gaines with them in the first place, squat and military is slow, deadlift isent what it used to be either. so, people tell me i want to stay on Linear progression as long as possible, so i was thinking of just changing the reps. though i still want to gain strenght and some size, ive been really happy with my weight gain, hopefuly its not all fat:p

anyway, what rep range would you recommend using now that 5 doesnt work anymore? 10x3? and if i do that, on the friday im suppose to do 3 reps 2.5% heavier than the last monday, how many reps do i cut it down to then? 8? 5?


thats the workout if u dont know what im talking about
 
That's a quick plateau, personally, i think its a mental barrier. You have to get angry with the weights for time to time, especially to increase strength.

If your bored with the routine by all means change but i don't think you have physically plateaued.
 
could be a mental barrier.. but the body does get used to things.. and i read that after 1 month it could be wise to change it
 
Yep, 4 weeks is a good rule of thumb for interimate to advanced trainings.

Try a waterbury routine there also fullbody which i think you should stick too.
 
You can stick with the same weights and its just as hard but change doesnt happen if you just keep doing the same thing. Change it up every now and then and up the weights even if they are a little bit harder then you want.

Edit** second thought. If you are using Bills program that forces you to change it up. So IDK heh.
 
It's not mental.. the body gets used to workouts in 5 or 6 sessions, that's only 2 weeks on that program. How long have you been working out (I mean besides just this program)?

people tell me i want to stay on Linear progression as long as possible, so i was thinking of just changing the reps
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What's this crap? What 'people' and why would they tell you that?

From reading your other posts, you've said strength gain is more of a priority than size.. why would you go to a 10x3?
 
What does cycling the 5x5 entail? I am under the notion that you keep the same rep scheme but change the exercises.

I am not currently on a schedule or routine, but am in the process of formulating one. When it comes time to switch things up, would mixing the days suffice?

So far I've got this:

Monday- Straight legged dl- 5x5
Hanging leg raise- 5x5 (gotta keep it clean)

Tuesday- Clean and jerk (more like a half assed jerk/press)- 5x5
Bent over rows- 5x5

Wednesday- Squats- 5x5
reverse crunch- 5x5

Thursday- Wide grip pull-ups- 6x4 (bodyweight)
Seated DB press- 5x5

Friday- RDL- 5x5
Decline crunches, db side bends, or some other twisting motion- 5x5

Saturday- Single arm snatching/bent pressing- 5x5
bent over rows- 5x5

Sunday- Off...but I might do some neck work for fun- 5x5...lol

No, I don't have any chest work. I believe I have a ligament injury on my right pec which seems to get worse with progressively heavy chest work. My numbers have stayed predominantly the same, in terms of benching and whatnot. I guess I'll be benching 180 forever...*tear*

I would like any input on the questions and routine, please.
 
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LeiYunFat said:
What does cycling the 5x5 entail? I am under the notion that you keep the same rep scheme but change the exercises.

I am not currently on a schedule or routine, but am in the process of formulating one. When it comes time to switch things up, would mixing the days suffice?

So far I've got this:

Monday- Straight legged dl- 5x5
Hanging leg raise- 5x5 (gotta keep it clean)

Tuesday- Clean and jerk (more like a half assed jerk/press)- 5x5
Bent over rows- 5x5

Wednesday- Squats- 5x5
reverse crunch- 5x5

Thursday- Wide grip pull-ups- 6x4 (bodyweight)
Seated DB press- 5x5

Friday- RDL- 5x5
Decline crunches, db side bends, or some other twisting motion- 5x5

Saturday- Single arm snatching/bent pressing- 5x5
bent over rows- 5x5

Sunday- Off...but I might do some neck work for fun- 5x5...lol

No, I don't have any chest work. I believe I have a ligament injury on my right pec which seems to get worse with progressively heavy chest work. My numbers have stayed predominantly the same, in terms of benching and whatnot. I guess I'll be benching 180 forever...*tear*
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Have you ever had your injury checked ??
 
No, never formally. I went to my doctor and sought opinions of several other doctors, but it was never anything like, x-rays or therapy or whatnot. The occasions in which I went to a MD for this consisted of discussion only.

I used to think it was a muscle tear, but resolved that it wasn't it's definately in the ligament/tendons.
 
Muck said:
It's not mental.. the body gets used to workouts in 5 or 6 sessions, that's only 2 weeks on that program. How long have you been working out (I mean besides just this program)?



What's this crap? What 'people' and why would they tell you that?

From reading your other posts, you've said strength gain is more of a priority than size.. why would you go to a 10x3?
Click to expand...

i read some article that you should stay on a linear progression as long as possible, but ofcource, when the gains stop you should switch to advanced.
ive heard you can stay on a linear progression for like 6-12 months, if you change things up a bit every once in a while ofcource.
and about the 10x3.. i dunno, someone said i could do it just to change it so i would start gaining again. would you just recomend me to change exersices instead? like doing RDL instead of normal, doing front squat instead of the standard, doing DB bench press instead of BB and stuff like that? or should i try out a different linear progression routine? or go on to dual factor theory with loading week and deloading week and that stuff?

this is a quote from the page i found the bill starr:
"After a while, linear progress doesn't work so well. You want to do this for as long as you can. And I mean, resetting and running at your records, changing some exercises, rep ranges, whatever, just keep trying to get some linear progress as you want to milk this kind of progression for all it's worth. After a while it will become pretty obvious this doesn't work for you any more. Welcome to periodization."



and before i started this i had worked out for a while, nothing big though, just noobish stuff.. i had no idea what i did, did some pushups, bicep curls at home.. some pullups (without really propper form) was at the gym for a while only hitting the mashines.
 
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3x10 would be ok if that's still above 80% intensity for you. I doubt it is though.

The long as possible is of course until it stops working. I had success lifting muscle groups once a week for quite a while. Other people I know have gotten great gains from that as well, doing just that.. for years. I think with 3 times a week, you can make quicker gains, but you can't do that as long either. I would suggest trying that, and you can move your rep range around all you want, but stay above 80% intensity (that's going to vary, there's no chart that's going to tell you what your max rep range is for that) if your main goal is strength gains.
 
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Muck said:
3x10 would be ok if that's still above 80% intensity for you. I doubt it is though.

The long as possible is of course until it stops working. I had success lifting muscle groups once a week for quite a while. Other people I know have gotten great gains from that as well, doing just that.. for years. I think with 3 times a week, you can make quicker gains, but you can't do that as long either. I would suggest trying that, and you can move your rep range around all you want, but stay above 80% intensity (that's going to vary, there's no chart that's going to tell you what your max rep range is for that) if your main goal is strength gains.
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well i could try to do the 3x10 for some weeks and see how it goes, some size aint a bad thing either. if i dont get gains with that, then its probobly time to go on to dual factor, or should i then try a completley different linear routine?

and about the 80 percent thing.. what if i dod 8 reps.. thats exactly at the 80% mark (according to my sources), or should i try to do something that is more intense? i was thinking about 6 reps.. but thats only a 1 rep change from 5 reps. though i dunno if its of any importance how big the changes are in reps or whatever?
and the sets i choose is just for the volume i want right?
 
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What sources? The only source is you. 80% for one person can be 3 reps, for others it can be 12 (beginners). General rule is, the longer/more advanced you are in training, the lower the reps you want to work in for strength gains, because that's the only way you work with a high enough intensity to still get strength gains. When you first start lifting, you can do a lot more reps at 80%. That's part of the reason you see a lot of training programs starting at high rep counts, because people can get very good strength and size gains with that. As you progress though, that drops considerably.. and that's why a chart showing intensity %s are going to be pretty much worthless for you. You just have to test that yourself to find what rep range you can still work in while still gaining strength.

As far as how intense, I would base that on how you feel. The closer you are to 100% the more stress on your joints and tendons you'll feel. If you can go higher than 80% and not feel like you were hit by a truck, then go for it. Some people can work over 90% and have great success with it, and other people can't go over that at all without joints becoming too sore and having to take unnecessary rest. I vary my intensity pretty regularly.

You could also try 10x3. That's a similiar concept as 5x5 (staying above 80% and keeping volume 25 or above) to get good strength and size. You can also do that 3 times a week. I think that would be a better alternative to 3x10 (unless that's a fairly high intensity for you, but you'll have to check that yourself).

I would determine your maxes for your lifts if you don't know them. Then do as many reps as you can at 80% (different day obviously). And use that # as your max count. I would definitely not use a chart for determining that.
 
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yeah.. 3x10 is kind of alot of work though, with all those sets :S
then ill go to the gym today and find my max lifts on all the exersices, then on friday ill go and determin my max reps with 80% of that weight and then on monday ill use that rep range on the bill starr program.. sounds good?

though i am a bit nervous of trying to find my max reps, spechally in squat and deadlift :S ill probobly stop when i feel like i cant go any higher, cuz i dont want to wait until my back starts bending or i cant manage to squat it up.
 
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I estimate on squats because my gym doesn't have a squat rack and don't trust some random person enough to spot me on it. Just be real careful.

That's still better than doing a certain # and looking at a chart to tell you what your max is. Like I explained, that's not at all accurate.

And yah, I'm kinda glad that's the way our body works. I hated doing sets of 12 and 10, and finding out that those weren't very helpful later on.. was welcome news.
 
thanks alot for the help on this! just checked my max reps, dunno if all of them are 100% accurate, since espechally on bench and rows im a perfectionist on my form, since those are the techniques i have most troubble with. though i only did 60kg max bench, which suprised me as before i did 5 reps of 60 on the bill starr, though i tucked my elbows inn more now, which i found to be alot harder.
and when i find my rep for 80% what if its different on different exersices? do i take the lowest rep number and work with that, or just work with different reps on each exersice?

and about the bench, how wide should my grip be. there are some marks pretty wide on it, until now ive used my middle finger on that mark, but i dunno if thats right, i switched to using the ring finger on that mark today, though i see alot of people use their pinky on that mark.. so what is the "normal" thing to do? keep in mind im pretty tall, just above 1.90meters.
it seems the wider i go the harder it is to tuck my elbows inn.
 
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You could do different exercises at different reps, as long as you're working 80% or above.

Oh, I thought you meant 3x10 was a lot of work, but you meant 10x3. Yah, that's a lot of sets, and I haven't tried that.
 
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