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Linear Progression Stalling on Upper Body, Going fine with lower body?
Since doing the Starting Strength Program from the beginning of June, log here, my lifts have progressed as follows:
June 17, 2017
Squat: 225
Bench: 205
June 19, 2017
Press: 120
Deadlift: 315
The lower body workout weights were backed off of previous efforts due to the increased volume of SS versus what I was doing previously. The upper body weights were not backed off as volume remained kinda the same.
July 19, 2017
Deadlift: 335
July 24, 2017
Press: 128
July 26, 2017
Squat: 280
Bench: 212
So since June 17 here is my progression:
Squat: 225 - 280
Deadlift: 315 - 330
Press: 120 - 128
Bench: 205 - 212
And that progression has been "easy" for the squats and deads. The bench and press have been a slow struggle. Repeating weights week to week and slow reps.
Any thoughts?
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You could reset and work back up and make sure to use fractional plates, or do more volume on your bench and/or press. Check out the new e-book put out by Drs. Baraki and Feigenbaum. The Bridge | Barbell Medicine
Quick edit: you didn't ask about your lower body lifts, but if squats and deads felt like an easy progression, why so slow? Why only 15 pounds on the deadlift in over a month?
Last edited by marcf; 07-27-2017 at 06:32 PM.
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Thank you for the article, I will check it out.Originally Posted by marcf
As for the slow deadlift progression I think I've only done them two-three times in the month because of the switch to once a week. I'd have to double check the log. Also, part of the reason for that is I had ten days off when I was on vacation in Maui. Maybe not the best period to use as an example but this has been the behaviour for me even with the previous workout mentioned.
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Not a bad excuse to take a break!
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1 to 3 lbs per week on press and bench at those weights for a novice is not slow progress. That's normal progress. If you're having to reset it might be because you're trying to add more weight than that.
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To me it simply looks like your squat was disproportionately weak to all the other basic lifts and it simply caught up to the rest.
I'd recommend doing both. In my experience upping no of sets to 4 on bench and press, sometimes sneaking out an extra rep beyond FAHVE (just make sure you can actually do it, no need to have failed reps) in 1 or 2 of those sets made a huge difference in my pressing progression.
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Maybe I'm just bad at navigating Barbell Medicine , but how did you find out about that e-book? I vaguely remember Jordan saying he was working on programs beyond his general intermediate template, but never saw articles posted to his site.
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He posted about it on instagram.
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Ah, thanks. I don't use instagram, so maybe that's why I'm out of the loop.
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