What happens when novices don't increase their weight every time?

[Karl Schudt]

Let's see if I can make that more clear with a specific example. Same athlete, same weekly schedule, all else being equal. Workouts go like:

Program A: 100 lbs, 110 lbs, 120 lbs, 130 lbs, 140 lbs, 150 lbs (end of week 2)

Program B: 100 lbs, 100 lbs, 100 lbs, 100 lbs (Point 1), 110 lbs, 120 lbs, 130 lbs, 140 lbs, 150 lbs (end of week 3)

.

Program B is much more likely to be 100lbs, 100lbs, 100lbs, 110lbs, 110lbs, 110lbs, 120lbs, 120lbs, 120lbs, and so on, because the lifter is conditioning himself to avoid anything that's hard. There's a psychological adaptation that goes along with the strength increases. You get better at doing hard stuff. But if it's not hard, and if you don't add weight because you are afraid of it being hard, then you don't get better at it.

[ChrisRozon]

We all understand your question. We just don't understand why you're asking it...

[jbackos]

My experience is that if you repeat the same poundages, the body will use less and less tissue to move the load over time. Since you will be using less available strength to move load, you will begin to decondition. Eventually the weight that you were lifting for a set of five will become difficult to lift for a single. IMO either continually make progress or take up group clsses and exercise.

[Chris Lippke]

Is it not obvious that if your training weights do not increase you are not getting stronger, and thus not training?

Contemplate this on the Tree of Woe, OP.

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There's a psychological adaptation that goes along with the strength increases. You get better at doing hard stuff. But if it's not hard, and if you don't add weight because you are afraid of it being hard, then you don't get better at it.

At first, you fear it.
Then iron forges your will.
Becomes what you crave.

[jeffnc]

The wheel of pain did provide a style of progressive resistance.

Yeah, good point.

I guess what I was really getting at is that IMO, most of the general public believes that if you do something for a very long time, you will slowly get stronger and stronger, even if the resistance doesn't change. But I think they're confusing technique with power. For example, if you practice almost anything with a focus on correct technique, then over time you will become more and more precise. This would be true of golf, or martial arts, or playing the piano, or whatever. So theoretically, if you practiced doing squats correctly for 50 years, presumably you'd get good at doing squats, if "good" means easily performing excellent technique, if not getting actually stronger.

Kind of tangential to my question, but anyway....

[Troy May]

I think Karl has hit the nail on the head as far as any "damage" is concerned it's letting your mental capacity to drive yourself to do the work that atrophies when you sit on the same weight for too long.

[Crom]

We all understand your question. We just don't understand why you're asking it...

If I may speculate as to the reason for, and perhaps some validity for, the question:
In my case, I have been trying to follow "the program". And I actually could follow the program for a while. But although I "could" do it, it left me feeling disastrously fatigued, sore, dizzy, sick to my stomache, and mind-muddled for the off day, and I would just barely recovered to the point where I "could" do the next workout, only to start the excruciating process all over.
So, I just quit trying to move up every workout and move up every second or third workout. On the second and perhaps third workout I can feel that the weight and stress has become more manageable and "easier" and it then gives me a little more confidence to move up. So although I did not actually move to a higher weight on the repeat days, I could definitely feel that I had improved and was stronger.

Of course I have a big excuse because I am 66 years old. So I feel free to use "the program" as a guideline without having to adhere to it with a religious zeal. I am getting stronger, although maybe just a little slower. So why undergo mental and physical turmoil ? I know, it is "wasting time", but being sick/sore on the off days is also a form of wasting time.
Since there is individual variation in all things, maybe a slightly slower rate of increase is also appropriate for some younger people (speculation).

[jeffnc]

What would be the purpose of program B? Why would you want to waste time by working out with the same weight over and over again?

A couple ways to answer that. First, I'm not proposing the program, I'm simply asking about the implications of it. To answer your questions, the purpose of program B could either be 1) that as mentioned, many in the general public believe this would increase your strength. Or 2) for whatever reason they are in "maintenance mode" for an indeterminate period of time. You might not want to get any stronger, for various possible reasons, but you don't want to get any weaker either.

But my real question was always this: it was an open ended question, not really just a yes or no. I wasn't even sure how to ask the question because I wasn't sure what the possible answer might be. But it was conceivable and plausible to me that a possible answer might be something like this. Your body might be on some "physiological response trajectory", or have a certain "momentum". (Of course this would actually be the chemical reactions occurring in your body, nothing mystical or new age.) Once you stop this momentum, the body might not respond to the same change in the same way, e.g. a 10lb increase in resistance after a week of no weight change might have little to no effect, compared to the same weight change when you're on the correct "trajectory". I have no reason to think that's true, just curious.

We all understand your question. We just don't understand why you're asking it...

Just so I can learn more about it how the body works and responds. I'm just curious.

Practical Programming for Strength Training | The Aasgaard Company

Did you read the article?

This is a little confusing, because you're referencing a link now that isn't an article, so I'm going to assume you're asking me about your link in an earlier post, which in passing I assumed was part of a sig line (which makes me wonder what this link is for....) But anyway, yes I've read it now. And since I've read it, it's off the subject, but I'm very confused about something you wrote, if you don't mind going over it in this thread.

"There are many strong lifters who cannot perform a “pistol” – a one-legged bodyweight squat, basically a balance trick for a light-bodyweight athlete – who can still manage to squat 600 and not fall down. And who performs better on the field, the weak pistoleer or the strong squatter?"

Not sure where to start here. (Never heard the term "pistol" but sounds good so I'll use it.) Let's start with your second sentence. What do you mean by "weak pistoleer"? Someone who is weak at pistoling but otherwise strong, or someone who pistols strongly but is in other ways weak? Assuming you mean the latter, then in my experience we have an issue.

I play soccer, and last I checked, Messi never smoked a guy on the field by "squatting strongly" past him. On the other hand, "pistoling" is basically a primary explosive power move by which changes of direction are made on the soccer field. For example, get moving to the right, "selling" your intention to the defender and forcing him to move in that direction, "pistol" down hard on your right side, explode out of that driving left with more force/speed than the defender can muster (at least given the required response time), and go the other way. And you're calling this a "trick" of "balance", which is kind of hard to fathom, because it seems to me the better pistoleer is going to win every time.

I can certainly buy the idea that squatting would make you a better pistoleer. In fact, in the context of the article, I would have expected you to say that all along. But if you're saying getting strong at squatting might leave you weak at pistoling (which you seem to have said), then I could be a serious disadvantage on the soccer field in terms of useful power, relative to my opponents.

We all understand your question. We just don't understand why you're asking it...

To be a little more specific, as I alluded to in my original post by referring to getting stuck, one of the things I was curious about was if there was any correlation with things like this that I've read.

"It is harder to get unstuck than to make small consistent jumps over time."
WNDTP | Kunkel, Racculia, and Wisneski

I wondered if there was some reason you might "get stuck" simply by staying at a weight for too long, and that reason alone.

[Brodie Butland]

I play soccer, and last I checked, Messi never smoked a guy on the field by "squatting strongly" past him.

Well, to be fair...last I checked, no one ever smoked a guy on the field by strongly pistol squatting past him either. Show me one video example in any soccer match of a player using a pistol squat on the field.

But the stronger soccer players are able to win more battles for the ball simply because they don't get pushed around as easily, right? And doesn't progressively overloading the squat make us stronger?

This would be like me saying that last time I checked, LeBron never beat another player by "squatting strongly" past him. He has, however, been able to plow through defenders and box out players more effectively because he's a hell of a lot stronger than most NBA players.

On the other hand, "pistoling" is basically a primary explosive power move by which changes of direction are made on the soccer field. For example, get moving to the right, "selling" your intention to the defender and forcing him to move in that direction, "pistol" down hard on your right side, explode out of that driving left with more force/speed than the defender can muster (at least given the required response time), and go the other way. And you're calling this a "trick" of "balance", which is kind of hard to fathom, because it seems to me the better pistoleer is going to win every time.

Well, not exactly. What you're describing is a maneuver of switching momentum on one leg. That is not the same as a pistol squat.

So here's the broader question: why might becoming strong at a pistol squat not help with the change of direction maneuver on the field that you're describing? Hint: why might shooting a heavier basketball not help, or even hinder, shooting a standard weight basketball?

I can certainly buy the idea that squatting would make you a better pistoleer. In fact, in the context of the article, I would have expected you to say that all along. But if you're saying getting strong at squatting might leave you weak at pistoling (which you seem to have said), then I could be a serious disadvantage on the soccer field in terms of useful power, relative to my opponents.

I think you're reading things that aren't there. Strength is the most general adaptation available. A strong squat will carry over to any aspect of athleticism that benefits from strength, and it is very easily titratable. Pistoling, on the other hand, is limited by factors other than force production (i.e., strength). It would be a terrible idea to use pistoling for strength development for this very reason--to develop strength, squatting is far more effective. And it would be an equally terrible idea to use pistoling for technique development for the reasons alluded to above.

You really need to read the training versus exercise versus practice articles that are floating around here. They cover these matters far better and more eloquently than I can.

I wondered if there was some reason you might "get stuck" simply by staying at a weight for too long, and that reason alone.

Well, if you refuse to increase the weight, then you're going to be "stuck" at the lower weight by choice. There's no reason why you can't decide to sack up and increase the weight later, though...it's not like if you squat 135 lbs for a year that you'll become permanently unable to squat over 135 lbs irrespective of whether you decide to actually DTP.

You will, however, get weaker over time by doing the same weight repeatedly, because you aren't requiring the body to adapt any more. So you would "get stuck" in the sense that it will become progressively more difficult to squat 140 lbs at your next session if you just stick to 135 lbs repeatedly...in fact, after a long enough period, it will become progressively more difficult to squat 135 lbs at your next session if you just stick to 135 lbs repeatedly. We see this in practice all the time with new lifters who insist on not raising the weight "until my form is perfect." It's not unusual to see them even fail the same weight after enough time passes.

[jeffnc]

Well, to be fair...last I checked, no one ever smoked a guy on the field by strongly pistol squatting past him either. Show me one video example in any soccer match of a player using a pistol squat on the field.

What I'm talking about happens constantly.

Well, not exactly. What you're describing is a maneuver of switching momentum on one leg. That is not the same as a pistol squat.

It seems as close as you're gonna get. You're saying that getting stronger at squats will help you do better at non-squat moves on the field, but then you're saying that getting stronger at pistols will not help you do a move that is much closer to a pistol than most other moves are close to a squat.

It would be a terrible idea to use pistoling for strength development for this very reason--to develop strength, squatting is far more effective.

This doesn't really surprise me. What surprises me is saying that a strong squatter will not be able to pistol. This seems to be inconsistent with everything else I've read about "starting strength" ideas. For example, leg pressers cannot squat heavy, but squatters can leg press heavy. Core exercisers cannot squat heavy, but squatters have strong cores.

But perhaps the issue of what a pistol is precisely, and whether or not it actually happens on the field. This certainly seems more like one.

You will, however, get weaker over time by doing the same weight repeatedly

So what you're saying is that you are doing damage. It's difficult to understand why this would be so, or the mechanism by which it works.