Narvaez Family Starting Strength Log

[slowjoe]

Congrats on the cert.

Re: the deadlift: stop missing. I find that a miss takes around a month to get over mentally. Reset, choose a small increment, then ride the wave.

And never, never try to pull again after a miss. You miss, even once, you're done for the day. Go home thinking you might be able to make the lift, rather than knowing you can't.

[Tom Narvaez]

4/16/12

Press:
Tom: 157.5x5x3
Don't care.

Deadlift: 405x1
Fuck this. First instinct is to break something. Second instinct is that I'm overtrained on my deadlifts. Third instinct is to figure out what to do. I guess I'll have to reset 20% or something.

Probably the worst day of training of all-time.


Thanks for the 'grats on the cert, peeps.

[Tom Narvaez]

So... here is my entire lowerbody training history in an easy to digest format:


Day Squat Deadlift
9-Sep 305x5x3
12-Sep 315x5x3 345x4
14-Sep 325x5x3
16-Sep 335x5x3 355x5
19-Sep 345x5x3
21-Sep 355x5x3 365x5
24-Sep 295x5x2
26-Sep 365x5x3 305x5 Deadlift
Note: reset Deadlift due to form (hitching on 365)
28-Sep 365x1
Note: Repeated squat due to depth concerns, got 1 rep
30-Sep Deload 365x5
2-Oct 325x5x1
4-Oct 325x5x3 375x1
Note: Okay, at this point it appears four days is obviously not enough time to recover for my pulls anymore
6-Oct 330x5x3
10-Oct 335x5x3 315x5
12-Oct 340x5x3
14-Oct 345x5x3 320x5
17-Oct 350x5x3
19-Oct 355x0 325x5
Note: Started trying to diet using intermittent fasting, lost weight got 0 reps
21-Oct 355x5,5,0
24-Oct 360x5x1 335x5
Note: Switched to Madcows for squats
28-Oct 367.5x3x1 345x5
31-Oct 367.5x5x1
2-Nov None 355x5x1
Note: First time I ever tried pulling without squatting, my log says it was my best set ever in terms of technique/speed
4-Nov 375x3
7-Nov 315x5+335x5 365x5
Note: I started an extremely restrictive diet at this point (RFL)
11-Nov 365x0
Note: Couldn't recover while on RFL
14-Nov 295x5x2 370x5
Note: Hit an all-time PR while on a very restrictive diet (losing 2-3lbs per wk)
18-Nov 345x3
21-Nov 285x5x2 370x6
Note: Second consecutive PR WHILE dieting, perhaps I'd been over training my pulls/lower body?
24-Nov
Note: Pulled hamstring very badly doing GHRs
28-Nov 275x5x2 315x4
Note: Hamstring prevented me from doing anything near PRs for quite some time
2-Dec 275x5x2
5-Dec 275x5x2 345x1
9-Dec 275x12
12-Dec 275x5x2 345x4
16-Dec 235x15x5 175x15
Note: Restrictive diet ends
18-Dec 245x12 245x12
20-Dec 255x12 255x12
22-Dec 265x12 265x12
24-Dec 275x12 275x12
26-Dec 285x12 285x12
28-Dec 295x12 295x12
30-Dec Deload Deload
1-Jan 385x1 400x1
Note: Maxed out after getting shit faced on New Year's eve. I think I had probably regained most of my lost strength at this point.
4-Jan
Note: Did bodybuilding style workouts for a week, hated it, went back to strength training
12-Jan 305x5x3 345x3
14-Jan 315x5x3
16-Jan None 355x0
Note: Yes, that's zero reps for deadlift.
19-Jan 325x3x5 355x3
21-Jan 335x3x5 365x1
26-Jan 345x5x3
28-Jan None 366x5
Note: After one week off of pulling, I took more than what I singled and hit it for five.
2-Feb 365x5x2
4-Feb 355x5x1 375x5x1
Note: Crippling tendonitis sets in, but I pull an all-time PR with ease 7 days after I last pulled
6-Feb 315x5x3
Note: High bar squats because of the elbow
8-Feb None 385x5x1
Note: Only four days later, I pulled another deadlift PR
10-Feb 325x5x1
13-Feb 320x5x3 396x1
Note: Five days later, I try to pull, I get one rep. The squats were "medium" at that time.
15-Feb 330x5x3
18-Feb 335x5x3 391x1
Note: After taking off 5lbs and still getting only 1 rep, despite getting 385 for 5 only 10 days earlier, I reset my pulls
20-Feb 340x5x3
22-Feb 345x5x3 355x5
Note: These deadlifts were extremely hard. Clearly I'm overtrained/underrecovered on the pulls
25-Feb 308x5x3 353x5
Note: "Repeated" the weight because I was at SS seminar working on form
29-Feb 350x5x3
Note: Restarted GOMAD, I'm in extreme caloric excess
3-Mar 355x5x3
5-Mar 360x5x3 365x0
Note: This really makes no sense at all, I pulled eight days later and still managed to get zero. During this period I probably gained 3-5lbs as well.
7-Mar 365x5x3
10-Mar 370x5,5,2 365x5
Note: This makes no sense, either. Five days later I pulled 365x5 AND it was after squatting PR weights.
12-Mar 265x5x2
Note: Light squats are introduced and I switch to a single top set instead of sets across
14-Mar 375x5 385x5
17-Mar 380x5
19-Mar 285x5x2
21-Mar 385x5 395x5
24-Mar 390x2
Note: My log blames deadlifting on Friday for this Monday squat failure
26-Mar 295x5x2
28-Mar 390x5
31-Mar 395x5 405x0
Note: As you can see, I waited for TEN DAYS and still didn't recover. This just makes no sense. Did I detrain? Was this a product of trying to pull on Monday? I have no idea. It makes no sense.
2-Apr None 405x3
Note: So, two days after going 405x0, I go 405x3. The first time, I waited ten days and got zero. The second time I waited 2 days and got 3. I didn't squat first for the 405 triple.
4-Apr 400x5
7-Apr 405x5
Note: I pulled my hamstring doing GHRs on this day (not very badly)
9-Apr None 415x1
Note: Log blames this deadlift failure on the hamstring.
11-Apr 410x5
14-Apr 415x5
16-Apr None 405x1
Note: Hamstring wasn’t a factor today as far as I could feel





After going through all of that data, I'm really no closer to understanding how to program my deadlift at all. My very best pulls have actually come on days when I've squatted despite my insistence otherwise. I actually made progress on my deadlift while dieting. I've made almost zero progress on my deadlift during my recent bout with GOMAD. I went from 385x5 to 395x5 after four days. Then, after ten days, I went from 395x5 to 405x0. It's all completely fucked. I can't make sense of it yet.

[Tad_T]

In other news, I passed the Coaching Certification process! I'm now a Starting Strength Certified Coach! I'm stoked. In the last line of my evaluation, Rip said that I was great on the platform and that he'd hire me. That is a huge confidence booster for me. I feel awesome about this.

Congratulations!

[Tom Narvaez]

Thanks, Tad!

[Carlos Daniel]

I wasn't able to make any sense either. Actually, my own progress was smoother than yours. It just seems that when I hit 400, it kinda stopped there. All the way to there, it was more or less moving.

[slowjoe]

After going through all of that data, I'm really no closer to understanding how to program my deadlift at all. My very best pulls have actually come on days when I've squatted despite my insistence otherwise. I actually made progress on my deadlift while dieting. I've made almost zero progress on my deadlift during my recent bout with GOMAD. I went from 385x5 to 395x5 after four days. Then, after ten days, I went from 395x5 to 405x0. It's all completely fucked. I can't make sense of it yet.

I haven't gone through your whole log, so I'm not sure where your problems are. However, you do seem to be altering your programs pretty frequently. You need to give an idea time to find out if it's going to stick. For example, at one point, you decided to go to weekly deadlifts, presumably due to potential overtraining. You missed that work set, and gave up. This isn't logical. If you were overtrained, a week wasn't enough time to fix the problem.

Likewise, you seem to be getting hamstring injuries with reasonable frequency. However, you are still working at high % of 1RM at your next training session. Is this sensible?

You're in this for the long haul. It might be more productive to give a training schedule 4-8 weeks before changing again.

[Tom Narvaez]

Not trying to say you're wrong, but I'm just going to explain what I was thinking at each step of the way and why I did what I did:
1) I was alternating deadlifts with power cleans as per the novice program. I got 385x5. I went 395 the next time I pulled (4-5 days later) and got 1 rep. I thought it might have just been a shitty day so I went back down to 391 and still only got 1 rep. At the time, I took this as a sign that pulling heavy that frequently would not work.
2) I reset to 355 as per the 10% reset protocol. I switched to once per week. The first set of 355x5 was excruciatingly hard. It was harder than 385x5 when I hit that number. I suppose I probably should have reset MORE at that point. I went to the SS seminar about three days later. I ended up working up to around 355 again and it was EXTREMELY easy. I waited eight days and then went out and got 365x0. Seven days later, I tried 365 one more time and got 5. Seven days later, I got 385. Seven more days later, I got 395. However, I switched at this point because it was becoming obvious that I could not both pull heavy and squat heavy on Friday and still be able to make my Monday squats. I failed 390 horribly after doing 385 with ease. This wasn't a fail due to it being too heavy, even my warmups felt 50lbs heavier than usual. I thought, at the time, that it was because I wasn't giving enough time between deadlifts and squats. So, I moved deadlifts to "Monday" thinking that three days of rest would be better than two.
3) I waited a "cycle" and after ten days of rest, I tried to pull on Monday. I got zero reps. I figured the only way this could be possible is that squats were interfering with deadlifts. This was the longest I had ever gone without deadlifting, I only added ten lbs, and I had that big of a reduction. So, at the time, I assumed this was horribly wrong programming.
4) Then I tried pulling on my "light squat" day as per the original advanced novice program. I got three reps after getting zero. In my mind, that confirmed that squats were the culprit.

Anyways, as far as the hamstring thing goes, they both happened during GHRs. The first one was really bad and I didn't use a high % of 1RM at all. The second time, it was just a minor tweak. I couldn't feel any pain while walking. I warmed up my squats and there was zero pain. I didn't feel any pain until my worksets of squats and deadlifts. As of now, it is pretty much healed. I guess I could have handled the second tweak a little differently, but I have no problems with lifting through small stuff like that. In any case, I've tweaked my hamstring twice in eight months doing the same thing (explosive, rest-pauseish, GHRs).

[LeonidasfromSparta]

After going through all of that data, I'm really no closer to understanding how to program my deadlift at all. My very best pulls have actually come on days when I've squatted despite my insistence otherwise. I actually made progress on my deadlift while dieting. I've made almost zero progress on my deadlift during my recent bout with GOMAD. I went from 385x5 to 395x5 after four days. Then, after ten days, I went from 395x5 to 405x0. It's all completely fucked. I can't make sense of it yet.

I don't know man. Deadlift programming is pretty much a topic we're ignorant about.
My take on this is that you should change something. Being stubborn on 5s on the deadlift every week/2 weeks doesn't seem to work for you at this point. I expected the increase in squat to transfer to the deads but this isn't happening.
My suggestion is to add deficit deads and rack pulls. They seem to have a lot of carryover on the deads.
Also Andy Baker might know more about this. I'd ask him on his programming thread.

[Tom Narvaez]

I haven't tried pulling 1x/2wks yet, but I have my doubts about how effective it would be anyway. I think I'm probably a bit overtrained at this point. I've wanted to run a cycle of deficit deadlifts for quite sometime because of all of my struggles off of the ground, but my main concern is that things would just turn up exactly the same way they have with my deadlift. I mean, as others have pointed out, I switched a lot of stuff, too much, too often in my first few months, but since then I really haven't strayed very much at all. It's not as if I'm missing a single rep here and there. I have very regularly gone from like 5 reps to 0 and back again.