Intermittent Fasting and PPST-Advanced Novice

[Captain Ronn]

My squat sets did not go well today. Attempted 425lbs @ 5x5. Got 3,3,2,4,3. Weird. Benched 275x5x3 and this felt pretty good. Did not attempt to deadlift (time constraints). I'm not entirely sure if I can attribute the poor squats to IF, though I am inclined to do so. I mentioned previously that I was coming off an overtrain and a part of me thinks I have not adequately recovered from this.

Today I weighted in at 235 down from about 241. This may be all water weight (?) but I feel leaner and I think I look leaner.

My hypothesis is of now twofold. One that I am still suffering from an overtrained state and two that I need to ease my body into lifting during IF.

My solution is to cut intensity and volume, that is, cut weight and reps. I plan to drop the weight very low and work at 2 sets of 5.

[milesdyson]

Ronn,

was that a "PR" 5x5? if so, it doesn't matter how you lost the weight. it wasn't going to happen.

[Captain Ronn]

Miles

Not a PR 5x5.

I don't follow you. Could you elaborate a little more as to what you're trying to say. I'm not linking losing weight to losing strength. I don't think I missed these reps because I lost weight if that's what you're getting at. I think that maybe this diet is not conducive to heavy training or perhaps my body needs to adjust to training on such a diet. Like going no/low carb from a hi carb diet, performance can suffer until the body adapts.

The point of my previous post was to say "hey, I'm losing weight, which may be mostly water, but I also feel like my lifts are suffering".

Scale at home this morning read a little below 230. Cheap scale so may not be accurate.

[milesdyson]

i asked if it was a PR attempt because it would be foolish to expect to PR after losing 6lb.

basically i don't understand how you can say "i don't think i missed reps because i lost weight" and instead blame the structure of the diet. if you had switched to IF and eaten maintenance, sure, you could claim your body needed to adjust or whatever. but in this case the deficit has to be the biggest factor in your ability to gain or maintain strength. another topic is your programming in the first place, which as an intermediate+ should probably be geared to maintaining strength.

[Captain Ronn]

OK, thanks for your input. Sorry for bothering you.

[milesdyson]

it's okay.

[poopmonkey]

Interesting thread.

I will be following it and updating with my own progress.

I'm currently doing the advanced novice program, and mixing in IF on my non-trainings.

So on training days I eat normally (lots of fat and protein) and non-training days I don't eat anything at all until about 5-6 pm.

Too early to gauge any results but I feel this should work well for both fat loss and allowing me to continue to make linear strength gains.

[Wrenn]

I have been using an IF style diet for the past 4 months and also started SS about the same time so maybe my experiences might be useful to someone.

I have been using the Warrior Diet which is a version of IF that uses a 20/4 underfeed/overfeed. It's not a true fast and I usually eat ~1500kJ during the underfeed period, mainly fruit but sometimes nuts/milk/cheese/tuna. I eat my main meal at nights usually over a 3 hour period. I have been counting calories fairly carefully and hitting around 8000kJ-9500kJ per day so a fairly high calorie deficit for my size/activity level.

I lost ~13kg over 3 months, going from 121.5kg to 108.2kg.

I found it the easiest of all cuts I have done. While I counted calories I didnt have to watch it as closely as when doing 6 or 3 meals/day, and when I ate it was massive satisfying meals. Also, for two weeks over easter I didnt count calories and just ate what I wanted and my weight stayed constant which was good. I never had any problems with hunger or lack of energy during the day. I also like it as it fits in well with my natural habits and schedules.

At the start of January I also started SS and made solid progress but given I was on a big calorie deficit, was doing a LOT of cardio, and not getting much rest between weight days I started stalling on most lifts after about 11 weeks. I made the following improvements though, which was more than I expected given I wasn't eating or resting enough for muscle gain:

Squat: 60kg -> 97.5kg
Bench: 50kg -> 87.5kg
Deadlift: 50kg -> 115kg
Press: 30kg -> 55kg
Weight assisted Pullups: 10,8,6 @ 74kg assistance -> 8,8,7 @ 35kg assistance

I have since switched to a 2 day/week maintenance lifting schedule and have made some small improvements to most lifts in the past 3 weeks while still losing weight.

Recently I started looking at the leangains method and I like it a lot. I have just started doing 3 days leangains and 4 days WD as that fits in nicely with my schedule. Also I upped my calories slightly to help maintain some strength gains while I continue my cut. I have another 15-18kg to lose so another 6 months or so before I start thinking about bulking.

[tennisgod]

i asked if it was a PR attempt because it would be foolish to expect to PR after losing 6lb.

I disagree. A reduction in strength would only occur if he was at the absolute maximum of his strength at that weight, which certainly not be the case in 99.99% of lifters. The fact that Gary Gibson can squat 400+ at 180# is an indication that weight is not the only factor.

I have reduced roughly 4Kg from 96.5Kg and I am holding all PR's and actually increasing the DL.

[milesdyson]

I disagree. A reduction in strength would only occur if he was at the absolute maximum of his strength at that weight, which certainly not be the case in 99.99% of lifters.

this is ridiculous unless you have a useless definition of "absolute maximum of his strength at that weight."