6 Months deep, feeling a little lost, feeling a little fat.

[roundboi]

Hello Marky-Mark and the Rippetoe bunch,

In June of 2018 I was 29 years old, 5'9", and 325lbs with a 48 inch waist, at what seemed like 90% body fat (my bones were fat). Cut to June 2019, I turned 30 and got my weight down to 195lbs using a reckless combination of keto, fasting, and very stupid cardio exercises, but I was still mostly untrained with a ton of loose skin and a high bodyfat%. I picked up Starting Strength after about a 12 year hiatus from the gym. Here's where my 3x5 numbers in were June and where they sit today (in lbs).

Body weight: 195 -> 225
Squat: 135 -> 315
Deadlift: 185 -> 370
Bench: 135 -> 200
Press: 65 -> 135
Powerclean: 0 -> 0 (I'm a pussy)

I have a few questions about where to go from here. I have bought and read Practical Programming, and it seems like I might be a couple years late too late for the Texas Method. Is it time to switch to some Andy Baker style HLM? Additionally, what advice do you have for someone who appears to be extremely nonathletic naturally? Every rep on my squat is an absolute grind; it doesn't matter if I'm warming up with 185 or doing a heavy set of 3 with 320, they are all slow as hell and I just feel like I have no explosiveness. I don't have a great way of measuring my vertical jump but if I had to guess it would be in the 12-15 inch range (this is the main reason power cleans scare me).
My last question has to do with my weight. Do you think my numbers are high enough to justify a small cut before trying to take another run at an LP while I bulk back up? I lost a fuckload of weight once, and I know for a fact I can do it again, so I'm not really scared of getting fat again, but my waist is getting up in the 39 inch range again and I'd like to stay human-shaped for as long as possible while still getting strong.

Thanks for taking the time to read this nonsense, and thanks for all you do for this community, you probably saved my life, and I appreciate it.

All the best,
Russ

[Nockian]

Your numbers haven't been going up for over 6 months ?

You aren't 'grinding' five reps-grinding is what you do on a heavy RM single, or the last rep of the set. Have you failed any lift-in other words it crushed you and the bar ended up on the pins/chest/floor ? If not, then you haven't yet understood the concept of 'grinding'. Keep adding 5lbs or micro loading until you actually fail a lift because it staples you, not because it feels heavy.

[Erik Y]

Speaking as a trainee, if I were you I’d do the following things: 1) check the first three questions (best to include them in your post), 2) read Practical Programming, and 3) get some professional help. At this point, partly due to your history, things are becoming pretty individual. Maybe your squats are grindy because you have a form issue. Maybe your fat to carb ratio is too high (you were on keto at one point, after all). Maybe you are just a slow lifter and grind much more than others. There’s a million things you could troubleshoot here, and you’ll save yourself a lot of time and trouble getting a consultation or a few one-to-one sessions or some online coaching. Also, a lot of information is missing here, which implies that you don’t yet know what the right questions to ask are, and that’s something that will get solved faster on a phone call than a back-and-forth through message boards. It’s your training, so you get to choose what to do with it, but for my money, you’ll be happier and healthier with a consultation than with any answers you find here.

[roundboi]

Your numbers haven't been going up for over 6 months ?

You aren't 'grinding' five reps-grinding is what you do on a heavy RM single, or the last rep of the set. Have you failed any lift-in other words it crushed you and the bar ended up on the pins/chest/floor ? If not, then you haven't yet understood the concept of 'grinding'. Keep adding 5lbs or micro loading until you actually fail a lift because it staples you, not because it feels heavy.

No, my numbers have been steadily increasing since June, with a couple small resets here and there due to life/training interruptions. I'm still adding 5lbs a week to my deadlift relatively easily. And no, I haven't actually failed a rep ever on the squat I don't think. I guess what I mean by "grinding" is that all my reps are hilariously slow, and the bar speed is the same (slow as hell) regardless of how heavy the weight is or feels.

Speaking as a trainee, if I were you I’d do the following things: 1) check the first three questions (best to include them in your post), 2) read Practical Programming, and 3) get some professional help. At this point, partly due to your history, things are becoming pretty individual. Maybe your squats are grindy because you have a form issue. Maybe your fat to carb ratio is too high (you were on keto at one point, after all). Maybe you are just a slow lifter and grind much more than others. There’s a million things you could troubleshoot here, and you’ll save yourself a lot of time and trouble getting a consultation or a few one-to-one sessions or some online coaching. Also, a lot of information is missing here, which implies that you don’t yet know what the right questions to ask are, and that’s something that will get solved faster on a phone call than a back-and-forth through message boards. It’s your training, so you get to choose what to do with it, but for my money, you’ll be happier and healthier with a consultation than with any answers you find here.

Hi, thanks for the reply. I've definitely read The First Three Questions, and I think I do a reasonably good job of meeting those requirements. I rest 8-10 minutes between heavy squat sets, I've been steadily gaining weight on about 3500 kcals per day (220 grams of protein, etc), and I sleep as much as I can, although sleep is the most likely resource to get fucked because of my life/work schedule.

I've read Practical Programming, which is why I was asking about switching to an HLM style program, and seeing a coach is for sure something I plan on doing soon(tm), once I can justify it financially. If you don't mind me asking, what information am I missing? And what would be the right questions to start asking? I was trying to make my post pretty concise, but I'd be happy to fill in any details I'm missing.

[Erik Y]

You answered a few of my questions just now, but here’s a few more: Are you wearing lifting shoes? A belt? A regular T-shirt as outlined in the book or some kind of athletic fabric thing? Are you using chalk? How many times a week are you deadlifting at this point? How big are your intervals when you move up in weight? What alterations have you made to LP so far (light day, backoffs, etc.)? Is the bar staying over the middle of your foot? How many times have you reset? Have you taken any breaks from your lifting recently?

These are all baseline things I’d want to know before looking at a programming change, and as I mentioned, I’m not a coach, just a trainee. I’m willing to bet that there’s a form or recovery issue here and it’s not necessary to make a dramatic change to your programming just yet. Again, that’s going to be difficult to suss out on a message board, but we can have a shot at it.

[Nockian]

If your lifts are going in the right direction then what exactly is the issue ? There is no problem being slow, as long as the weight gets lifted with acceptable form through the full ROM demanded by the movement. Just keep at it until you can no longer micro-increment one, or other of the lifts due to failure. Do a reset, try twice more, go to threes if you want to run it right to the very last increment, then you are done and it's time to move things along.

Once you are doing an intermediate program then you can start to implement a more strict diet to reduce weight if that's your goal. This will mean manipulation of loads, volume, accessory work, rest periods in order to facilitate the short term loss in strength. You might want to add in some conditioning work such as prowler, rower or bike.

All this is in the book.

If you are having issues with the movements, or techniques, then you need to post a video if you want help, or find and pay for a coach.

[Robert Santana]

No, my numbers have been steadily increasing since June, with a couple small resets here and there due to life/training interruptions. I'm still adding 5lbs a week to my deadlift relatively easily. And no, I haven't actually failed a rep ever on the squat I don't think. I guess what I mean by "grinding" is that all my reps are hilariously slow, and the bar speed is the same (slow as hell) regardless of how heavy the weight is or feels.



Hi, thanks for the reply. I've definitely read The First Three Questions, and I think I do a reasonably good job of meeting those requirements. I rest 8-10 minutes between heavy squat sets, I've been steadily gaining weight on about 3500 kcals per day (220 grams of protein, etc), and I sleep as much as I can, although sleep is the most likely resource to get fucked because of my life/work schedule.

I've read Practical Programming, which is why I was asking about switching to an HLM style program, and seeing a coach is for sure something I plan on doing soon(tm), once I can justify it financially. If you don't mind me asking, what information am I missing? And what would be the right questions to start asking? I was trying to make my post pretty concise, but I'd be happy to fill in any details I'm missing.

How many grams of carbohydrate?

[Will Morris]

Additionally, what advice do you have for someone who appears to be extremely nonathletic naturally? Every rep on my squat is an absolute grind; it doesn't matter if I'm warming up with 185 or doing a heavy set of 3 with 320, they are all slow as hell and I just feel like I have no explosiveness. I don't have a great way of measuring my vertical jump but if I had to guess it would be in the 12-15 inch range (this is the main reason power cleans scare me).

I'm not a great athlete, by any stretch of the imagination, but I do have a slightly above average ability to jump. Even with that, any squat I perform over about 275# appears on video to be RPE=10. Every squat above 275 feels very, very heavy. My PR for a set of 5 was 475 about two years or so ago, but, still, anything over 275 felt heavy and moved very slow.

I am a very slow squatter, I am a very slow deadlifter, and I am slow on the bench press and press. If nothing else, I would just say that your situation is not entirely unique.

[roundboi]

How many grams of carbohydrate?

A typical day of for me would be 325-350g carbs, 220-240g protein, and 100(ish)g of fat. I'm pretty good about tracking what I eat but sometimes I overshoot on fat and it fucks everything up. I try not to go over 3500 calories a day, and I was gaining about 5 pounds per month on this diet but that seems to have leveled off and become my maintanance intake now, as I haven't gained a pound in a few weeks. Also, let me just say that when I was abusing myself with keto I was eating less than 20g of carbs per day, and my life was devoid of pleasure. It's much better now.

You answered a few of my questions just now, but here’s a few more: Are you wearing lifting shoes? A belt? A regular T-shirt as outlined in the book or some kind of athletic fabric thing? Are you using chalk? How many times a week are you deadlifting at this point? How big are your intervals when you move up in weight? What alterations have you made to LP so far (light day, backoffs, etc.)? Is the bar staying over the middle of your foot? How many times have you reset? Have you taken any breaks from your lifting recently?

These are all baseline things I’d want to know before looking at a programming change, and as I mentioned, I’m not a coach, just a trainee. I’m willing to bet that there’s a form or recovery issue here and it’s not necessary to make a dramatic change to your programming just yet. Again, that’s going to be difficult to suss out on a message board, but we can have a shot at it.

Yes lifting shoes, yes belt, yes cotton T-shirt, yes chalk. I thought all of that stuff was just assumed when training, haha. In the last month or so I switched to deadlifting only once per week, on Fridays, and i've been cruising on 5lb increases pretty easily. I've reset my squat twice now. I ran into a wall at 275, did a 20% deload, fixed some pretty major form issues (turns out I didn't have the bar low enough on my back, wasn't pointing my chest down at all) and I was able to run an LP back up to 315 without much issue, but I ran into a similar wall at 320, did another 20% deload, and added a light day on wednesday. I also started pressing 3 days a week this month because I like it, and I made my first real progress on that lift in a while. My bench progess is slow too but for whatever reason I care about that less than I do my other lifts. I'm concidering trying to increase my squat 5lbs per week now for as long as that lasts, and then when I run out of juice there it will probably be coach time.

How unrealistic do you think it would be to try and both press and bench press 3 days a week? I've really liked the extra volume on the press and I feel like that might help my bench out too, but 2.5 hour gym sessions are rough, and I'd also like to start adding some accessory stuff eventually. Should I just mummify myself in chalk and let the gym become my tomb?

[Robert Santana]

A typical day of for me would be 325-350g carbs, 220-240g protein, and 100(ish)g of fat. I'm pretty good about tracking what I eat but sometimes I overshoot on fat and it fucks everything up. I try not to go over 3500 calories a day, and I was gaining about 5 pounds per month on this diet but that seems to have leveled off and become my maintanance intake now, as I haven't gained a pound in a few weeks. Also, let me just say that when I was abusing myself with keto I was eating less than 20g of carbs per day, and my life was devoid of pleasure. It's much better now.

Bump up to 400 on the carbs and see what that does. 300-350 is good but it's not what I'd consider an upper limit.