Press Stalling after 4 weeks, is this normal?

[BuffaloBuffalo]

Press started at 65, now 95 after 4 weeks. I have been going up by 5 pounds each time I am doing it, but this last workout felt very hard and I barely got my 3 sets of 5 in and my form broke down, so I will microload next time. Is it normal for press to stall that quickly? All my other lifts are still going up by 5 pounds each workout.

[Mark Rippetoe]

The First Three Questions | Mark Rippetoe

[Erik Y]

I’d be curious to know your height and bodyweight.

[BuffaloBuffalo]

I’d be curious to know your height and bodyweight.

Height 5'11.5 weight 176 last time I checked (about a week or 2 ago).

[Mark Rippetoe]

A Clarification | Mark Rippetoe

[Robert Santana]

Read the articles. Even if you are still light because you are in the process of gaining weight, like we know you are, you should be able to break 100 lb on these by loading properly.

[BuffaloBuffalo]

Read the articles. Even if you are still light because you are in the process of gaining weight, like we know you are, you should be able to break 100 lb on these by loading properly.

Could you clafiry this? So going up by 2.5 pounds per workout at this point is not OK? Mark's article that he posted made it sound as if that's fine and I'm just impatiently complaining. I'm hoping that I can go from 95 to 100 but in 2 workouts instead of 1 after seeing his articles.

His other suggestion above is I'm not eating enough. Not trying to restrict calories on purpose, but eating has probably screwed up over the holidays, plus I had a cold. Hopefully I'll keep progressing once I start eating normally again, though my squat, deadlift and bench are all progressing fine so I guess my diet is mostly OK (was gaining a pound a week but haven't weighed myself in 1-2 weeks). I am 31, too old to do GOMAD.

[BuffaloBuffalo]

Well, I FAILED on bench today...in week 5. I guess with my cold last week, and the holidays, I didn't eat enough--my weight hasn't gone up at all in 2 weeks, at least I now know what the issue is, along with poor form . Now feeling pretty disappointed in myself, guess will see what happens next time.

[dlocas]

Well, I FAILED on bench today...in week 5. I guess with my cold last week, and the holidays, I didn't eat enough--my weight hasn't gone up at all in 2 weeks, at least I now know what the issue is, along with poor form . Now feeling pretty disappointed in myself, guess will see what happens next time.

You need to increase bodyweight. At each meal, just eat one piece of food more than you usually eat (e.g. three bread slices instead of two; two glasses of milk instead of one, etc.). At 5'11" 176 lb, you have a lot of room to fill up your frame. I was once 6'1" 180 lb; many years later, I am now 6'1" 265 lb.

In general, gaining bodyweight helps with all types of pressing.
For a novice, just improving your technique will add pounds to the bar. Of course, the press appears to progress very slow since 5% is only 5 lb when you are using 95 lb. Even in my case, a 5% improvement would still be shy of 15 lb, as my best strict press is 239 lb.

There are several ways you can get past your current training weight of 95 lb, but it probably won't happen over just one or two sessions. Strength takes time to accumulate.

Option 1 would be to start doing 5 triples instead of 5 sets of 3; weight and total volume would be the same, but overall rep quality would improve, as your form isn't likely to break down. If you concentrate on making each rep perfect and sound and accelerating the bar is it goes up, I am pretty confident that after 2-3 weeks of this, you would find your strength has gone up. Just the volume will add up and make your shoulders, triceps and traps grow, which will lead to increased strength.
This option is almost guaranteed to work if you are patient and refrain from adding weight. Wait until you feel stronger, and then see if you can do 95 for three sets of 5 with ease, and if so, then you will be stronger.

Option 2 would be to add more overall volume in the form of quality sets. If you are struggling to do all 3 sets of 5 at 95 lb, you could try doing 85 lb for 4 sets of 5 instead of just 3 sets.

In terms of overall volume, 95 x 3 x 5 = 1,425 lb and 85 x 4 x 5 = 1,700 lb. To your nervous system, 85 lb is close enough to 95 lb, but with 10 lb less, your rep quality will be much better and you will be doing almost 20% more volume (overall volume = tonnage). You could even add a 5th set and do a straight 5 x 5 with the 85 lb, but don't go overboard with the volume either; a 20% increase is enough to drive adaptation, especially in a novice. The increased volume will add mass to your pressing muscles and the reduced weight will allow for better technique and muscle coordination. If you do this for a couple of weeks, I am pretty confident that you'll find 95 lb lighter than ever before. I know because it's been done it many times over by lifters from around the world, bach in the day when pressing was an art.

The most important thing when starting out is to improve technique and accumulate some quality volume.
Back in the 1940's when the Press was a contested lift and was judged in such a way that athletes had to actually press the bar using shoulder strength, weightlifters had strongly built shoulders and the strength that came with it. Most guys today are shocked when they learn the volumes these guys were doing when training their press. Incidentally, almost nobody today have the raw pressing power these weightlifters had.

My own style of pressing is what was called the "layback" style -- I lay back just enough for the bar to pass my head going up in a strength line and then drive the bar to lockout. Here is a famous example from 1952:

[Jr_Geezer]

I love how delicately Davis puts that 330 lbs down.