Gear acquired (Rack, bar, weight). Question on the starting point.
I've started my NLP (three days per week) and am finding a rhythm.
However...
I started each exercise with just a 45# barbell. I'm now a few weeks in, and progress is steady, but slow.
A couple videos I watched on the four compound exercises (here) mentioned, as a starting point, taking each exercise, adding five pounds for a set of five, increasing until form starts to suffer, do two more sets, and then calling that a workout.
The Question is: should I? Or is it better to keep going the route I'm on for now?
Less worried about "quick gains"; more interested in longevity and sustainability...
... but this is MIGHTY slow.
The answer IS IN THE BOOK. Read it.
You were never supposed to start with an empty bar as a work set weight, with the sole exception of if that really is a good weight for you. It sounds like you stumbled on the correct procedure for determining a start weight. It's in the blue book, it doesn't have its own section. The idea is you keep jumping the weight up evenly from the 45 pound bar until you hit a weight where the set starts to get slower toward the end, and then not just call it there but do two more sets at that weight with an actual rest before each. You get a conservative start weight that way but not one that's TOO conservative. Read the blue book in its entirety, or at least all the chapters covering the main lifts, and do it as soon as possible. There's a lot in there you will miss if you try to skim it looking for "just the important stuff".
Much appreciated Commander. Halfway through the "Deadlift" chapter, currently. Either I missed it entirely, or haven't hit that specific piece of information yet. In any case, if it's in there, I'll keep trucking to find it. Regardless, thanks for the clarification.
The info you seek was already in the squat chapter. And the Press chapter. And will come again in the Deadlift chapter, then the Bench Press chapter, etc., etc. It's not highlighted or emphasized, just another paragraph in each chapter. You'll have to read (or re-read carefully).
Not to be snarky, because I missed it the first time around and started every lift with an empty bar and progressed from there. I now refer to that year as my "Practice NLP" for that and many other reasons. The next time around, I had read and internalized those paragraphs and started much higher than an empty bar.