Are these press weight worthy for a Texas?

[SouthernLifter]

Age: 29 years
Sex: Male
Actual body weight: 228 lbs
Height: Almost 6 feet.


I´ll be quick... I am on the NLP. I benched 231,5 lb for almost 3 reps (the last one my spotter must have given me some help) and pressed 149 lb for three reps. I did a few resets but the result was always the same: I bench 231,5 for 2 or maybe 3 reps and press 149 or maybe 150 for about 3 and then progress stops, even with severe microloading from the 220 lb for bench and 150 for press. My point is... are these numbers worthy for bring the presses to an intermediate stage like TM or compressed TM?

Common sense tells me that I am geneticaly weak at presses. But trust me when I say that a eat a lot, some days over 4000 calories with more than 250 of protein and the sleep is not a problem because I am doing home working and and I give myself the luxury of sleeping as much as I want.

I am a fucking pussy who needs TM for 100 kg bench or is there a trick that I'm not knowing?

Thanks !

[Bill Anders]

SouthernLifter,

First off, at your height/weight/age, you aren't even close to ending your NLP on your presses. This is coming from a 6'00"/225lbs/54 year old who's presses are comparable. That means that you should be well ahead of me.

You answered 2/3 questions of The First Three Questions. What are your rest periods for your press workouts?

Regardless, without you going whole-hog into TM, you can transition just your presses to TM-style programming while running your NLP. Matter of fact, pretty much everyone should once they get to that sticking point on their presses during their NLP. Nick has articles and videos about doing exactly this issue:

Article - Intermediate Programming For The Upper Body Lifts
Video - Press and Bench Press Programming – Getting and Staying Unstuck

Take lots of notes during the video. It's full of nuggets that will get those weights moving in the right direction.

[SouthernLifter]

SouthernLifter,

First off, at your height/weight/age, you aren't even close to ending your NLP on your presses. This is coming from a 6'00"/225lbs/54 year old who's presses are comparable. That means that you should be well ahead of me.

You answered 2/3 questions of The First Three Questions. What are your rest periods for your press workouts?

Regardless, without you going whole-hog into TM, you can transition just your presses to TM-style programming while running your NLP. Matter of fact, pretty much everyone should once they get to that sticking point on their presses during their NLP. Nick has articles and videos about doing exactly this issue:

Article - Intermediate Programming For The Upper Body Lifts
Video - Press and Bench Press Programming – Getting and Staying Unstuck

Take lots of notes during the video. It's full of nuggets that will get those weights moving in the right direction.

Hi Bill. This is the kind of answer that I was waiting for. Considering what you say about your own experience I think I can give another chance to the NLP for the presses and then inmediately bring my presses into the intermediate programming (I saw those articles before of posting, but thanks for sharing).

Regarding the rest period question, I rest A LOT between series. This is the only way that a pussy like me can get some progress into the NLP. Specifically, I rest about 10 minutes between press series and I can get about 15 rest for bench series,

Thanks so much for posting !

[Bill Anders]

Glad to help.

Re: rest periods - that might be your problem. That's a long time to be resting between pressing movements, which are smaller muscle movements. Those rest periods are appropriate for the big movements (squat/deadlift) once you (20-something) are in the 400-500+ range. But too long for the presses.

Just for a comparison to be descriptive, not prescriptive, since my pressing lifts are similar to yours - for heavy 5x3 and 4x3 worksets, I rest 5 minutes between (which is probably a hair too long) and for heavy singles I rest 2 minutes. Note that this is for an intermediate program for me, not your NLP.

As is outlined in the article and video, it's your current lack of frequency that's holding you back. It happens to all of us. Go to 2x/week for both (heavy/light), consider decreasing your rest period, and watch those weights move up.

Oh, and cut out the pussy talk. You're stuck at a point where every single one of us get stuck, as explained in Nick's article. Now, if you're giving up on your last rep of all of your lifts, we'll talk...

[SouthernLifter]

Glad to help.

Re: rest periods - that might be your problem. That's a long time to be resting between pressing movements, which are smaller muscle movements. Those rest periods are appropriate for the big movements (squat/deadlift) once you (20-something) are in the 400-500+ range. But too long for the presses.

Just for a comparison to be descriptive, not prescriptive, since my pressing lifts are similar to yours - for heavy 5x3 and 4x3 worksets, I rest 5 minutes between (which is probably a hair too long) and for heavy singles I rest 2 minutes. Note that this is for an intermediate program for me, not your NLP.

As is outlined in the article and video, it's your current lack of frequency that's holding you back. It happens to all of us. Go to 2x/week for both (heavy/light), consider decreasing your rest period, and watch those weights move up.

Oh, and cut out the pussy talk. You're stuck at a point where every single one of us get stuck, as explained in Nick's article. Now, if you're giving up on your last rep of all of your lifts, we'll talk...

Thank you very match again, mate. Thanks for your time.

I will keep your advice in mind and try to apply it.

Honestly I had never thought about what you say about the breaks during presses !

I'll hit the damn presses hard again and I hope to bring good news to this board in a few weeks

Cheers !!