Probably dumb but I recently started warming up to a single heavier than the first work set of squats and that seems to take the edge off. I always seem to struggle more on the first set than the third of squats.
Sooner or later, a time will come when the weight on your back becomes terrifying – and the fear of failure or even injury can be paralyzing. I've seen lifters literally freeze on the platform, re-rack a heavy bar, and not attempt a rep they aren't sure they can complete.
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Probably dumb but I recently started warming up to a single heavier than the first work set of squats and that seems to take the edge off. I always seem to struggle more on the first set than the third of squats.
Doesn’t Rip say in one of the books that he has seen numerous examples of people hitting new 5RMs straight after doing heavy singles?
I don't remember him saying that.
PPST3, page 283 (on my kindle edition at least) under the sub heading Back-off Sets:
“Many lifters have found that they actually set the majority of their 5-rep PRs when they are done after a heavy single.”
Fascinating. I forgot.
If the quote is in the context of Back-off sets, he did not mean to use a heavy single in your warm-up to feel more confident about your 5 rep set.
That's dumb because you are wasting energy that should be reserved for the heavy set of 5.
He meant that intermediates or advanced lifters who program heavy sets and back-offs can still hit PRs for 5 on their back-off if their heavy set is a single.
If you are doing 3 sets of 5 across and adding weight every workout or every other workout, you are a novice and have no business doing singles.
Just accept you will always be afraid of a new weight that you don't know you can lift, but you do it anyway.
Semantics.
Where is energy wasted if the single and the 3 work sets across are all completed? Sounds like a good intense workout to me.
If the work sets start failing then rethink the single.
And before it's brought to my attention, I realize that the heavy single + 3 sets across = YNDTP