Triples for Females

[melody]

I don't do starting strength, but there are a lot of 3's in my program. My dead lift and presses have been progressing well, squat has not but that is probably for other reasons. I think the consensus of the girls here was to use 5's as long as possible and then try 3's to keep linear progression growing. Somewhere there is a thread about this.

[jep6095]

I squat 2x per week. On Monday's I go up to a heavy single and on Th/F I squat 3x3 at a range of 85-90% of my heavy single. Triples work best for me. I'm able to grind through them, if necessary, and recovery isn't an issue. I was stalling out on 5's but believed I was still able to progress, which I am. I'm 45.

Using triples, while training women, has been a very useful tool. And not just for older women. I had a young pilot who at times flew twice a day in the Texas heat before training but we were still able to add weight to the bar using triples instead of stalling out on a 3x5 scheme.

I highly recommend it.

jp

[Jordan Feigenbaum]

Most of my clientele are of the female persuasion and age 33-60. We've had lots of success pushing 5's for a long time, although I have seen that they respond well to increased pressing volume and microloading. Additionally, I find that I have to move to weekly progress after 2-3 weeks and doing an intermediate setup with volume sets of 5's and PR sets of 3 on intensity day work well. I haven't had much success with triples for volume work unless we were working up to a heavy triple then doing back off sets of 5's to accrue the volume. Just my experience.

[Tiff]

I am just at the point in my linear progression where I am making the switch to five sets of triples. I am going to implement this rep scheme for everything except the deadlift. I will post again in the near future on my progress!

[Bleve]

5 x 3 seems to work pretty well for masters guys too (me! 41y/o male) - I got stuck at ~185kg with 3x5, swapped to 5x3 and last week I was doing sets at 205kg (squats).
We use 3x3's a lot for girls when they stall on 3x5's, seems to work pretty well. got one girl who's been with us for ~4 years now (since she was 12), getting good solid progress with 3x3's and 5x3's and the occasional 3x1

[mikeylikey]

Thanks everyone.

[Gillian Mounsey]

I agree with most everything stated above. My personal opinion and experience is to use 5's for as long as possible because of their ability to build the best strength foundation. Triples seem to be great to push past a sticking point but don't require the same physiological adaptations as 5s.

I will go to triples with female clients once they have graduated to the intermediate phase. I will often go back to 5's once the stick has been overcome. If I stick with triples, I increase the overall volume by adding sets such as a 7 sets of 3 scheme. In my opinion this helps to achieve the adaptation that we get from 5s.

[Vadania]

I am a 24 year old female and I've been on SS for about 3 months now. I've been making steady gains with 3x5 on all my lifts except my OHP - I stalled very early and even with solid form, microloading, eating more, etc. I just couldn't seem to make any gains. A few weeks ago I switched to sets of 3 and it has helped immensely.

[Gwyn Brookes]

I agree with most everything stated above. My personal opinion and experience is to use 5's for as long as possible because of their ability to build the best strength foundation. Triples seem to be great to push past a sticking point but don't require the same physiological adaptations as 5s.

I will go to triples with female clients once they have graduated to the intermediate phase. I will often go back to 5's once the stick has been overcome. If I stick with triples, I increase the overall volume by adding sets such as a 7 sets of 3 scheme. In my opinion this helps to achieve the adaptation that we get from 5s.

This makes so much sense! I switched to triples when I was having recovery issues, but eventually made the decision to go back to sets of five because I really wanted to grow, was ready to eat to make that happen, and I felt that fives were more conducive to growth. I may very well use triples again when I get stuck, but right now I'm very happy with fives still.