The Skinny Fat Lifter Part 2 Question

[Andrew Travis]

Hi. first, some stats:
Age: 19 Height: 5’9”
Bodyweight: 170 -> 208 (38” waist)
Squat: 95 -> 250
Press: 65 -> 125
Bench: 95 -> 187.5
Deadlift: 135 -> 315
I started out eating 3,500 calories with protein 205, Carbs 400, Fat 130. This past month, all of my lifts have stalled and I’ve noticed my bodyweight is also no longer going up. It’s staying right at about 208 on the nose. I was thinking about doing the “mini-cut” discussed in The Skinny Fat Lifter Part 2 and then proceeding with my LP. It seems like most people in my demographic are squatting in the low to mid 300s by the end of LP and if I increase my calories further now feel like the body fat may get too high. You mentioned that to match the decreased ability to recover (from reduced calories), you temporarily transition to an intermediate program to allow for ongoing progress. I was wondering if you could elaborate a little further on what the programming would look like during this time in terms of the weight jumps. Maybe fewer increases per week, or smaller jumps per session, I’m just now about to add in power cleans as well.

[Robert Santana]

How big are your jumps on the lifts right now? How often are you squatting and deadlifting? How long are you resting?

[Andrew Travis]

Right now it’s 5lb jumps for the squat, I’ve been doing that since 195 all the way up to 250, with 2 resets of 10% when I got stuck. No light Wednesday’s yet. Rest periods have been 5-6 minutes, although after completing a tough 250x5x3 on Monday, I only did 255x3x1 on Wednesday. So I failed my first set after a last warmup set of 215x2x1.

Press is 2.5lb jumps, I’ve been doing that since 115 and those have been difficult. It’s been taking me at least two or three workouts to get all reps of the 3x5, even after a few resets. Bench is 2.5, since 175, also been hard. Rest has been 3 minutes for both of those.

Deadlift is 5lb jumps and I’ve still been doing that 3 times per week because I had some serious technique problems, and I also believe I had an artificially weak deadlift for a while. Now however, my last week has looked like this: Monday: 315x3x1 Wednesday: 315x4x1 Friday: 315x5x1

[Robert Santana]

You probably need to drop your squat and deadlift frequency and rest 5 minutes on the pressing motions. This is a programming issue more than a diet issue.

[Andrew Travis]

I’ll give it a shot. Thanks for the feedback.

[Robert Santana]

You are welcome