Garage Gym Warrior Problem

[Whey and Steak]

So about a week ago I was diagnosed with an esophageal ulcer. It's related to another problem I have that I won't get into at the moment. The relevant information is that I haven't been able to eat hardly anything since last Sunday. Even water was a extremely painful to get down. I managed to drink some protein shakes in order to maintain some level of strength but I lost about 8lbs. I was in week 3 of Garage Gym Warrior and I had just done my heavy day right before the incident. Needless to say I haven't lifted in about a week. My main question is, where do I go from here? I was doing so well with the program and I was so optimistic about my progress only to have this huge setback occur right as I was getting going. I can now eat again and I'm doing my best to gain as much weight as possible. Should I restart towards the end of my lp and do GGW from the beginning? Should I just repeat week 3? I'm at a complete loss. Any help would be appreciated.

[chrisza]

Having done the program 1.5 times now, you could probably give week 3 a go as it's still a relatively light week or it should be if you started with an accurate 1RM. Most of you weight loss was probably water weight and you'll likely gain it back quickly.

[msupples]

Matt Reynolds and Scott Hambrick touched on this a little bit in Barbell Logic Episode 29. Essentially after an extended layoff, they do a mini LP with larger jumps to get back to a hard weight, and then go from there. Take a listen.

[chrisza]

Matt Reynolds and Scott Hambrick touched on this a little bit in Barbell Logic Episode 29. Essentially after an extended layoff, they do a mini LP with larger jumps to get back to a hard weight, and then go from there. Take a listen.

That's a good strategy, but he's only missed a week. Week 3 in GGW only works in 70-80% of 1 RM.

[msupples]

That's a good strategy, but he's only missed a week. Week 3 in GGW only works in 70-80% of 1 RM.

But he also lost 8 lbs. I had an issue with a GI illness on GGW Week 8 that caused me to drop 8lb and lose one training day. I went back into Week 8 the next week and failed all over the place, and never really recovered. I'd at the least go back to Week 1 (that's only 2 weeks lost, really) and gain some wait.

[Jeff Illingworth]

Yeah, there is a difference between missing a week and missing a week while also not being able to eat. Give yourself an lp and transition back to ggw like Msupples says. Take notes, you'll probably have to do this again someday.

[Whey and Steak]

So when you guys say run an lp where approximately should I start? I had a 1rm of 345 on the squat at 170lbs before I started the program.

[Jeff Illingworth]

You go through your "normal" warm-up process and find the weight that is a challenging set of 5 with tolerable form. It works pretty much like it did the first time you did an lp, but you'll probably make big jumps from one training session to the next (like 10, 15, or even 20) as opposed to 5 or 10 pound jumps.

Again, take notes. You'll probably have to this again sometime.

[George Christiansen]

Unfortunately, you just have to see where you are.

You could retest you 1RM on each lift and just start the program over or you could just start again at week one and if it is too hard then calibrate back a bit. It probably won't be too easy as three weeks of strength increases on that program aren't going to make week one much easier than it was the first time.

[Whey and Steak]

Okay so quick update. I just got back from the gym and ended up just redoing day 1 of week 3. For me this amounted to 4x4 squat at 275 which was a grind but I still managed it. I think in order to make up for the weight I lost I overate and actually put on more size than I had before. I was about 170 flat before and before today's workout I was 175.5. Not sure what to make of this but that's what happened.