Sanity check- spreading to program out over 6/7 days at home

[No4_nz]

Merry Christmas all, 50 yr old, 5’11, 225lbs. Late start to SSNLP, bought SS in 2015, played with it a bit and got more serious this year with PP and the BB Prescription.

Covid lockdowns have propelled me to spend the money on a bar, 400lbs of plates and a rack with lat pull attachment. On the plus side this allowed me to convince my wife to start training, but it means I’m sharing/coaching. We’ve found that we prefer to spend less time each day and spread our programs out over the 6/7 days. Easier to build a habit and be consistent about training. She hit the limits of the LP after 6-8 weeks and is on H-L splits now, and I’ve just started Texas Method. Given those programs are more of a weekly cycle, it seems to me that there is no harm in alternating squat/pull with pressing, so the standard 3 day program becomes a 6/7 day program.

I get that recover for the next squat day may be impaired by a press the day before, but there must be fatiguing/recovery issues of some sort when doing 3 lifts a day that would offset this. I don’t recall having read anything that discusses the recovery compromises in quite this light. Current work sets are squat 286, deadlift 330, press 112, bench 165. I still have some headroom on squat/deadlift but I find the fatigue levels interfere with life so am switching to TM across the board.

I wish to focus pressing generally as previous shoulder injuries mean that is my weak area. I pinched a nerve while swimming back in 2016 that almost paralysed my left tricep (>90% strength loss) that took an age to recover and is still not strong, which lead to a torn supraspinatus tendon in my right shoulder early this year when my left arm given way during a lockdown pike press. Still rehabbing that one so both shoulders are about equally bad at the moment.

Would welcome some more experienced thoughts on the issue of a spread out program.

[Elle]

I'd be curious to hear the experts weigh in, too.

I am currently doing LP with squat & deadlift one day and bench/press (and a Zone 2 cardio row) the next and enjoying it a lot. As I've progressed, I've found this impairs my deadlift on lower body session 3 of the week, so I've had to sub in a light pull day. But it's worth it to me to have the shorter workout time and more consistent schedule, because it makes me more adherant and therefore progress faster than I would otherwise. I suspect one day I'll get to a point where it doesn't work anymore and then I'll need to adjust back to "the program" or move on to intermediate programming.

I'm surprised your wife stalled so soon on LP, did she switch to 3 rep sets and 2.5lb jumps on the upper body stuff? Eat enough protein? Etc etc etc?

[J. Killmond]

Dear No4_nz,

At your age and strength levels, is it time to move away from the novice linear progression--that's a question only you can answer.

In Practical Programming (starting at p. 145 and going to the end of Ch. 7), various 4-day splits are discussed, along with one-lift-per-day, and 5-day and 6-day programs.

If those sorts of adjustments enable you to progress your lifts weekly, it may be true that "you're not doing the program", but no worries!

For the overhead press, in order to keep improving, eventually you have to add training days. Here's Coach Delgadillo's excellent podcast:

Press and Bench Press Programming - Getting and Staying Unstuck | Nick Delgadillo

Also, his shorter article on the same topic:

Intermediate Programming for the Upper Body Lifts | Nick Delgadillo

[Hayden-William Courtland]

When you are no longer in NLP and/or as you get older there are many modifications that can/should be made to prevent accumulation of excess fatigue (light days, changing the order of the lifts, etc.). The lower body day should not fatigue an upper body day that comes immediately after it. If this is happening, a closer look is needed. Spreading workouts beyond 5 days can work, you just need to monitor recovery and make sure that the spread doesn't lead to detraining of any of the lifts.

[No4_nz]

Thanks for the responses. It sounds like my thinking does stand up, at least partly. I've read the PP chapters, and the 4-day split discussion seems to head where I'm going but the 6/7 day discussion seems to be more about adding more volume rather than spreading the same volume out.

For example, my last week of LP (2 weeks ago) was structured this way (starting empty bar and about 4 steps to working weight):
Monday - Squat 275x5x3, long break, Deadlift 147.5x5 - both OK, but I was 'feeling it'
Tuesday - Press 110x5x3 - this was very hard
Wednesday - Squat 265x5x3, Lat Pull 187x8x3 - light day
Thursday - Bench 163x5x4 - this was very hard
Friday - Squat 280x5x3, long break, Deadlift 330x5 - both tough
Saturday - Press 111x5x3 - this was very hard
Sunday - Bench 165x5x3 - only just made this.
I had figured an extra Bench on the Sunday, given the 'light' weights on Saturday, should be possible but maybe it was too much. However given that I was struggling with the press also, I figured it was time to change and try Texas Method stretched out, to add volume and reduce the increase to once a week (backed off so that intensity day is about the same as final LP).

Last week:
Monday - Press 100x5x5
Tuesday - Squat 253x5x5, Powerclean 110x5x3 - this was ok but the cleans agravated my shoulder so swapping back to Lat Pulls
Wednesday - Bench 132x5x3
Thursday - Squat 220x5x3, Lat Pull187x8x3
Friday - Xmas, take a day off
Saturday - Press 111x5 - still hard
Sunday - Squat 286x5, long break, Deadlift 330x5 - both OK.
This week I'm swapping to Bench focus, targeting 165 again and adding 5lbs to the Squat & Deadlift. We'll see how it goes.

[No4_nz]

Yes, I did cycle though 3 rep sets and then to 15 reps in whatever manner was possible, with 1lb jumps. The change to H-L (each lift once heavy and once light, spread across 7 days with Light Press preceding Heavy Deadlift on Fridays) cycled across 3 weeks with heavy 5s,3s and singles before the next jump seems to be working.
Her protein intake looks reasonable but not great (her summer meals tend to coffee&toast, fruit&yoghurt, and salmon&salad for dinner) but I'm wary of disturbing that pattern. When I ran a meal tracker for a while to see what my macros looked like she was giving me very sideways looks and threatened mutiny if I tried it on with her. I'll take what progress I can.

[Hayden-William Courtland]

Squatting volume from last week is where I would adjust first. Many people cannot handle a 5x5 SQ day, especially if they are a Masters athlete. I would try a 4x5 instead and maybe also remove the middle day squat entirely.

[JFord]

I’m an old guy (63) and had a very long Covid-induced inability to do strength training until I was able to build my own home gym. I had been doing intermediate programming but started back with novice programming.

I may not be “doing the program“ but I’ve been able to significantly extend my novice progression by switching to 5 sets of 3 and I’m hitting PRs again. I’ve also switched to 6 w/o’s per week with one exercise per day.

I found that two or three exercises per day were kind of overwhelming for me and took too long with 6 minute rests between sets (plus 5 Sets of 3 instead of 3 sets of 5).

I think that if form is good, recovery is good, and weights are going up in each exercise with each (or almost each) session, then to quote a great politician, “What difference does it make?”

Right now I like seeing PRs again and I know that soon I’ll have to switch back to intermediate programming. Until then, I’m just enjoying the novice ride!

[No4_nz]

An update for anyone who is thinking about a spread out program. 16 Weeks of Texas Method over a 6 day spread has worked well. I typically work from home these days, so often get the first lift done in the morning during a break. Failing that, early afternoon about 2pm. I'm running into my limits now, but I feel that this isn't due to the 6 day spread, rather the total volume/timing over the week.
I followed the advice above and switched press to Nick Delgadillos's program, which helped a lot initially but I'm starting to stall again. I've tried adding extra light lifts in case it wasn't enough stress, but it is looking more like it is fatigue. Shoulders still feel unstable but have improved to the point where its hard to remember to do my physio rehab exercises.
I'm not running a caloric excess as I'm a still 102kg which is a bit excessive. Haven't lost any weight to speak of as yet but have tightened my belt a notch and given the strength gains I'm not complaining, but it deters me from increasing my intake.
Currently running sets across but I'm really starting to feel it on squats and deadlift so back to reading the books again to plan the next tweak before fatigue starts interfering in life too much, Maybe switch to HLM for lower body. I may even try to hold progress on the pulls and try to lose a bit more waistline for a bit so I try a caloric excess to see if I can get a break through there.
Haven't been doing much conditioning as I've been demolishing some concrete with a cutter/sledgehammer when time/weather allows which I figure is enough for the moment.

last week (switched back to my native kg as everyone seems comfortable with metric):
Monday - Volume Bench
Bench: 81kgx5x5 (14kg over 16 weeks)
Curls: 46kgx8x3 - recently added as an ancillary exercise to chins

Tuesday - Volume Squat
Squat: 145kgx5x5 (28kg over 16 weeks)
BB Rows: 80kgx8x3 - added as the ancillary pull exercise

Wednesday - Volume Press
Press: 57kgx5x5 (14kg over 16 weeks)
CG Bench: 73x5x3 - added to try to unstick intensity press.

Thursday - Light Squat
Squat: 129kgx5x3 (29kg over 16 weeks)
Pin Press: 73.5kgx3x1 - recently added to assist press, very hard

Saturday - Intensity Press/Bench - failed Friday Press badly with sore L shoulder, delayed lifts to Saturday to see if that helped
Press: 66kgx1x5 (failed at 71, 68.5, down 4kg on last week, was 18kg over 16 weeks until this crash)
Bench: 82.5x5 (failed at 85 warmup for 91, down 7.5kg on last week, was 15kg over 16 weeks)

Saturday - Intensity Squat/Deadlift - reaching my limits but I'm really happy with progress so wouldn't mind just holding this for a bit or even backing off for a rest.
Squat: 161kgx5 (31kg over 16 weeks)
Deadlift: 187.5kgx5 (needed straps, 37.5kg over 16 weeks)