Am i still capable of linear progression?

[Ayliffe]

Thanks for this Q&A board, Rip. I've learned a lot just hunting back throughout the pages and reading your responses. On to the question.

I've been training since January 2011. I started doing a half-assed version of your program, but without key components such as eating enough or progressing every workout - so i didn't really do the program. I messed around with all sorts of different splits while i was still an idiot and eventually found 5/3/1 and have been stuck to it for about a year now. I'm 5'9, weigh 170.

My recent lifts are:

Squat - 285x1
Deadlift - 325x1
Bench - 190x1
Press - 115x3
Power Clean - 145x2

For the first part of my lifting career i left the PC and press out due to bad form and a nagging shoulder injury, but added them back in about 9 months ago. In March, i ruptured a disk in my lumbar spine and have recently fully recovered from it. I'm currently prepping for a fire academy bootcamp, down in your home state of Texas, which i will be attending in a few months (the exact date has yet to be decided), so I've been doing a lot of conditioning work (prowler, hill sprints and 1-2 mile runs) while sticking to the main five exercises (except for the bench, since i hurt my back i've had some problems with it and have replaced it with push presses for the time being, but plan to bring the bench back once i can figure out what the hell is wrong).

Now my question is, when i get back from my bootcamp, do you think i'd be able to make steady progress on your linear progression assuming adequate recovery? Or am i too far along to reap it's benefits?

Thanks for any input,

- Alex.

[veryhrm]

If those are your "recent lifts" and you've just recently recovered from your spine injury (how did you rupture said disk? and how was it treated, BTW) that implies your maxes were higher.

What were your lifetime rep maxes did you get on 531 say in the 5rm range?

[Tiburon]

It's in the book