Bench stall in 8th week - suggestions?

[Ben]

Hi,

I'm 6 foot, 33, and 14 stone 10 pounds (206 pounds). Started SS mid-April, and am now in my 8th week. (Did 2 months of some internet program last year, but other than that I'm a complete beginner.)

Anyway, having started in april on 50kg, yesterday I failed for the third time at 87.5kg (192.5 pounds) on Bench. I was hoping to be on around 110kg (240 pounds) for 5 x 3 by the time I finish SS, so I'm gutted I've stalled already. Was going up in 5 pound jumps as thought it too early to microload.


1. Do I need to gain weight?
I put on half a stone quite quickly, but now gaining weight very slowly, if at all. Here's what I ate yesterday:

breakfast: 3 egg, 3 bacon, toast, baked beans
Lunch / post wo: double whopper with cheese and protein drink
early dinner: Lamb steak, large salad, small potion of chips
late dinner: Lamb steak, large salad, small portion of chips
snacks: bowl of kellogs fruit and fibre cereal with cream; half gallon milk; fruits

That's pretty typical, except just recently I've not been having the whoppers or McDonalds as much. No idea what my bodyfat % is, but my 34 inch jeans are still fine for me.


2. What do I do with my Press, while I'm resetting Bench?
Got 55kg (121 pounds) 5 x 3 last time on Press. Was planning to just keep adding weight to this but in smaller jumps.


Grateful for any suggestions.

cheers,
Ben

[misspelledgeoff]

definitely not too early to microload at 2.5 pounds on bench and press.

take a healthy reset and work back up with 2.5 pound increments. I'll bet you get to your 240 pound bench goal.

[Ben]

Cheers missedspelledgeoff, that's good to hear. I'll do what you suggest and see what happens

[DV]

definitely not too early to microload at 2.5 pounds on bench and press.

take a healthy reset and work back up with 2.5 pound increments. I'll bet you get to your 240 pound bench goal.

I agree with this, but you also need to keep on gaining weight, although it wont come as fast as in the beginning.

[tescott]

As for your press, just keep it going. It's not heavy enough to interfere with your bench recovery much.

[gzt]

2.5# increments should come sooner rather than later. Second the suggestions for backing up, doing 2.5# jumps. You should probably gain more weight, too.

[Alex Bond]

Nothing wrong with going to the Texas method, too. You'll make just as fast progress microloading SS 2.5# at a time as TMing 5# at a time and personally, I loved just working up to a single heavy set of 5, putting all I had into it, and calling it for the day on the exercise. The Bill Starr-esque 5x5 intermediate programs often call for 5x5 working up to a heavy top set. I think it is something good to explore. 192.5# is low for starting TM, but everyone's different, maybe 3 months of TM will shake things up and after that you can go back to linear progression to squeeze everything you can out of it.

[Mike O.]

I've seen this mentioned by others, and it's certainly proven to be true for me - I need to be gaining weight in order to sustain linear progression, even with small increments. I'm using 1.25# jumps now on bench and press and if I'm not gaining weight I stall.

It's frustrating at first to have to decrease the increments, but it's better than stalling by a long shot. You can still reach your goal with linear progression.

[gzt]

Alex - the question is whether he can do 5# at a time on the Texas Method. Doesn't work for long.

[Ben]

Thanks Alex, nice to know Texas Method is an option. Will definitely consider it if I stall again on bench. But cos it's only my first stall and I was still getting 4 or 5 reps every set on that weight I reckon I should reset and stick it out.

Thanks GZT, Tescott, MikeO and DanishViking. I agree I need to gain weight. I seem to have got bigger but weirdly I'm not any fatter (leaner now if anything). Not gonna do anything drastic; probably just bump the milk back up to 5 english pints (think that's 6 US pints) and have one meal at BK, KFC or McDonalds a day, plus the usual meals. See how that goes. I've got some small plates so can do the microloading. They're in bright colours and I will look pretty gay using them though, especially as I'm weaker than everyone in my gym.

And just to be clear, you recommend I microload straight away after deloading, ie even through the weights I did okay before? I'll do that, but let me know if I've misunderstood.

Anyway, cheers for the help