How often increase weight on The Bridge 1.0?

[Pat Hughes]

Hi all - I know everyone is different, but how often would you typically expect the weights to increase when doing the bridge? Currently on week 4, have only just increased squat weight and all other lifts stayed the same.

Regardless of whether I'm increasing the weights, I assume the increasing volume as I do moderate and high stress weeks will still lead to strength gains?

Many thanks in advance

[ericjspencley]

Hi Pat!

Simple answer: it increases whenever you are able to put more weight on the bar while staying at the correct RPE.

Long answer: It's nuanced. But assuming you are still early in your lifting career, probably every week or so.

The key to RPE is knowing how YOU felt. You might be someone like me who on a set of 6, even my first rep "looks" like it's pretty heavy. My girlfriend on the other hand would blast through the first 5 reps of a 6 rep set and the 6th rep looks like she's in slow motion. It's very very hard to accurately rate someone else's RPE without seeing a ton of their training history.

I assume you are new to RPE. I, as well as most people here, had troubles when first switching to RPE. Most of us came from SSLP where we would grind the shit out of every set to keep our ego up. RPE is NOT about ego. I made some mistakes the first time through the Bridge and lied to myself about RPE just to get more weight on the bar. I never felt like I was making any progress and thought the program was bullshit and messed around for a few months before any real progress came. Once I accurately followed RPE, my lifts jumped up like crazy.

Did you 100% have 2 good reps left? Would you bet $100 on it? That's a 8
Did you think you have 2 more good ones, but not really sure if you could complete both and you would be uncomfortable betting $100 on it? That's a 8.5
Did you think you 100% had 1 good rep left but there's not even a chance you had 2 left? That's a 9

I think the majority of people here will agree that they tend to overestimate their true strength and when a set is really @9, they rate it @8. I for sure used to do this and I always felt beat up and made little progress. Once I switch to being 100% honest my training has not been the same since.

[DylanKittrellCPT]

Assume you are stronger than last week until proven otherwise.