Hi guys. Just finished week 2 of the BB beginner template. I had been running starting strength NLP before that. I had finished this after 3 months and as soon as progress halted. Took the advice not to try milk and to start a new program.
At the end of SS I had got up to 145kg X5 for 1 set. Now since both the Monday session and today’s heavy deadlifts my deadlift is declining quite rapidly. Today I really struggled to pull 135 for 4 @7 and actually had to drop to 130 for my 2 sets @8. It’s worth noting I’m on a calorie deficit now and wasn’t before. All my other lifts have stayed steady or increases slightly. And I really hope at this point in time that’s not normal.
Which is odd. Im wondering if it’s just adjusting to the huge increase in deadlift volume going from SS to BBM beginner prescription.
Wondered if anyone else had a similar thing happen if any others had gone from SS to this program. It’s likely I will jump straight to phase 2 at the end of the 4th week which Jordan did say might happen as I had already made most of my progress on LP.
Hoping to see a slight improvement next week. I’ve added 200 calories to my deficit to see if that helps. I’m not really wanting to get to specific with my macros etc just more looking for anyone if they had similar experiences as they adjusted to a big increase in volume.
I haven’t ran the Beginner Prescription, but I ran The Bridge right after SSNLP followed by HLM. Towards the end of the accumlation blocks I felt weaker (not beat-up like NLP, just weaker) for a couple of weeks, but then the noticeable strength gains would come in waves.
Also, your default should be to add weight week-to-week unless you find it’s overshooting your RPE.
Thanks for the responses guys! Yeah my back is totally fried from all this volume. Today was the first day that I actually feel stronger. Hopefully one more week and I’ll be more adjusted. Yeah I know default is to add weight. Just was having to remove plates to keep the RPE the same. I am responding well to the new squat programming and they are increasing steadily!
Let’s see what Thursday brings for the next heavy dead session!
Yeah I’m hoping so. The fact I was running SSNLP before hand where the deadlift is the only exercise run for one set and the fact it seems to be the only lift that has nosedived considerably makes me think this. On squat and bench I can comfortably do 2 sets at RPE 8 for the same weight and infact often push some small plates on for 2nd set @8 and keep the intensity almost the same as a way to ensure I am adding weight as default. Deadlift even with 2 in the tank the next set for the same weight would almost go up to a 10!
You’re not using RPE correctly. @7 should not be a ‘struggle’ and additionally you shouldn’t be dropping weight and call that @ 8. Maybe go read the RPE stuff and watch the videos again.
My first introduction to consistent, focused barbell training was also through SSNLP. One drawback of that whole school of though is the expectations. After the first 3ish months of SSNLP, I had SO many frustrating training sessions because I couldn’t add 5 lbs, and therefore my strength wasn’t increasing. Those kinds of expectations sabotaged me for a long time until I encountered BBM and began to understand how much more complex this getting-stronger-thing really is, and to embrace the process. Even now, I have to catch myself and reframe my expectations especially when regaining momentum from any kind of set back.
If you can being savagely honest with yourself in gauging RPE, trust the process, and be patient, you will get the results you want. For me, it helps to focus on how much I just enjoy training, regardless of the outcome. No matter what, I just want to keep coming back to the gym when I am 60, 70, 80 and have some awesome old guy strength.
Well no of course because I’m barely 3 weeks in and learning how to use it. I have watched all the videos. The reason I struggled with the @7 is because a week prior the @7 was heavier. That’s my point. I massively overshot the weight because I didn’t expect to drop over 10 percent in strength in one week. I still find it hard to guage estimated lifts based off my warm up sets. Therefore use last week’s lifts as a guide to what I should be lifting the next week. Hence then knowing I overshot my@ 7 and therefore took weight off to not overshoot my @8s. So as far as I am aware. O am using RpE correctly. It’s just an adjustment period to using the system.