Deloads

Training Q&A [Moderated]
1

Hi BBM team,

after sorting my lower back stiffness and tightness I had a look at my past training and I took the Christmas week off training to help nurse my lower back went back yesterday and I can say I’m definitely a little de trained as I’m a aching like a b**** but my lower back is perfect.

so my question is if someone is really feeling mentally and physically fatigued half way through a particular program do you suggest a deload then continue where they left off ? For example week 4 then deload week 5 then back to what should be week 5 of the program ?

my second question is if I’m doing a particular template that says cap at x amount of sets once RPE becomes @9 again.
do i a) stop at say set 3 of potentially 4 ? or b) lower the weight to complete the volume at the given RPE?

i normally complete all sets + cap just wanted to know if for whatever reason I was struggling should I stop or just lower the weight. As I’m assuming in a perfect situation I would complete all sets at the same weight ?

Thanks.

2

Hey Cole,

Thanks for the post and I hope you had a good holiday.

  1. We wouldn’t recommend taking a deload everytime someone feels fatigued, though if there performance is regressing after a period of improvement, then we’d consider it.

  2. You should stop when the same weight (@8) becomes @ 9. I’m not sure what you mean when you say you complete all sets + the cap. Let’s use the following as an example:

5 reps @ 6, 5 reps @ 7, 5 reps @ 8. Repeat 5 @ 8 until @ 9, cap at 3 sets)

You’ll work up to 5 @ 8, then repeat it for as many sets of 5 until it becomes @ 9 - doing 3 additional sets of 5 maximum before you’d just call it.

1 Like
3

@Jordan_Feigenbaum Hi and thank you for clearing this up for me,

your example the repeat sets @8 is what I would always complete. (Regardless if it felt like a 9 after the first repeat)
But I could maintain it @9 with the given rest but what I will do now is once it feels like a true @9 I won’t fear not completing the cap of x amount of sets.

i think the reason I don’t like to not get all the additional volume in is that currently I Can only train 3 days a week in the gym I do GPP at home. So I’m doing your 3 day templates.

thanks again.

4

I wouldn’t add sets to the back off to make it @ 9. I’d just reduce rest periods.