The gym that I go to only has dodecagon plates, which makes deadlifting more than one rep fairly annoying. At the end of each rep, there is a decent probability that the plates will land on a vertex and roll to bring the bar away from mid-foot, and if I do 5x1 as my programming suggests, I have to reset almost every set (sometimes multiple times). This would not be a huge problem if it were consistent, but it happens randomly enough to make it annoying to measure progress in the long run. I have thought of how I want to solve this problem, and I would love to hear your perspective on my thought process.
- I could switch to a deadlift variation that does not require me to set the weight down completely and giving the plate an opportunity to move (touch-and-go?).
The downside for this is that I am moving away on the specificity spectrum you guys describe, but I am not training to compete, so it might not be a huge tradeoff. Also, I think this would require a higher degree of technique.
- Switch my programming to be multiple sets of singles.
This seems like the more preferred approach because it will still be as specific as possible, but my problem is that I don’t know how I should approach selecting weights relative to my 5x1 to achieve a similar amount of stress. It seems to me that I would want to use a higher weight on 1x5 than 5x1 because I get a recovery period.
For context, I currently do my 5x1 at 85-90% of my estimated 1RM, and I am not a huge fan of resetting every rep because getting into the proper position by the final reps becomes pretty difficult.