Hei guys,
I’ve been running the low fatigue template for a few months now. I’ve been enjoying training very much and I am thankful for you guys putting out such a great product!
Even though progress has been more or less pretty steady so far, it seems to me that for the last two months or so both my bench and my deadlift might have starting plateauing. In response, I have reread the troubleshooting part from the e book accompanying the low fatigue templates. Before starting to adjust training, I wanted to make sure that I am indeed observing a plateau. In the e book you guys have written that the program should produce strength improvements every 1-3 weeks, provided that outside gym factors are in check (which I consider them to be in my case).
My question now is:
How do you define “strength improvements” as they appear in the graph produced in the analysis tab of the program?
As you can see in the screen shots of the last 9 weeks of my bench and deadlift performance, it seems to me that my performance seems kind off cyclical, i.e. strength improves for a few weeks, upon which it drops more or less back to where i started, while it then increases again. So in a sense, strength is improving every 1-3 weeks if one compares it to prior week’s performance, but not if compared to performance across the whole 9 week training period. I am trying to figure out whether or not I should adjust training as described in the trouble shooting chapter, or if I should just keep going as is.
About me: I’m 25, male, weighing around 200 lbs, been training for about 3 years. Started with about 2-3 months of starting strength, then got a coach (Alex from BBM) for 3 months. Thereafter I kept training similarily for a couple of months. Finally, I’ve been using the BBM templates (Powerbuilding I & II, Strength II, Low fatigue).
Bench performance for the last 9 weeks on Low ISF 4-Day template:
:
Deadlift performance for the last 9 weeks on Low ISF 4-Day template:
Strength improvement would be the ability to use more weight for a specific exercise over the same ROM at the same RPE. It doesn’t look like the program is improving your strength at the current rep and RPE schemes, though a strength improvement may be realized during a peaking block. I’d be wondering what you’re experiencing every 4th week and how you’re trying to progress loading wise. It kind of seems like all of your top sets have been within 2.5kg of each other over 9 weeks. That’s pretty remarkable, though I’d suspect there’s likely more variation there.
Hey Jordan,
Thanks for answering.
The way I used to go about progressing my loads on each lift goes as follows: I take my previous week’s e1rm and add about 1-2% to it. Then I plugg in that new e1rm into the rep calculator within the excel file to get an idea of a load that I’d like to hit in the upcoming training session on that lift. For the past 6 weeks or so, however, I have been writing down weight ranges instead of specific weights as “goals” for the upcoming session, focusing more on hitting the prescribed RPE, trying to pick the right weight based on warm ups (Even though I thought that I was doing this previously, I think I was (sub)conciously too focused on hitting the goal weight, i.e. I would kind of “tell myself” that I hit a single @7, even though it might have been lighter or heavier than it actually was).
As to what I’m experiencing every 4th week, I’m not quite sure what you’re asking here. I usually feel progressively more fatigued during a 4-5 week duration as volume and/or intensity slightly increases during the program. Does this answer your question?
Would you recommend to continue running the program and reconsider the question of stalling after having run the peaking block (I.e. the last weeks of the program)?
Fabio,
Thanks for the reply. I agree that load selection is important when it comes to driving the desired adaptations and monitoring response to a program. I don’t think automatically increasing it 1 to 2% per week is consistent with the dynamic nature of human performance. A range may be more suitable with a low and high end ranging from, say, from 15% below your best effort to 2.5% above it. If you’re averaging more weight over a block, that’s a good sign that you’re ‘raising your floor’, which is likely to ‘raise your ceiling’ over time. I don’t think it’s likely that you’ll be able to raise your ceiling every week, but over time that’s the direction we should be heading.
I think I’d keep running the program if you’re enjoying it, paying attention to load selection, and then see how you feel about next steps going forward.
-Jordan
I guess I’ll keep running the program, paying close attention to load selection, and see what the peaking block will yield. Thanks for answering, appreciate it very much. Keep bringing the good work! 
