Hey guys,
Have you got any advice for planning training ahead of a period (6wks in this case) of particularly high life stress (uni projects + exams + interviews), where trying to get strong will be taking a back seat?
Currently, 8 weeks into the strength template but the thought of doing heavy singles/triples every training day in the peaking portion is quite off-putting given I’ve no meet to peak for and I have other priorities at this time than hitting big numbers in the gym.
My plan for now is to run the 3-Day Hypertrophy template again, modified to do 8s on the main lifts and 10s on the secondary lifts for the first 3 wks. My rationale here is I’ve been doing plenty of 4s, 5s, 6s over the past ~4 months and think a break from that would make me look forward to training even during this busy period. Does this seem like a reasonable approach? Or am I just bitching out on some voluntary hardship lol
That’s a reasonable plan, and a good place where autoregulation can be particularly helpful.
in the past, i’ve found myself obsessing a bit with a couple of concepts. One is a leftover from SSNLP, where a workout has to feel “hard as hell” to be productive. the other is worrying a little too much about gains in the short-term.
RPE is such a great tool because you can factor in life-stress when using it to adjust your weights. if my template is calling for sets of 3 at RPE 9, i can adjust the weight to whatever I’m ready for that day. I do not have to scale the lift to my e1RM from when I was feeling great. while i used to dread heavy fives at the end of my NLP run, i never dread heavier weight these days. 3 reps at RPE 8 or 9 should be just that, very achievable (relatively easy to hit). If I’m feeling stressed, i can just lower the weight to an amount where that dread goes away.
Did i workout at my absolute optimal best? no.
Did that workout feel a little too easy? maybe.
But will one (or six) weeks in a thirty year training run make a big impact. definitely not.
The quote" “what are you going to do, not train?” can mean get in any workout (that hopefully you enjoy). working out should help relieve stress, not add to it.
i hope all goes well for you…
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