Hey, I am new to BBM, been training around 6 years for fitness, the last four years I actually started focusing a bit on strength and muscle size (wish I didn’t waste those first two years, but oh well live and learn). Anyway I am 160-162 pounds now and maintaining that weight.
I ran PB1 for my first BBM program and enjoyed it, and I am enjoying Low Fatigue Strength, low intensity 3 day.
I have noticed that during both programs I saw a good increase during the first cycle when the rep schemes were around 3-5 and then hit nice PRs during the pivot week, so my strength seemed to transfer quickly, which was good because it put my numbers back to when I weighed 190 pounds last year! BUT…after this when single work began, on both programs I saw the first couple weeks good and that E1RM stayed the same (293-310 on pb1 squat, and 303-321 during LFS, but all lifts did this a bit and about same %), and hit good single PRs at my new lower BW, but then after two weeks of singles and the triples, I am seeing a slow ramp down in E1RM (as I did in PB1). (from 321-308). Is this a bit of fatigue accumulation? Mental fatigue maybe from single training? Just looking for possible tips or things to consider/be aware of during these later parts of programs. I did notice that after PB1 (I didn’t do a peaking template) the numbers shot back up after I switched programs and took a few days off. Is it expected for there to be slight decrease during the later cycles of programs? Thanks!
Rather than compare e1RMs from sets of 3-5 to singles, what has been your experience with single-repetition efforts (load and RPE) over the past few weeks? I would not expect a decrease in performance towards the end of a program, no.
The first couple weeks of singles it was good and RPE was kept between 7-8 as prescribed with a little progression in E1RM or kept about the same. Then last few weeks its going down.
Sleep, I supposed, could be affecting my performance as I switched a medication around and my sleep and stress have been a little off.
Here is the analysis tab from my program…I may be overthinking it as there are regular fluctuations, it just seemed like at the end of the first phase I had made some gains, even if minor. Also I am keeping in mind that all of my lifts are like 5-10 pounds heavier than the program before this, PB1, which was the first program I ran. Is it possible the increases are just slowly acclimating? All of my supplements have made a gradual incline, but this is probably partially due to the fact they are new movements, but it is nice “mentally” to be hitting new PRs on those each week.
Any thoughts? My sleep has been a bit better. I also should add that I changed my bench form to prevent my butt coming off and I lengthened the pause by to a solid one count so I am sure that has something to do with the minor decrease on bench.
I’m talking about overshooting the singles, which is where your e1RMs come from. I do not think the medications are contributory at all.
While I agree with your practice for warming-up in general, the narrowness of your e1RM range suggests that you’re doing the same thing over and over again weight wise. I think you could benefit from doing a single at 5 to 8% lighter than your planned single (where you would increase your e1RM) and if it moves okay, go up and hit it.
Hmm, I think we may be talking past each other here. Let’s use an example where your e1RM was 400 one week and you wanted to bump it to 405 the next. Your last warm up for a planned 1 @ 7 at 365 (for a 405 e1RM) would be ~ 335-340, and the same weight as the week before when your e1RM was 400. The idea being- hey that felt pretty similar or a little better and then you send it on the 1 @ 7. If you aren’t building momentum week to week, I think the programming or progression strategy needs to be addressed.
I think you’re misunderstanding me. I would not increase the warm-up week to week. Having a bench mark weight is useful if you’re searching for something you can correlate with performance.
You’ll note we don’t program singles @ 6 or 6.5 because we tend not to use RIR as a proxy for singles.
As far as what you should do next week, I think I’d adjust how you’re doing warm-ups this week and the next iteration of the program you use. If the weight on the bar isn’t going up regularly for the same exertion, I don’t think the program is working for making you stronger.
I haven’t raised my warm-up weights that I use for a gauge in years. If there’s any doubt, I’ll take something more conservative based on that feeling.
How would you go about adding one or more gauging sets, when that 335 single is no longer recognisable, even
as a quick warm-up? Eventually, I want to pull 700 lb , and more calibration sets beyond 335 may be needed. I suppose that’s what Lutticon asked about as well, in their previous comment (#9.1).
When the weights you’re working towards go up significantly, say 10%, then your last warm up and previous sets are going to change with bigger jumps in them. FWIW, Austin and I don’t more warm up sets now than when we weren’t quite as strong. Perhaps less, if anything. My warm up for 700 x 1 @ 8 on DL would look like:
70kg x 5
120kg x 3
170kg x 1
220kg x 1
270kg x 1
300kg x 1 (feeler set)
317.5kg x 1 @ 8 if all goes to plan
Also, Jordan if you don’t mind (taking up your time here), with what I experienced in LISF, would you advise if I make good momentum then hit a wall to stop the program and look elsewhere or to continue the program and see if it was just bad sleep, health patterns, programming issues, etc. (my sleep has been better this last week btw) and push to the end and learn more due to having data to see trends and notes, etc.?
I already switched to Hypertrophy and an enjoying the change mentally and physically, but for future circumstances would like to know.
Yes. It should still be ~ 5.5 even if your 1RM goes up 20-40lbs.
That seems reasonable.
For an expanded answer, I think the text accompanying the template hashes this out.
Ultimately though, I think your program should be enjoyable and drive the results you want- though perhaps not at the rate you want. I don’t feel strongly about either the hypertrophy or low fatigue template for you based on what you’ve presented so far. Either would be more than adequate and the choice is really yours to make based on preferences for training and goals.
Jordan, interesting comment about not using RiR for gauging the effort of singles.
I switched from the powerbuilding II to the bodybuilding template in Jan and after a couple of weeks decided I’d start each session by working up to a moderately heavy single in one of the primary lifts. I’ve got the data from the end of the powerbuilding II template as a bench mark and so my idea was to do this as a way of gauging how much of my performance I was maintaining on a less strength focused program. As an added benefit I’vve also found it a pretty good way to set my expectations and target weights for the rest of the session. Ostensibly this is supposed to be an RPE 8, but in retrospect really what I’m looking for is a rep that feels heavy but doesn’t experience any pronounced slow down of the bar speed. I think this makes more sense than RiR for singles, but it’s also pretty binary data. Is this a decent way to think about regulating effort on singles and assessing performance?
Excellent information. I did read the whole Low Fatigue Text, I’ll have to look it back over. Do you mind if I share this to the Facebook group? I feel like a lot of people have had similar questions about warm-ups for 1 Rep maxes and how to approach your top set with a gauge
We’ve addressed this within the group a number of times previously and I think it would be better if folks asked their own specific question.
So the same strategy would apply for multiple rep sets?
Also, could you please clarify whether or not you prefer RPE (>=6) as RIR? For eg, I notice you generally suggest an RPE 6 being equivalent to a last warm-up set, where the bar speed doesn’t decline, rather than a true 4 RIR set. However, I found the following excerpt from https://www.barbellmedicine.com/blog/autoregulation-and-rpe-part-i/:
The lifter rates this last set @ RPE 6, i.e., this is the first set to require noticeable effort, with an estimated 4 reps in reserve before failure.
I strictly followed the latter RIR approach during my Beginner Template run and it was great. With 4 rep squats in the low-mid 200s, the weight jumps were about 5 lb per RPE rise. So my RPE 6 wasn’t really that much quicker than 8. I don’t know if that’s what was intended or not. Perhaps I’m splitting hairs here and none of this matters, so please relieve me of this burden :p.
Thanks a lot. This thread has been very helpful to me.
Depends on how the multiple rep sets are programmed. If it’s working up to a top set of 4 @ 8 or 9, I’ll typically do 4’s all the way up for a few weeks at the beginning of a block to get a feel for what loads I should be using and what weights are going to “tell me” the load for the day.
I think most people would be best served by using ramp up sets.
RIR is a good proxy for RPE in multi-rep sets, but it isn’t the way we use it for singles or in all cases.
Just chiming in to say that I was facing the same problem as the OP: squat and deadlift e1rms were stagnant or slightly declining during the second block. Additionally I felt quite tired and sore routinely. After 1 week on block 3 (which has a deload) my numbers shot up 30 lb in a week.
I had the opposite experience with my bench: steady progress throughout and no huge gain in block 3, though continued steady progress.
I think the volume dose for squat and deadlift may have been a bit too high whereas it was spot on for my bench. All of which is discussed in the book. OP you should check in after running block 3.
, and more calibration sets beyond 335 may be needed. I suppose that’s what Lutticon asked about as well, in their previous comment (