Tl;dr: squat 1eRM went down on Bridge 3.0 and trying to determine how others figure out similar issues and make programming adjustments
I’m on week 7 of Bridge 3.0. My squat 1eRM increased the first few weeks on the program, but has steadily diminished since then. Would love some help troubleshooting from more experienced BBM users so that I can make appropriate tweaks to my squat programming in the event I re-run Bridge 3.0 or move to other BBM programs.
Ideas so far about what the issue could be:
Training specificity may be too low (I was accustomed to squatting 3x/week previously; now am doing more variations)
Absolute intensity on the supplemental/variation squats may be too low to drive improvement in the main lift (Maybe related to specificity….not sure what is normal, but my paused squat/pin squat/HBBS 1eRMs are much lower than my LBBS – about 60-70% of my LBBS 1eRM)
Volume dosage is off
Would be great to hear others’ experience on how you deduce issues with your programs and how you correct course.
(Other relevant info in case you’re interested) Vital stats: M / age 41 / 5’7”, 175lb Training history: about 2 years serious; SS, HLM, bit of RPE-oriented training prior to BBM Initial squat 1eRM: 352 (week 1 of Bridge 3.0) Peak squat 1eRM: 368 (week 3) Current squat 1eRM: 355 (week 7) Other lifts: progressing well, with e1RM increasing nearly each workout like the BBM gang suggests they should
My subjective view is no - it has not changed. Should also note that I felt I had form dialed in decently prior to beginning Bridge 3.0 through both in-person and online coaching.
Ok, good to know. If it had, and/or if you felt like your subjective RPE’s had changed over the course of the 7 weeks, it would be entirely plausible that your e1rm would stay stagnant or go down as a result. Since this is not the case, it is quite odd.
Assuming your management of outside stress and recovery factors like sleep, nutrition, etc have been consistent/not generally worse, the most plausible explanation I think is that you have just trained long enough in the squat to require more stress than the bridge can provide, aka, you’re undertrained. I’m not sure what HLM program you had used, but it may have had more absolute volume with the main lift or variations. You might check your log to be sure of that. If that’s the case, you could of course add volume gradually, especially since your other lifts seem to be progressing at a rate you enjoy. If you go this route: it would mean repeating the bridge, which I think is reasonable considering progress in your other lifts. If adding additional volume is working for your squats, but your other lifts start to slow or backtrack, stop the bridge and pivot to another BBM program, like 12 week strength or hypertrophy. You will have completely tapped the bridge’s benefits.
You could also make the argument to just ride out the bridge this one time and switch to another BBM program thereafter.
I’m generally not a fan of how BBM programs squats. I’ve noticed they’re doing better in their 2.0 templates, so maybe Bridge 3.0 is different, but at least for Bridge 1.0 there’s just way too much low back fatigue programmed in there, ESPECIALLY for most of us coming off SSNLP and slightly (or more than slightly) good morning-ing our LBBS.
I also find “beltless” variations to be useless. When I was still doing BBM programming I started switching out beltless lbbs with high bar or front squats and finally was seeing squat progress. I briefly looked through their updated 2.0 templates they sent me recently and it seems like they’ve kind of started doing the same thing.