ChatGPT summery: A new lifter (23M, 137kg, 6’2") enjoying progress with Strength I Gen 1 is struggling with recovery, likely due to a calorie deficit or program intensity. Weighing options: continue powerlifting with a moderate deficit or switch to hypertrophy to focus on weight loss, fearing strength loss during the transition. Saving for a belt and sleeves for future progress.
Relatively new lifter here (5 months) nearing the end of a 2nd run of a the Strength I gen 1 template and so far I love the training and the strength gains but I’ve ran into a few issues I believe are specific to my case.
Background info:
Male, 23 YO, 187 cm / 6’2" tall, currently weighing 137kg (297lbs) down from the starting 165kg (360lbs)
Maintaining a weekly deficit of 0.5kg with the goal weight of 110kg (240lbs)
Official 1rm are S:185kg B:110kg D:195kg
Current estimates are S:200kg B:120kg D:210kg
*I dont use knee sleeves or a belt at all
Sleeping 8-10 hours a day but dont always go to bed at the same same time (i fall asleep between 10pm and 4am)
Recently I’ve been having problems recovering between workouts or even between sets. For example last sunday I did heavy deficit deadlifts which absolutely cooked my lower back. When I say cooked, I really mean it. 4 days later, which is a deadlift heavy day as per programming I felt fine but obviously wasnt since the expected 190x1@8 didnt budge at all and I had to drop down to 180x1@8 which, a week prior, I repped x4@9. Also important to mention, my knees feel stiff. They dont hurt but even days after heavy squats they feel stiff as if I need to do some bodyweight squats to warm them up. Does it sound like a cause for concern or do my knees need to recover same as my muscles?
My question is, is it more likely that the problem with recovery is somewhere else or even caused by my caloric deficit or did I progress as a lifter to the point where S/B/D essentially every workout is hard to recover from? Should I move on to Strength II?
I dont want to derail the thread dump all my problems here, but I am aware that I should focus more on the calorie deficit part and less on the strength but I like lifting too much hahahah. I was thinking about switching to Hypertrophy for 2/3 months and upping the deficit to 1kg per week to speed things up but I was very afraid of losing my hard earned strength and muscle.
Should I switch to hypertrophy/powerbuilding, increase the caloric deficit a bit, try to maintain as much muscle as possible and return to powerlifting in 2-3 months (would also be enough time to save up for a belt and sleeves haha) or should I continue powerlifting same as now, maintain the 0.5kg deficit and try to make progress. The only problem with the “continue powerlifting” option is that I REALLY need the belt as the core starting to become a limiting factor on heavy squats and deadlifts but it makes no sense to buy a belt now because Im going to lose weight and the belt is going to be too large. Im just no sure whats the optimal path to take