I've been doing weightlifting for a few years, and my focus during quarantine has been to try and lift 225 lbs on bench press for five reps. I was making some decent progress, but I'm stalling close to the finish line. I've written out an outline of my routine as it pertains to bench, and I'm curious if anything stands out as off or deficient:
I do a push day about twice a week where I work bench press first, moving over five sets of five reps from an initial weight to a final weight. At the moment, the initial is 185 and the final is 205. Lately I get to the final set, and I fail when my arms are parallel with my body, straight out, at the third or fourth rep.
After bench I do a mixture of tricep, shoulder and chest exercises, normal stuff. I also try to do a couple sets of bench at the end of the push day, going for ten reps at a lower weight. The whole routine probably takes an hour and a half. I've put on a bit of weight, not much, during quarantine, so I don't think the issue is a lack of nutrition (I could probably be a little smarter about what I'm eating, don't know much about that honestly).
I don't know, I'm fine with plateaus, I know how these things go, but I'm just wondering if there's anything obvious that I could be missing in the routine or that I'm doing wrong. And if anyone has found a good routine of their own for making progress on this front, I'd love to hear it.
Disclaimer: puny, rank amateur so gulp down my advice with ample sodium
What helps me with consistent growth is to have two routines on the go - I have a 'blue week' and a 'red week', where I do specific pull, push and leg routines in each.
For instance, I have a bench press in both weeks' push sessions, but blue's is 2x8 while red's is 3x4 - as such they require different weight loading.
If I'm struggling to complete a full set, then I stay at that weight until I can finish it. Once I can, I increase the weight the next corresponding week.
If the weight ever feels too much that I can't hit my rep target, nor are the number of reps I complete increasing, then I may lower to the last comfortable weight I could complete, but increase the number of reps;
E.g. Start at 50kg @ 30 reps total, increase to 50kg @ 45, then to 52.5kg @ 30 etc.As such, I'm juggling two targets at once, trying to increase the weight lifted in either week. Since the weeks are alternating, I'm not trying to improve my weight or reps from week to week, but rather fortnightly, whilst still working out all the muscle groups weekly. This means that A. You're tricking your body with shifting load demand and B. You're effectively simultaneously constantly yet gradually increasing load.
I probably don't lift heavy enough yet to have serious issues with plateauing anyway so 🤷♂️
How long have you been doing that specific routine for?
The general rule of doing "the same thing" is no more than 4-6 weeks once you're well trained or you'll start to plateau .
If you have someone who can spot you after you do a warmup set of 5 aim for a small rep set like (2-3) at something like 210, even if you can't complete the entire range of motion for the lift you are still stressing the muscles at a weight that expands your plateau. Idk if that makes sense its what a competitive weight lifter told me when he was helping me break my squat record last year. Kinda sad as he was nice but I noticed some of the nazi tats on him after that and hard ignored.
Yeah I don't generally have a spotter, particularly these days. Trying to go for higher weights with fewer reps makes sense, part of the reason my progress is slow is that I'm nervous about failing on bench, so I'm taking it kinda slow.
Rolling the heavy ass bar down to your hips is just giving your torso a super-deep tissue massage
Yeah I'm doing a PPL routine, I just gave an outline of the push days for this purpose. My exact push routine for much of quarantine has been this:
5x5 Bench, how I described above
3x(8-12) OHP
3x(8-12) Incline Dumbell Press
3x12 Tricep Pushdown, supersetted with 3x20 Shoulder Raises
2x10 Bench Press, supersetted with 2x20 Shoulder Raises
Huh. I'll start that up next week, see how it goes. Texas method seems very powerlifter-y, do people do accessory work on top of it?
In addition to the great advice u/nilceps is giving you you could also try changing your set/rep scheme to see if you like what's happening. IIRC, Texas Method already has you switching up your sets and reps. Bonus points for switching out accessory lifts. If you're at a plateau and you're already busting your ass, at some point you're going to have to feel out what is working for you and what isn't if you want to get beyond it.
