When did you first have to deload?
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knt217
Posts: 115 Member
I've been doing SL for 3 weeks now. I haven't deloaded yet, but I feel like it's coming...and maybe I should have already anyway. I'm hoping to get a video tomorrow of my squats, but I struggle with my right knee, and am feeling weak in that area...I'm supposed to lift 75 lbs tomorrow. My OHP yesterday was pretty shaky on the way up (only at 55 lbs) on the last couple reps of each set, and I don't think my form was perfect...but I got it up. Bench feels fine still. Deadlift feels fine. Row is starting to get difficult at 80 lbs. Should I deload at this point, or when I literally cannot push the weight back up in any of the exercises? When did you first deload when you started lifting?
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When I failed a weight 3 times. I count any poor form reps as a fail. I think I deloaded ohp first at like 55 lbs0
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i think difficulty is okay, so long as you feel okay about the level of effort you're asking your body to make. but if you feel like the weight is causing your actual form to degrade, then i'll vote for backing up a little. a 'bad' muscle habit is much harder to uproot from your nervous system once it takes hold, and a 'good' one is much easier to learn when you're not trying to replace some other pattern your body's got used to doing. so a deload is like an investment in your future progress, in a way.
remember too that sl was basically put together for men, so the 5lb increments with every workout are designed for them too. many women max out faster with some of the lifts than a man would, particularly the upper-body ones you're having more trouble with.
and i like ohp, but it's an unrequited kind of love. basically, that one's a bear.0 -
You might be surprised how far you can go. OHP can be sneaky, it may be a rough session last time but be no sweat the next. You are still new to SL, so it's mostly form you gotta hammer in and sometimes it just clicks and weight moves easy, then you gotta figure out what you did.
But yeah, there's lots of factors in play - how much you weigh, whether you started with the recommended (male) starting weights, if you are/how much you are eating at a deficit and body type. Lanky leggy types seem to have issues with squat/deadlift, whereas if you are short limbed some lifts are easier since you don't need to move the bar that far. You might have to watch more form vids on what works for your body type.
I hung around 85lbs and 100lbs on squat for 3 attempts just to beat in form. Video taping is valueable - OHP might feel slow mo but your form could of still been there. If it was going up diagonally (I'm guilty for this one) then that's form going downhill.
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Depends on the lift. I didn't really even de-load in squats or deadlift when I did the program for 12 weeks. I had a few times where I decided to stay at a weight but didn't really fail per se. I did pretty quick on OHP because the first time I tried adding weight to the bar it was when trainer was helping me learn deadlift and such so we did a full session through SL and my form went to hell for some reason. First time trying with weights on bar my head decided it didn't want to be under that bar, lol. So I decreased even though it wasn't 3 fails just to get form down better. Rows were one I struggled to figure out and get comfortable with so they didn't so much de-load but I didn't do a lot of increasing either. I did some bent over rows for a while instead of pendlay. With bench, my first de-load took several weeks as I followed the "fail so many times then de-load" format the most with that lift compared to rest.0
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I will repeat a weight if my form is really off or if I fail a set. I don't deload unless I've failed that weight three times or if I'm coming back from some time off.
Like @awkwardsoul said, you may be surprised at what you can do. As long as you're being safe and your form is good, keep trying.
And like @canadian said, fractional weights will be your best friends with the upper body lifts. I'd definitely recommend spending the $20 to get a pair of 1 lb. or 1.25 lbs. weights, so you can increase in smaller increments.0 -
What @canadian lbs and @crabada said about fractionals. It's not too much to say that my fractional plates are keeping me in the SL program. The OHP and BP would be just too discouraging otherwise; I'm still in the lower 50s for OHP and lower 60 for BP and I'm 10 weeks in. I've deloaded a couple of times on both to fix my form0
