Starting Strength Programme - Consecutive Days?

jollyjoe321

Hey,

I'm looking to start the SS programme by Mark Rippertoe, I've done some gym work before, but mainly on the machines rather than barbells, so this is new to me!

The programme says to do 3 non-consecutive days, so in an ideal world I'd do Mon-Wed-Fri. I can't however do Fridays due to other commitments, and this also means I can't do weekends. Do you think it'd work at all doing Mon-Wed-Thu? I'm guessing it wouldn't work quite as well, but as long as I'm improving in some way I don't mind too much!

Info:

Height: 5ft 9inches
Weight: 158lbs (11 stone 4 lbs/71.5kg)
Age: 18

I'm sort of hoping that due to my age I've got a decent recovery time, but that might be optimistic, what are your opinions? Please don't put me down on this, (as I've seen done to a lot of people) I'm a newbie and don't know any better.

Cheers!

bluetuesday5

No. Surely you can find some time to train on either Friday, Saturday or Sunday. It's not like the workouts take that long. If you can't I would suggest picking another program.

Leadfoot_Lewis

No. Surely you can find some time to train on either Friday, Saturday or Sunday. It's not like the workouts take that long. If you can't I would suggest picking another program.

^Agree. You never want to work the same muscles on consecutive days. Bad idea.

timbrom

Honestly, I'm going to disagree with the above posters. I mean, ideally find a way to find time on Friday or Saturday (Sat-Mon-Wed works fine too) but if you honestly can't, at 18, you will likely have the recovery ability to make it work. Especially at 158 lbs, you are going to have to make sure to eat ALL of the food on Wednesday and Thursday, but it'll work for you, for a while.

Eventually you may find yourself feeling pretty beat up on Thursday. When that happens, make Wednesday a light day on squats (about 80% of Monday's weight). I would suggest not deadlifting on consecutive days, deadlift Monday and Thursday, and learn the power clean right away and do those on Wednesday.

Not ideal, probably, but you should be fine for a while.

GeordieGirl80s

I'm no expert and I know nothing about the programme you mention but if you did 2 different muscle groups on Weds/Thurs (ie upper body Weds, lower body Thurs) then you'd still get your recovery time between sessions. But I also kind of agree with the others who says surely you can find time at some point on Fri or Sat, a 1 hour work-out is 4% of a day.

jhc7324

Honestly, I'm going to disagree with the above posters. I mean, ideally find a way to find time on Friday or Saturday (Sat-Mon-Wed works fine too) but if you honestly can't, at 18, you will likely have the recovery ability to make it work. Especially at 158 lbs, you are going to have to make sure to eat ALL of the food on Wednesday and Thursday, but it'll work for you, for a while.

Eventually you may find yourself feeling pretty beat up on Thursday. When that happens, make Wednesday a light day on squats (about 80% of Monday's weight). I would suggest not deadlifting on consecutive days, deadlift Monday and Thursday, and learn the power clean right away and do those on Wednesday.

Not ideal, probably, but you should be fine for a while.

I agree with this too. A way that might make this work better for you would be to try his Practical Programming template:

http://www.amazon.com/Practical-Programming-Strength-Training-Rippetoe/dp/0982522754

Its a very similar program, but it removes power cleans, and replaces them with pullups and chinups.

In this template you squat every workout, alternate bench and OHP as the second lift, and alternate between pullups, chinups and deadlifts for the 3rd.

So on your schedule you'd have:

Monday - Squat, Bench, Pullups

Wednesday - Squat, OHP, Deadlifts

Thursday - Squat, Bench, Chinups

Monday - Squat, OHP, Pullups

Wednesday - Squat, Bench, Deadlift

Thursday - Squat, OHP, Chinups

I ran that program for 6 or so months until the squat weight got too heavy for me to recover in between workouts so I switched over to 5/3/1.

oldantired

I recently read an interview with Jack Lalanne when he was still alive. He worked out every day and advocated only taking a 10 second rest between sets. I think, for now, you should be OK. You may find the Thursday workout a bit more challenging especially as the weight increases.

rick_po

You can probably do M/W/Th for several weeks, but eventually it will wipe you out.

This might be a situation where a split routine would work better, if you can do a Mon/Tues/Wed/Thurs schedule. jhc's suggestion looks good, too.

Alternatively, just do SS twice a week. You won't make progress as fast, but you'll still make lots of progress in a short period of time.

A lot of serious runners will do a 2-a-week beginner strength program and train their running the rest of the week. If you have another athletic goal, you could do 2-a-week SS and use your weekend and off days to pursue your other sport..

Sam_I_Am77

In a perfect world, you would probably not want to train full-body like this on back-to-back days. However, life is crazy and one must fine the time to train when they can. If Mon, Wed, Thu is the best you can do, then by all means friggin' train on those days; it's not the end of the world. If you manage to become "over-trained" by 3 days then you're likely doing something horribly wrong in your recovery. Your Thu workouts might not be the best but again, if it's the best you can do then do it; train as hard as you can. Then you have 3 days (Fri, Sat, Sun) to recover, make sure you eat good and get plenty of sleep.

This is just my opinion based on my training experience and your training schedule, these would be my personal changes, take it as you will.

1. I wouldn't rotate A & B but I would make some changes and have an A1, B, and A2 and look something more like...
- A1
3 x 5 Squat
3 x 5 Bench
1x 5 Deadlift (only do these on A1 as DL's tend to require more recovery time and putting these on Monday gives you a full day)

- B
3 x 5 Squat (possibly use a lighter load, I would do this for 4 to 6 weeks and then re-evaluate)
3 x 5 Press
5 x 3 Cleans

- A2
3 x 5 Squat
3 x 5 Bench
3 x 15 Back Extensions

#lettheflamingbegin

jollyjoe321

No. Surely you can find some time to train on either Friday, Saturday or Sunday. It's not like the workouts take that long. If you can't I would suggest picking another program.

^Agree. You never want to work the same muscles on consecutive days. Bad idea.

Hi both,

Nope, I can't find the time as every weekend I am based on an airfield 70 miles from home. I travel down on a Friday evening and have work commitments that restrict going to the gym in the mornings. Hence why I said I couldn't do Friday, Saturday or Sunday.


Thanks to the rest of you for the constructive posts, I'll see how I get on then for a couple of weeks or so and try one of your proposed adjustments. Thanks!