My arms don't seem to be getting stronger.
SarahMorganP
Posts: 921 Member
So on Wed I will start week 5. I can still only lift the 45lb bar during the overhead press. Today I did get 1x5@50, 1x4@50, 1x3@50 And 2x5@45. Even just the bar is so hard for me. Why can't I seem to make any progress with this?
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ohp is deadly because it's so dependent on form and keeping a strong 'shelf' through everything that your bra band crosses. the moment the weight is too heavy for me in that area, it's like if you're standing on a floor that's rotten. the weight just falls 'through'.
and then once it's gone 'through' my upper back, everything else comes apart too. so for me, this was one lift where lots of reps at weights just heavy enough to feel 'nice' made a major, major difference. i like to sneak in extra ohp reps 'just for fun' - which isn't bragging
it means i do it with light enough weight that it's fun.
one mental cue that sometimes helps me with the heavier sets is to picture myself as a torso plonked on the floor. literally. like someone chainsawed me through at the armpits and i'm 'sitting' directly on top of the floor like something out of a mad-science movie. it's not true, of course. it wouldnt' work if you literally let everything else below that sign off. but telling myself that my mid-ribs up is all that i have to 'push' with can make me concentrate all the leverages in the right way sometimes. you have to try to imagine you're pushing the bar away from your own fourth or fifth rib.
that and a weird thing that actually works: make sure you're squeezing the bar with your pinkies as well. saw that on some calisthenics guy's list of tips for doing pullups, and it engages all the 'border' muscles along your armpits and into your back.
also, 45 pounds is already a pretty strong ohp weight. just sayin'.1 -
I've been lifting for 8 months and am at 50lbs on ohp.ive bought fractional weights so I move up in 2lb increments but still get stuck at one weight for a couple of months at a time. Being able to lift 50 after just 5 weeks is really good.0
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^^second that!!!canadianlbs wrote: »also, 45 pounds is already a pretty strong ohp weight. just sayin'.
Keep in mind...the smaller the muscle the smaller the weight, the bigger the muscle the bigger the weight.
With that said, I started with a 20# bar on OhP - it takes time.
As @jowaring recommended, fractional weights are a great investment.
And like @canadianlbs said, work with different forms and keep your mid section tight.0 -
Ahh, the press. The bane of all the ladies (at least, those that enjoy rows xD).
Shoulders are tricky beasts in their own rights. Pressing overhead, as canadianlbs put it, requires a fair amount of stability. If you're tall, even more so, because it begins at the bottom of the chain, where your feet are gripped into the ground. So, well, shoes can make a difference. Get something non-too-squishy if you can
Proper posture is where everything is stacked together, so that's important to achieve in order to get the best leverage possible.
Grip width is important, as too wide or too narrow will make it hard to hold the proper shelf to press from. Differes a bit from a person to another, but generally speaking, about shoulder width is where it's at.
Fractionals are awesome to progress slowly on these, because it quickly gets tricky to put on more weight. Been at it for 3 years, and I only managed to get over 100lbs once (and i was ecstatic when that happened. Don't know if I could still do it since I was laid off for a while
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If that fails, adding reps might work better than adding weight. Work up to sets of 8 before upping the weight and trying for sets of 5.
OR, you can add in heavier push presses and control the negative to build that strength, and DB presses for shoulder stability. OR OR! Bottoms up KB presses. Maximum activation of the entire shoulder girdle. Start light!
But the tl;dr is: this is a lift you need to be patient and/or creative with to progress at. It,s also one of the most reqarding!4 -
It took me a long time to progress past 50 lb on OHP. The biggest thing that helped me, besides sheer repetition to build strength, was using a bar that had a narrower diameter. Although this bar is heavier, I have better grip strength and that makes a big difference. It's also just a hard lift for women bc we have less upper body strength than men genearly do. It'll come, it just takes time and practice.0
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yes it is so hard ! I'm stuck on the bar only. I started with 5 sets of 3 reps and now I am up to 5 sets of 4 reps.
also I find barbell rows hard to do, the part where you are supposed to pull your shoulder blades together, like it's hard to get my shoulder blades to do this and I am on a low weight !0 -
Agree with the above. Upper body in general is harder for me to see any increase on, even now I can nudge up on squats and deadlift but haven't seen ohp or bench with much improvement though we'll see how the current peak cycle goes since I didn't skip bench this time around.
And if it helps, from what I've seen around the forums and in posts of SL, the guys also complain about plateauing on OHP.1
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