Raw Powerlifting: How to Increase Your 1RM

[Spartigus]

Originally Posted by Fazc

Just make sure you're honest with yourself, are you actually stalling in the gym because of your lower back or are you just a little beat up? If you can still progress, then I suggest an important lesson is to carry on through. If you truly think you'd risk injury then it's your call to switch it up, just bear that in mind. A little pain is something to get used to.

When I ran 5/3/1 with excessive volume on deadlift day, I felt a similar pain as I do now. I could run it for a few more weeks I think, but I have been feeling pain in it for about a week and a half now.

[Spartigus]

Originally Posted by Fazc

Yep!



Sounds good to me.

Thanks! I will post in my log how it goes when I get home from lifting .

[Kuytrider]

Delighted you got this up and running Faz, thanks a lot for your sharing your insight and knowledge with us

Firstly, would I be a beginner or intermediate?: 1RM deadlift = 150kg, Push Press 1RM = 75kg, Squat 127.5kgx5, Bench 95kgx5

If I wanted to do cleans, what day would I do them and with what volume to fit in with everything else?

[Fazc]

Originally Posted by Kuytrider

Firstly, would I be a beginner or intermediate?: 1RM deadlift = 150kg, Push Press 1RM = 75kg, Squat 127.5kgx5, Bench 95kgx5

I'd stick with the beginner one for now, till you're sure it won't work for you. It's always better to exhaust the easy options it gives you more choices later on when you do stall.

Originally Posted by Kuytrider

If I wanted to do cleans, what day would I do them and with what volume to fit in with everything else?

I've never seen much value in Cleans to be honest, nothing against Cleans it's more to do with my inability to do/teach them. However if you really want to do them they're a fast lift so you'd want to do them first, I'd place them before the Deadlifts on Friday. Making your Friday look something like:

Cleans 5 x 1-3
Deadlifts 5 x 5
Abs 5 x 12

[Kuytrider]

Originally Posted by Fazc

I'd stick with the beginner one for now, till you're sure it won't work for you. It's always better to exhaust the easy options it gives you more choices later on when you do stall.



I've never seen much value in Cleans to be honest, nothing against Cleans it's more to do with my inability to do/teach them. However if you really want to do them they're a fast lift so you'd want to do them first, I'd place them before the Deadlifts on Friday. Making your Friday look something like:

Cleans 5 x 1-3
Deadlifts 5 x 5
Abs 5 x 12

Ok, thanks. So you're replacing the deadlift singles with the cleans in this example? (Hope that's not a daft question!) No thanks, I will definitely be doing the deadlifts instead Cleans can wait for later.

So the beginner has basically no assistance exercises due to the intense volume of the main lifts? I guess if you're not wrecked after the mains, you ain't going heavy enough!

Finally, how would one warm up for the singles? Today, for my 1RM attempt, I started with 8 reps at 40% of my 1RM target, then did 5 reps at 60%, 3 reps at 70%, 1 rep at 80% and 1 rep at 90%. Got a PR so it worked fine! (Think I answered my own question!)

The singles are at 90% of the 1RM, am I correct? Where would one begin the 5x5? At 70% of 1RM perhaps?

Oh and push presses are ok instead of OHP?

And no more questions from me for now

[Fazc]

Originally Posted by Kuytrider

So the beginner has basically no assistance exercises due to the intense volume of the main lifts? I guess if you're not wrecked after the mains, you ain't going heavy enough!

Pretty much, form practice and repetition is king. You'll respond well since you've had a background of 3 x week frequency.

Finally, how would one warm up for the singles? Today, for my 1RM attempt, I started with 8 reps at 40% of my 1RM target, then did 5 reps at 60%, 3 reps at 70%, 1 rep at 80% and 1 rep at 90%. Got a PR so it worked fine! (Think I answered my own question!)

Sounds good, whatever works for you.

The singles are at 90% of the 1RM, am I correct? Where would one begin the 5x5? At 70% of 1RM perhaps?

Good place to start.

Oh and push presses are ok instead of OHP?

Yarr.

And feel free to ask away.

[BendtheBar]

Singles...excuse me if this was covered. How do you determine singles weight? Simply what you feel you can do that day?

[Fazc]

For beginners I'd tend to say just pick something you can do in good form. For more advanced guys I'd expect them to know their 1RM or have a good guess, so 90% will do. Once you have chosen your lifts and have a session or two under your belt you should be pushing for PRs every time you hit that gym.

It should be treated differently from frequent lifting routines, in that because it's once a week you can flirt with your absolute max or close without as much of a need to hold back. I find that's why this is probably a nice intermediate step toward the more advanced routines which inevitably slim down the number of exercises to very few. You can have a good variety of exercises and figure out which benefit you, on top of that you don't have to worry as much about holding back.

I like this for intermediates, as a beginner doing full body routines you're honing your form. Here you hone that killer instinct with multiple heavy singles. Later on you'll need to periodise but by then you would have at least exhausted linear progression and have experience of maintaining control under limit weights.

[Off Road]

Originally Posted by Fazc

For beginners I'd tend to say just pick something you can do in good form.

Good answer. Once form breaks, that's your 1RM. Really no need to push it past that until you learn how.

[Tannhauser]

Something you guys (BTB and Fazc) were discussing on another thread piqued my interest. Steve was saying that he needed to get his eccentrics faster and Fazc said he would start moving forward again when they did.

I'm interested in this idea with regard to bench press. At the moment, I can't bench enough for this to be an issue, but in the past, everytime I got over 150kg on bench, the eccentric would become a huge problem. For a start, my shoulder pain would be excruciating and make it hard to control the bar. Secondly the bar would descend achingly slowly - though I sometimes had difficulty controlling the last 3-4" to the chest. I often felt that this took a lot out of me and stopped me from hitting big 1RMs.

On squats too, past 200 kg and I was descending at a glacial pace. I wonder if this saps some strength, too.

What's your take on eccentrics and the speed thereof?