Fail Fail FAIL!

shizz

So I've been doing the stronglifts 5x5 for about a month now and it's been going well pretty much everyday besides getting stuck on one or two exercises, but this morning it felt like everything was going wrong. I finished my squat although I nearly fell over one time because I changed my hand position for some reason, I did the barbell rows before the bench press and failed on that and didn't want to do it at a lower weight cause my lower back felt like it would spasm and finally I tried the bench press and couldn't do the weight I did the last time. I understand these things happen but it's a little frustrating.

Does this happen much to people here?

Pace2008

Only yesterday I was going for 62.5kgx5 on the press, having got 4 reps the week before, and for whatever reason I couldn't even get the bar past my chin. It happens, man. Whether it’s through lack of sleep, fatigue from training, poor nutrition, a misalignment of Capricorn and Venus or any other combination of known unknowns or unknown unknowns, everyone has **** sessions or goes through bad patches. The word “off-day” exists for a reason. Just forget about it, a single training session is insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Re. the bench, if you again fail over the next session or two you might want to deload. Though there’s a good chance it’s down to bad/inconsistent form. You won’t get away with ****ty form on bench press for long unlike, say, the deadlift.

shizz

Pace2008 wrote: »

Only yesterday I was going for 62.5kgx5 on the press, having got 4 reps the week before, and for whatever reason I couldn't even get the bar past my chin. It happens, man. Whether it’s through lack of sleep, fatigue from training, poor nutrition, a misalignment of Capricorn and Venus or any other combination of known unknowns or unknown unknowns, everyone has **** sessions or goes through bad patches. The word “off-day” exists for a reason. Just forget about it, a single training session is insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

Re. the bench, if you again fail over the next session or two you might want to deload. Though there’s a good chance it’s down to bad/inconsistent form. You won’t get away with ****ty form on bench press for long unlike, say, the deadlift.

Thanks man. Yeah gonna forget about it no problem.. as long as it doesn't happen next week :pac:. I've been meaning to get someone to record my form but haven't got around to it. I think I'm OK on them but I should probably try study it anyway.

Thud

yeah it happens, mine usually happen on a Friday after a long week. i often throw in some high rep lower weight or core stuff to make it feel like i've done something worthwhile when it happens

J-Fit

shizz wrote: »

Thanks man. Yeah gonna forget about it no problem.. as long as it doesn't happen next week :pac:. I've been meaning to get someone to record my form but haven't got around to it. I think I'm OK on them but I should probably try study it anyway.

It might happen next week but you have to take action, even if that means just resting in the interim. Failing on a weight you'd usually smoke is a sign that your body requires recovery of some variety. I'd have to agree with everything Pace has said, there can be many reasons as to why you fail and they are often hard to pinpoint. It happened to me just today. Pulling great weight from the floor for the past two weeks and fully expectant of a rip roaring session today before I was rudely awakened by the simple fact that the body, in my opinion, engages a sort of "protective measure" to preserve the structural integrity of the soft tissue that has been previously damaged, similar to the central governor theory. Before we get off on a broscience foot, this is an opinion of mine based on my interpretation of the research.

I also see "stress" as a single pool into which all our life stressors feed into. These stressors include mental (pissed off at work), physical (had hard session yesterday) and emotional (fell out with best friend). I believe these things to upset the body's recovery status. In my case this week, I've got to look back and consider the two rep PRs I set in squat and bench, the stag party I was at last Fri and Sat, the argument I had with my girlfriend and the resultant sleepless night. You might see patterns like this in your own situation and that is simply life being life.

You should note that the stronglifts programme does seem to progress in load a little too quickly so if you are loading too heavily, that will certainly feed into the above factors. 531 would be a decent alternative.

In my own situation, I'm lucky enough to be taking a deload this week and I'm sure I'll come back all guns blazing for the next cycle. It's happened before and I fully expect it to happen again.

shizz

J-Fit wrote: »

It might happen next week but you have to take action, even if that means just resting in the interim. Failing on a weight you'd usually smoke is a sign that your body requires recovery of some variety. I'd have to agree with everything Pace has said, there can be many reasons as to why you fail and they are often hard to pinpoint. It happened to me just today. Pulling great weight from the floor for the past two weeks and fully expectant of a rip roaring session today before I was rudely awakened by the simple fact that the body, in my opinion, engages a sort of "protective measure" to preserve the structural integrity of the soft tissue that has been previously damaged, similar to the central governor theory. Before we get off on a broscience foot, this is an opinion of mine based on my interpretation of the research.

I also see "stress" as a single pool into which all our life stressors feed into. These stressors include mental (pissed off at work), physical (had hard session yesterday) and emotional (fell out with best friend). I believe these things to upset the body's recovery status. In my case this week, I've got to look back and consider the two rep PRs I set in squat and bench, the stag party I was at last Fri and Sat, the argument I had with my girlfriend and the resultant sleepless night. You might see patterns like this in your own situation and that is simply life being life.

You should note that the stronglifts programme does seem to progress in load a little too quickly so if you are loading too heavily, that will certainly feed into the above factors. 531 would be a decent alternative.

In my own situation, I'm lucky enough to be taking a deload this week and I'm sure I'll come back all guns blazing for the next cycle. It's happened before and I fully expect it to happen again.

Thanks man. This does make a lot of sense. I have been doing back exercises every night an maybe this has hindered my recovery just a little bit. This possibly coupled with other things.

What do you mean by 531?

J-Fit

It's a programme. Just google it.

shizz

Thanks yeah just did. Think I might try stick to 5x5 for now. But that does look interesting all right.