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Should I do Starting Strength?

M

maunded

Guest
Hi all,

I was hoping to get some opinions/comments on Starting Strength.
Ive been training on and off for about 5 years, and by off, I mean I had a year off recently and went from 85kg back to 78kg and gained quite a lot of fat.
I started up again at the end of last year training a split system (upper/lower/rest/upper/lower/rest/rest) and have come back to 84kg using a program of heavy weight 4x8s.
Im hoping to move up to 90kg and I started reading about Starting Strength.
I tried day 1 of this program this morning and it really didnt feel like I accomplished anything, doing only 4 exercises and 3x5 didnt seem to fatigue me that much even though I increased the weight I would normally do for these exercises.
I dont want to lose the momentum Ive got so Im interested to hear if anyone has gone from a high intensity program to a basic program and the results they saw.

Thanks!
Dean
 
maunded said:
Hi all,

I was hoping to get some opinions/comments on Starting Strength.
Ive been training on and off for about 5 years, and by off, I mean I had a year off recently and went from 85kg back to 78kg and gained quite a lot of fat.
I started up again at the end of last year training a split system (upper/lower/rest/upper/lower/rest/rest) and have come back to 84kg using a program of heavy weight 4x8s.
Im hoping to move up to 90kg and I started reading about Starting Strength.
I tried day 1 of this program this morning and it really didnt feel like I accomplished anything, doing only 4 exercises and 3x5 didnt seem to fatigue me that much even though I increased the weight I would normally do for these exercises.
I dont want to lose the momentum Ive got so Im interested to hear if anyone has gone from a high intensity program to a basic program and the results they saw.

Thanks!
Dean
Click to expand...

Have a look at Ben-Eiko-5-3-1 same lifts but with a lot more volume.
 
Why not, unlike 99% of people who work out and never achieve the results they want, stick with your current program which appears to be working very well :p

If you start stalling in your gains in the gym (which if you keep eating but aren't gaining in the gym will probably just translate into fat gains, rather than muscle gains), back off for a week or 2 (eg revert to 80-85% of max weights in week 1, then 90-95% in your second week) then go again for another say 4-6 weeks (depending on how you're feeling etc again).

That and to the extent that Starting Strength relies on olympic movements, they are very effective provided they are performed correctly. Throw in a high risk of injury, I don't think the risk v reward equation comes out in your favour.
 
judgey said:
That and to the extent that Starting Strength relies on olympic movements
Click to expand...

Say what? Its squat, bench, press, deadlift, clean :P

To the OP: The whole point of starting strength is it starts out feeling easy, but before too long you dread the squat portion of every workout because its so damn hard. It works if you follow the program and eat.

At the end of the day, you need to do the program you enjoy / believe in. That is the best program for you.
 
At the end of the day, you need to do the program you enjoy / believe in. That is the best program for you.

This is the key to success.
The squat is the key-stone.
 
Always seemed like the volume was too low imo
Im trying out something pretty low volume at the moment so ill see how that goes
 
0ni said:
Always seemed like the volume was too low imo
Im trying out something pretty low volume at the moment so ill see how that goes
Click to expand...

Remember; Starting Strength is just that, it has a low volume, high frequency to get people moving and get their CNS working. I'm not going to put a time limit on it but it's not something I would leave any of my clients on for a great period of time.
 
It's up to you but IMO you need to give anything atleast 3-6 months before saying it doesnt work. Assuming you dont stall every 4 weeks your squat and deadlift will go up 30kg, bench and overhead press 15kg. It really depends on your lifts though if you're already squatting over 1.5x your body weight, benching over bodyweight you will probably be better off with something else as I don't think you will be able to handle weight increases every session for very long.
 
I'm a big believer in Starting Strength. Of course it feels light & easy when you start. That's the reason you can progressively & consistently add weight to the bar & see outrageous strength gains in short periods of time. If you add too much weight in the beginning your longer-term progress will stall.
 
Semillon said:
To the OP: The whole point of starting strength is it starts out feeling easy, but before too long you dread the squat portion of every workout because its so damn hard. It works if you follow the program and eat.
Click to expand...

This is absolutely true! It doesn't take long before starting strength becomes hectic. The squats make me very much a broken man these days, and on sessions where theres still deadlifts to do, well that's the definition of the word 'challenge' :o
 
If you're competent in your lifts and what you've been doing is working, then, unless SS is more applicable to your goals than your current routine, I don't see the need to be doing Starting Strength. Even if SS is more suited to your goals, once you're beyond the rank novice level, it's not really suitable for any extended period of time (you might use it when coming back from lay-off, but you probably wouldn't follow the program as written for 3-6 months, because you'd spend more time stalling and resetting than making progress). The Texas Method (which picks up where SS leaves off) would be more appropriate to intermediate lifters.

In summary, I don't know if you should be doing SS or not, but I'm suspecting not.
 
I recommend doing it for 3 months for the experience...

It's all about mastering the basic lifts... Although I suggest you should do the SS version that does not include power cleans...

Power cleans need full time coaching imo... The deadlift is more then adequate...
 
DCMusic said:
After reading the OP's explanation of his training I came firmly to the opposite conclusion.
Click to expand...
Could you justify your position?

It seems to me that he's gained 6kg in the last few months, lifting heavy, getting his whole body trained twice a week. He didn't mention how much his lifts have improved by or changes in body composition since his return to training, but the goal stated was about his bodyweight, and he seems to be doing fine on that front. Without further information, I'm failing to see the need for him to change over to SS. So, again, could you please explain why you firmly feel that he should be doing SS instead of what he's been doing?
 
Before this all goes off on a tangent, as it usually does...and....


With this topic being placed here, I would suspect this bloke wants to compete in power lifting at some point in time.

Am I correct?
 
Goosey said:
Before this all goes off on a tangent, as it usually does...and....


With this topic being placed here, I would suspect this bloke wants to compete in power lifting at some point in time.

Am I correct?
Click to expand...

Interdasting... When I did SS it was to learn to squat and improve my bench... Had nothing to do with competing...
 
Well, what I meant to write was it appears that he eventually wants to make it a goal of competing at some point in time.

If this is true then I suggest he go to a PTC type venue.
 
Goosey said:
Well, what I meant to write was it appears that he eventually wants to make it a goal of competing at some point in time.

If this is true then I suggest he go to a PTC type venue.
Click to expand...

Do you dislike SS?

Perhaps the PTC novice program is more ideal?
 
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