With the sleeping thread in the forum, I ask, does overreaching affect quantity and/or quality of sleep?
This is related to Korte's because, from my experience, I was a sleeping machine the first three weeks, sometimes getting in 12+ hours (no school w00t). However, near the end of my cycle, as I felt other signs of over-reaching (loss of "bounciness"... etc) I was sleeping terribly, always sweating and feeling hot. It's not like it was hot in my house, in fact it was very cool, but everytime I tried to hit the sack, I was jumpy and hot. For about a week, I was sleeping ~4 hours a night. Since I've stopped the loading, sleep patterns have returned to normal, ~9-10hrs.
Interesting.
I just finished the last workout of week 5, and it's taken a full 7 days to deload to feeling 80%. My vertical jump is not up to par, and I'm not as jumpy/boucny feeling so I doubt I'm 100%. This was the first workout in the unloading/competitive phase that I haven't gotten any low back cramping. The results can only get better as my body recovers.
5x5 is much much easier, as evident by the recovery process. I was feeling fresh after 2-3 days post 4 week loading, as compared to the 7 days in Stephan Korte's 3x3.