Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up now!

[djeclipse]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Well I put my 1RM (120kg) into the excel sheet, and that's what I'm basing it off. I did this 1RM in November of 2008, so I didn't see a problem with it.
On that day, I also missed the power cleans. These felt extremely sluggish and they were not fast enough, and I've had this happen to me when I tried power cleaning without much sleep/food, so I thought the same thing happened again. My bench press is still increasing, but my military press is starting to get hard.



Well I tried 110kg x 3 on Friday and I got it. I felt like I could do 110kg x 4 to be honest. I'm guessing that if I could only manage to squeeze out 107.5kg x 3 on Monday and I easily got 110kg x 3 on Friday, then I either became stronger or I didn't rest/eat well.

To be honest, my sleeping patterns are really screwed and I do think that it is impacting on training. Most nights (~4 out 7) I get 6.5-7 hours of sleep MAX whilst on the other 3, I might be lucky to get 8-9 hours.

November 2008? What does that have to do with Mar 2009? It's not your all time maxes, but your current 5 rep maxes. You are supposed tot take a week and figure out your CURRENT 5 rep maxes and use them.

If you are starting to stall in only week 3 you clearly set your weight's too high and aren't going to get much out of the program. Mad cow stresses, drop the ego and be conservative with your starting 5 rep maxes, you clearly didn't listen to his avice and are paying for it now.

 

[lolwut]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

November 2008? What does that have to do with Mar 2009? It's not your all time maxes, but your current 5 rep maxes. You are supposed tot take a week and figure out your CURRENT 5 rep maxes and use them.

If you are starting to stall in only week 3 you clearly set your weight's too high and aren't going to get much out of the program. Mad cow stresses, drop the ego and be conservative with your starting 5 rep maxes, you clearly didn't listen to his avice and are paying for it now.

Yes you're right. I tried to do 110kgx5 today and only got 3 reps out. What should I do now?

A bit of background about my lifting first. I had been doing olympic lifting for the past 9 months or so, but I never put on much weight. I tested my 1RM squat during this period (got 120kg) and I just assumed that this would still be the same, but it hasn't...

I've been missing the last set for squats on heavy Mondays for the past 3 weeks. The only one that I got was week 2 @ 102.5kgx5. An attachment of my "progress" is down below (sorry about the small resolution but I can't upload excel files).

Monday
===========
Squats
Bench
Power Clean
Hypers (2x10 @ 15kg)
Hanging Leg Raise (4x10)

Wednesday
===========
Squats
Mil. Press
High Pulls
Chins (3x5 body weight only)
Abs

Friday
===========
Squats
Bench
Power Clean
Dips (3x5 + 5kg)
Glute/Ham Raise (3x5-8 @ body weight only)

I've also include an image of my weight below. As you can see I've put on about 0.5kg per week. I'm pretty sure there is some muscle there because my legs have grown SLIGHTLY but it's mostly my chest and arms that have grown.

I'm thinking that since the only weight I got was 102.5kgx5 on the squat, I should use that as the 5RM. What about the rest of the lifts though? If I need to restart the WHOLE program, then would it be best to just start all over again with lower weights for everything? (chances are I may have over guessed my 5RM for everything else if I did it with the squat although I haven't failed on anything else).

Thanks for your help.

PS: When is the program meant to get "hard". Shouldn't it start getting tough after week 4? Also, if you're reading the program picture, blue cells are those that have been completed, yellow cells are those that I've missed and green cells are weights that I used to check if I should reset or not. Also my starting 5RM were as follows:

Squats: 107.5kg
Bench: 75kg
Power Clean: 75kg
M. Press: 60kg (although I moved this down to 57.5kg as I did fail 57.5kgx5 in week 3)
High Pulls: 90kg

 

[4CRWZN]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Can anyone explain what the Core Exercise Tonnage and Relavant Tonnage stuff is all about at the bottom of the spread sheet. Also with the set interval its on 12.5 should i leave it at that??

 

[djeclipse]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Yes you're right. I tried to do 110kgx5 today and only got 3 reps out. What should I do now?

A bit of background about my lifting first. I had been doing olympic lifting for the past 9 months or so, but I never put on much weight. I tested my 1RM squat during this period (got 120kg) and I just assumed that this would still be the same, but it hasn't...

I've been missing the last set for squats on heavy Mondays for the past 3 weeks. The only one that I got was week 2 @ 102.5kgx5. An attachment of my "progress" is down below (sorry about the small resolution but I can't upload excel files).

Monday
===========
Squats
Bench
Power Clean
Hypers (2x10 @ 15kg)
Hanging Leg Raise (4x10)

Wednesday
===========
Squats
Mil. Press
High Pulls
Chins (3x5 body weight only)
Abs

Friday
===========
Squats
Bench
Power Clean
Dips (3x5 + 5kg)
Glute/Ham Raise (3x5-8 @ body weight only)

I've also include an image of my weight below. As you can see I've put on about 0.5kg per week. I'm pretty sure there is some muscle there because my legs have grown SLIGHTLY but it's mostly my chest and arms that have grown.

I'm thinking that since the only weight I got was 102.5kgx5 on the squat, I should use that as the 5RM. What about the rest of the lifts though? If I need to restart the WHOLE program, then would it be best to just start all over again with lower weights for everything? (chances are I may have over guessed my 5RM for everything else if I did it with the squat although I haven't failed on anything else).

Thanks for your help.

PS: When is the program meant to get "hard". Shouldn't it start getting tough after week 4? Also, if you're reading the program picture, blue cells are those that have been completed, yellow cells are those that I've missed and green cells are weights that I used to check if I should reset or not. Also my starting 5RM were as follows:

Squats: 107.5kg
Bench: 75kg
Power Clean: 75kg
M. Press: 60kg (although I moved this down to 57.5kg as I did fail 57.5kgx5 in week 3)
High Pulls: 90kg

Once again, I can't stress this enough, READ THE WEBSITE! And loose the ego.

Bill Starr 5x5 - Madcow Intermediate or Linear Version

Read everything from the introduction to the end. Read ti a few times until you understand what you are doing and why. If you had actually read the website instead of just downloading the spread sheet and punching in the numbers, you wouldn't have wasted a month doing it wrong. Instead of starting to make PR's for the next month or so you will have to restart the program and do it properly.

This is where the "loose the ego" part comes in. You are already failing on a lot of your lifts.
If you are going to actually run this program properly you will have to spend this week, take a few days and figure out your real 5 rep max on all your lifts. Find out your true 5 rep maxes, not what you think they should be, or what they were last year. You need to know your maxes as of this week.

You can use this week as a deload, don't do a full work out, just go in, warm up and figure out your 5 rep max. Give your body some rest this week and get ready for the work ahead.

Then next week you are going to start the program all over using the numbers you got form this week. For even better results I would take your current 5 rep maxes, subtract 5lbs and use them for the starting 5 rep max. Have your 5 rep max in week 5 instead of week 4. It is much better to start conservatively and work your way up to your current 5 rep maxes then to rush and fail.

If you do this it should be very easy up until week 5. Once you get to week 6 you'll be making Pr's, but it shouldn't be that hard as the previous weeks you were getting your body ready, building momentum to start making PR's. It should be easy at the start. After a few weeks of making PR's it will start to get hard.

That is all I am going to write as you need to spend time and actually read the program, get some answers for yourself.

Post a journal here, hopefully you'll do better then the last guy I tried to help that couldn't get it through his head not to fu *k with the program.

Good luck.

Spend time, read the program

Also, what is the Glute/Ham Raise? Why are you doing it?

 

[djeclipse]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Can anyone explain what the Core Exercise Tonnage and Relavant Tonnage stuff is all about at the bottom of the spread sheet. Also with the set interval its on 12.5 should i leave it at that??

Why are people so dense?

DON'T FU *K WITH THE PROGRAM!

 

[lolwut]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Also, what is the Glute/Ham Raise? Why are you doing it?

They're like a cross between hamstring curls and hyperextensions. I used to do them because I got told they'd help with my squat and I subbed them for the curls/tricep extensions

 

[djeclipse]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

They're like a cross between hamstring curls and hyperextensions. I used to do them because I got told they'd help with my squat and I subbed them for the curls/tricep extensions

Squatting 3x per week adding weight to the bar every week will help with your squat.

 

[lolwut]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Squatting 3x per week adding weight to the bar every week will help with your squat.

Well then what should I do with curls/triceps? Just take them out?

EDIT: I know its "Don't fuck with the program" but I don't know how to do tricep extensions/curls properly. Seriously.

 

[djeclipse]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

Well then what should I do with curls/triceps? Just take them out?

The most important thing is you add weight to the core lifts, the little stuff doesn't matter as much.

The curls and tries are in there on friday just to make the people that used to do 50 sets of curls happy. You can leave them in or don't do them, it's not a big deal. The only thing he says is if the isolation starts to get in the way of your core lifts stop doing them. For now if you want to do the curls and tries go ahead. Just 3 sets of each on friday though.

Try running the program EXACTLY as it is laid out for your first time around. After that you will get to know your body and what works and make small changes on your own. Keep a log, write everything down, so you can go back and figure out what worked for you and what didn't.

 

[lolwut]

Re: Bill Starr's 5 x 5 program... Variation per Madcow2 (thanx) So here it is! K up n

The most important thing is you add weight to the core lifts, the little stuff doesn't matter as much.

The curls and tries are in there on friday just to make the people that used to do 50 sets of curls happy. You can leave them in or don't do them, it's not a big deal. The only thing he says is if the isolation starts to get in the way of your core lifts stop doing them. For now if you want to do the curls and tries go ahead. Just 3 sets of each on friday though.

Try running the program EXACTLY as it is laid out for your first time around. After that you will get to know your body and what works and make small changes on your own. Keep a log, write everything down, so you can go back and figure out what worked for you and what didn't.

Will do.

Also, what happens if my squat's 5RM ends up being 107.5kg? Do I still restart the WHOLE program ?(im doing the intermediate version).

PS: When testing the 5RM what intensity should I be aiming for? Should it be comfortable, medium or really hard to get all the reps out?

Thanks