This is mesocycle 3, 6 weeks long (as opposed to 4 for the first, 5 for the second)
I made this one a little more “powerlifting” with my rep range test week and kept my bench to 225x10, safety bar squat to 335x8, and sumo deadlift to 365x8
I experience a pump in reps 8-12, up to 15 for triceps and lateral delts. 15 plus most other places is fatigue for fatigues sake for me, no pump or even lasting soreness.
I’m doing this Monday-Friday 5 days with no rest days in between, I’m also cycling 2-3 hours a week with a client of mine, and it doesn’t impede recovery or make my lifts worse. Do your cardio. You only have one life.
I’ve also added dips, both weighted and assisted, to this mesocycle, in order to push my bench to new heights. I’m chasing a 4 plate bench still.
Ask me anything about the app! I’m still liking it, and I’m liking that I can make it more enjoyable by making it what I want to do, which is heavy lifting AND hypertrophy, without feeling like I’m losing out on hypertrophy gains.
@cattat I’ve been using the app and this is week 5 of 6 week mesocycle. I have improved on every lift so far and have gained noticeable size.
Dips: 25lbs x 5 reps week 1 to 55lbs x 9 week 5
Incline Bench: 145x5 week 1 to 165 x 5 week
Weighted pull-ups: 7.5lbs x 8 week 1 to 27.5lbs x 8 week 5
Etc.
Definitely found my sweet spot. I train MWF and do undulating periodization throughout the week. Mainly focusing on upper body hypertrophy and doing maintenance volume on my lower body.
@gnosisofthomas I designed my own custom routine although they do have preset routines for just upper body. My goals were more oriented towards building chest, arms, and shoulders in that order.
@cattat Can the app be adjusted to progress instead of by sets, weight and RIR to something like DDP (dynamic double progression)? I follow and apply some of the RP philosophy to my own training except progressing in sets since I don’t want my workouts to end up 2+hrs in the last week of a meso. Maybe I’m missing something.
@dawn16 The app doesn’t keep endlessly adding sets each week. It finds the sweet spot on a per muscle group and exercise basis. Ideally it has you do just enough sets that you’re sore in the target muscle right up until the next time you train it.
Also, slowing down the concentric and pausing in the stretched position generally creates way more disruption and DOMS. It’s helped cut volume in half on some exercises - if training time is something you’re worried about.
@dawn16 I don’t think so. It programs according to their methodology. For perspective, each session take between 35-45 minutes to complete on a 5 day per week program.
@dawn16 I don't like adding too many sets either due to time limitations. Check out Renaissance Periodization's video on myo rep match sets, that's what I've been doing. I'm doing full body 3x a week and if it's time to add a 4th set on an exercise I instead turn the 3rd set into a myo rep match set. In rare cases near the end of the mesocycle I turn the 2nd set into a myorep match set as well.
@cattat I’m considering adding dips to my routine too (for my bench to improve) How did you incorporate them?
I currently do
Cgbp and flys on Monday
Bench press and machine press Thursday
