High volume to overcome plateau

There is also the risk of causing a connective tissue injury. 5 minutes of accumulated Planche leans could destroy the elbows in a day. As always gradually build up to allow the body to adapt.

Jasper said:

This sounds very interesting. I've been plateauted on FL/PE2 for ages now so will give this a try.

 

I just can't get 4 x 48 so do you think I should try to do 384 reps ((4 x 48) x 2) or just go straight for the mastery reps of 600 ((5x60)x2)

 

Also, do you make each set a manageable amount like the deload amount or try to do as many as you can per set to minimise the amount of sets?

That's a bit early to stagnate in FL. Are you sure you're pushing hard enough? The first six FL PE's are notoriously uncomfortable to train, but you just need to ignore your burning abs.

Jon Douglas said:

Quite a few people seem to be jumping on this approach, which is fine, but please don't fall into the trap of running completely different programming to reach a secondary goal that you think will enable you to hit your original target plateau breaking strategies are occasionally a godsend, but don't let yourself get sidetracked or use it as an excuse to drop your reps unless and until you actually need to change something, as pointed out in the first post

Totally agree! Very well said.

 

Jasper, on 30 Jun 2014 - 09:09 AM, said:

 

 

As Ravn said FL2 is a bit to too early to plateau. I personally would not modify F1 program in any way unless I am really sure that adaptation is not happening after months of trying and giving it 100% effort. It might happen to very few exercises.

Having said that personally I think 450 is enough volume for exercises requiring mastery of 600. So for FL2 I would do 450 total reps keeping number of reps in each set to a number you know you can do until you reach 450. Even if it feels easy you need some margin when you first start this approach. Intensity will increase once you start increasing number of reps per set. 

 

Hopefully that helps!

I also agree that FL2 is early to plateau. And I really wish that I hadn't plateaued so early. But maybe I was bad in a former life and am being punished now.

 

Ravn. I certainly think that I'm giving 100% but on this exercise my abs don't burn as such but my form breaks down too much to continue safely. I think I've been at this same point for many months now so I fancy giving this method a try for a while to see if it'll allow me to break through. Perhaps if I continue to be challenged by this one I'll open a new topic about it specifically rather than hijacking this one.

 

RF_Guy. Thanks for the suggestion. I'll give 450 reps a try for now. That'll keep the time down too hopefully.

For anyone interested I have spent last couple of months trying to push through permanent plateau ABH. I think it barely improved since day one of F1. Form definitely improved but time held not much at all. I have been doing 450 total sec. for last couple of months and progressed to 15x30 on the minute. It was pretty terrible experience but there was constant improvement. Then since 15x30sec felt so aweful I started dropping total time while still increasing time per minute. Currently I have almost finished 12x36, failed just last 2 sets. For the first time I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. Once I can hold 10x40sec with 20 sec rest I will try Mastery.

RF_Guy said:

I Once for week is generally is enough for me, but if you have fast recovery you can do it x2 per week, x3 is probably not a good idea but you are welcome to try.

Basically the idea is to take the number of reps you need to execute (50 total, 5x10 for RC PE4) multiply by 2. That would be the number of total reps you have to perform. Then do it every minute set number of reps until you get your total (100), 25x4, or 20x5. Something you know you can do without failure. If you did 25x4 and did not fail even once then next time you are trying to do 20x5. If at some point you fail to do 5 reps then you continue working lower number per set until you do your 100 total. And so on.

I think I imght give this a try with HBP/PE2. Currently the last micro-cycle, 5 x 15, is a major challenge for me. I plan to use this once a week. My question relates to the "A" weeks of the Foundation Program, in that you do the PE's twice. Do I just stick with the "Normal template" on the second day or some other variation to allow for adequate recovery from the high volume day?

I wonder how many of us at the level most people working the early stages of Foundation are actually need very much in the way of elaborate plateau breaking strategies. If it were nearly as common a need as the discussion volume would suggest, I suspect that Coach Sommer would have addressed it.

Personally, I know my own mind is quick to think up some pretty elaborate strategies in order to avoid the obvious panacea of working harder more consistently.

Rather than performing super volume, how about cramming the effort into a set/rep scheme that at least somewhat resembles the template presented in Foundation?

I gave it my all every time but on some exercises (hbp pe2 and rc pe6) it took 9+months to get into the last mini cycle and complete it. I tried a lot of different strategies because honestly repeating the last micro cycle as is the standard recommendation did absolutely nothing for me. It was neve an issue of working harder in those cases for me although I know sometimes it is for some people. I would hold pe6 until I felt like my arms would fall off and refused to come down despite what my mind was telling me. Still couldn't get do week 9!for about 7 months... I noticed after every Deload week I would come back weaker. So I took the Deload week out eventually and it worked well. Ended up just going for max hold x 5 sets every week until I got 48 seconds.

I guess it is a personal call to decide if he wants to deviate from common template. I can only comment on my personal experience and what worked for me. I know how tp work hard and what max effort means. It was not enough. 90% of all exercises were progressing just fine on standard template, but 10% did not.

Fazool. I used Density training INSTEAD of GB schedule. How many times per week you do it should be only determined by your recovery. So if I wanted to use it for RC PE6 for example Density RC PE6 would all I am doing for that exercise, no other sessions of RC PE6 but density.

I'm having slow progress and even regressed in a couple elements so after my deload last week I started something new today. For example HBP PE2 is 75 total reps, I do 75 reps as fast as I can. I did it in ~4 minutes today. Once I can get it to the 2 minutes zone I will attempt for mastery. I figure each set of 15 plus mobility takes maybe 30 seconds or less. I did 4x15 2 weeks ago so I assume if I can cut my time from 4 minutes to ~2 I should be able to do 5x15.

 

My RCPE4 has for some reason regressed. Maybe due to weight gain, idk. I am also doing the same and wow was my time ever terrible for 50 total reps. When I can cut it down to 4:00 I will attempt mastery. 

Although I attempted high volume reps to go through a plateau, I now think that it might not be necessary.

 

Listening to Coach's podcasts (don't recall which one) I now believe that weak connective tissue could be the reason why many of us plateau in certain exercises.

 

Early this year, I hit a plateau in the following exercises: FL/PE2, HBP/PE2, MN/PE2, RC/PE1, SL/PE1.  I attempted to get out of the plateau using high volume reps.

 

The high volume worked only for FL/PE2, and in my mastery set I went on and did 100 bent hollow body rocks. (Note: I'm currently on mastery level for FL/PE3, but decided to slog it out and not do the high volume.)

 

The other exercises, high volume simply made my workouts last very long, and over time that became an issue.  My work outs were approaching 1.5 hours on average, because I was doing a lot of high volume.

 

At this writing, I can confidently say that I'm going to have mastered RC/PE1, HBP/PE2, MN/PE2 by the end of January 2015. ** All of these would have taken me between 13-15 months to master.  

 

As for SL/PE1, it's probably going to be end of February/early March (approximately 17 months).

I decided to just slog it out and do it the hard way but I now believe that it was a connective tissue issue that needed patience to develop.

 

** Also note that the length of time it has taken me to master some of these exercises does not accurately reflect my abilities.

 

To be sure, I could have mastered most of these exercises in a much shorter time frame (perhaps 6-8 months), but succumbed to the temptation of lethargy and poor training habits initially, lack of enthusiasm sometimes, stubbornness and not doing things the right way sometimes, using poor form sometimes, etc....

 

Had I been focused and disciplined then, as I am today, I have no doubt that things would have been accomplished a lot sooner.  So I guess part of this has to do with learning how to train GST effectively, diligently, and with a keen attention to detail, and I have now attained these habits with experience.