Pushing through holds with diminished ROM

Hey guys, just wanted to ask your opinion on this. I'm currently reaching the last microcycle on various excercises, and I find myself not being able to meet the times in the template as much as I would like to. I'm particularly having trouble with the Bent Hollow Body Hold and the Arch Body Hold.

 

In the case of the Bent Hollow Body Hold, after a certain time holding a position like the one from the videos, my back would fall a little closer towards the floor, and I'm powerless to correct it. However, my scapulae will still not hit the floor, and my lower back will still not lift from the floor (albeit it being not so strongly pressed against it, there's no air between the back and the floor). I have been pushing through this, and only considering it a failed set and stopping when my scapulae finally hits the floor and my lower back finally lifts from it.

 

Same happens with the ABH, after a certain time, my torso and legs will fall a little, powerless to stop it or correct it. However, I still am in an ABH, only not so pretty. After a time, again, I can't even hold this position and stop.

 

TL;DR: should I push through this diminished ROM if I still manage to achieve the basic "bulletpoints" of the excercise? or should I cut it as if it were complete failure? (and before anyone says anything, I have read the "How to know when to stop a set" topic and hold it very close to heart  ).

Ask yourself this:  would Coach say that you have achieved mastery in a movement if you had decreased ROM and were not strong throughout the entire set?

 

I would say no, based on you sounding less than confident in the movement.  If you want to move on I think you could, but if Coach was in the room with you he'd tell you to keep working at it until you can hold full ROM through a full mastery set.  If in doubt, put up a form check of your last set when checking for mastery.  Keep at it and you'll get it.

There's a point of diminishing returns, where more effort may cause injury.

 

So there's this threshold, particular to each one and only discoverable by experience, where you SHOULD push, but not beyond it. I squeeze 4-5 secs of lower ROM on ABH and just colapse after it. This helped me break through the 24s plateau and I'm on 4x48 now.

 

So yes, it MAY help. You just have to try and see. Even if you happen to overdo it somewhat, you'll have learned the sensation of the threshold and will know when to stop and when to push through. Probably will end microcicle, earlier, but it's possibly Worth if you don't know your actual limits yet.

A general way of looking at this is that many of the elements can be simplified with form changes.

 

As long as you are aware of the fact that you are making a form change, then what you describe is basically a drop set. You could even program the drop set, e.g 40s full ABH 20s partial ABH.

 

As long as you are making progress and know that the you are heading to the full ABH, do what you feel works best. Don't however make the mistake of accepting your partial ABH as good enough and move on.

 

I also wouldn't implement this technique until you've gone through a micro cycle enough (twice at minimum) to be sure you've hit a plateau and are looking for ways to break it.

 

As a general aside, there are two type of form breaks, changing shape to improve leverage, but otherwise pose no risk of injury. The OP's example being a perfect example of this.

 

The second class of form break must be avoided at all times, which is when the essential alignment of a position breaks under load.

 

Eg. doing push-ups with a sagging back or shoulders shrugged up by the ears. These kinds of errors can potentially lead to injury and the only way through them is to totally scale back to something that can be done with proper form.

Since the PE2's for both these exercises are "rocks," they force you to have correct form.  If you advance prematurely from PE1, PE2 will quickly tell you so.  You can get by with a flat (but not rounded) lower back on FL/PE1, but you can't rock with a flat back FL/PE2.  If your arch is insufficient in SL/PE1, it won't be pretty, but you'll still be in an ABH.  But try rocking on a flat torso.

 

That was my experience with SL/PE1.  I went through a full cycle and thought I had mastery.  But I wasn't able to complete a single set of 6 rocks of PE2.  Lesson learned.  I went back to week 1 of SL/PE1 and focused on not just having some arch but having full ROM with feet together.

 

Post a video and/or try a few reps of FL/PE2 and SL/PE2 to check your form.

Thxs a lot for the replies guys! I should have mentioned that in no way would I consider the diminished rom performance acceptable for mastery, and therefore would not advance to the next progression in said case. The question was merely to address if I would gain better results by pushing through diminished rom or just cutting it short when I can't hold the perfect rom anymore.

 

So, speaking in Cole's terms, should I push through holds with a dropset or will it have diminished results? I think you guys have answered this for me.

 

I will however post a couple of videos for form checking, both because I was going to do it anyway and to show you guys the differences I meant.