Bench dips are too easy...can I skip to next exercise?

I completed the pseudo planche pushups, so I'm now onto bench dips. The pseudo planche pushups were very challenging, but I find the bench dips to be trivially easy. As a long-time weight trainer, I guess I'm pretty strong in pushing exercises. Should I go through the entire progression of bench dips, or can I skip to the next exercise?

As long as you can demonstrate mastery of both the exercise and the paired mobility, you can and should move forward to the next exercise.

Zach Armijo said:

+1 to what Josh said.

 

Not all the exercises are meant for strength gains. You would be better off if you spent some time on Bench Dips and hit the deepest ROM you can on these, easy or not. You will see the problem arise in later exercises.

OK, thanks. I will just follow the program and focus on range of motion. I've avoided heavy dips in the past due to the inevitable shoulder pain that arises. Maybe, I can avoid the same fate by easing into it via the bench dips.

OK, I've progressed to full dips, and...pain in my left shoulder. I've always had this issue. It doesn't happen immediately, but after 2-3 weeks of dips, the posterior part of my shoulder starts to click and hurt. What are some alternatives? Whenever I see hollow back press being done, the elbows never go beyond the torso. Perhaps I can do something like elevated pseudo planche pushups? OK, I made up that exercise in my head...

Sounds to me like you didn't take Zach's advice about really maxing out the ROM benefits of bench dips and have exceeded your shoulder's stress tolerance. Also, last I checked Negative full ROM parallel bar dips come before full dips. Did you perform mastery of those and the paired mobility?

Keegan said:

Sounds to me like you didn't take Zach's advice about really maxing out the ROM benefits of bench dips and have exceeded your shoulder's stress tolerance. Also, last I checked Negative full ROM parallel bar dips come before full dips. Did you perform mastery of those and the paired mobility?

I went though the negative dips and paired mobility just fine. Problem started in the second week of full dips. I also did add a third HBP workout for the week, so the increase volume might have something to do with it. It's frustrating, because the muscles feel so underworked. I'll cut back on volume and focus more on mobility and see how it goes.

It may be helpful to understand that there is more going on here than just working the muscles.

Connective tissue is being strengthened, which takes time and careful effort.

You are developing strength out of a deep ROM which you may have never done before, at least not in a organised manner.

This process will continue over the next elements so taking your time here is essential, and it's not a race.

Also keep in mind, if you don't feel you've done enough volume than you can also do a few sets of push up variations etc to get more volume in.

Well said Cole.

A cautionary tale for you Hyok Lee - I raced through HBP to PE11. Whilst I could do the previous progressions I neglected to spend time on them to lay the foundations as it were.       I ended up aggravating an old shoulder injury and have had to back off then restart at PE1. Eight months later, I am just about able to to PE3. 

Thanks for the replies. It's hard to be objective with your own workout. It's good to get outside opinions.

So is the ultimate lesson here transferable to all progressions?

ie
- Don't skip that which you may find easy because there are secondary/tertiary benefits to each exercise that are essential to developing ultimate strength/mobility.

And, if so, if one does find the dips very very easy can we at least start on week 9 or will we still be missing out on essential condition that occurs from the lower rep sets in the early weeks?

And if you can't complete any reps of the next progression, that is when you'll need to go back and look for where that gap in your game came from

Personally I'll always do atleast one month cycle of each exercise even in the case were theoretically I could do the mastery reps. I'm not in a hurry and sometimes some exercises have some important details that are only revealed with practice of that exercise. I'd be different perhaps if I was really experienced at GST and could evaluate such things, so I'll take the more conservative approach.

Worse case scenario is "I could have finished Foundation a couple months earlier", which in the grand scheme of things doesn't bother me that much .

I am new to this program and has chosen a little conservative strategy. I am thinking that even if one could perform the mobilty excersice to mastery level, there are still great benefits coming from doing the reps over some time. A person who has never done Jefferson curls or Xiaopeng before, but immediately could rep off some in mastery style, would still benefit from doing them, maybe with increased weight. 

dritar said:

Personally I'll always do atleast one month cycle of each exercise even in the case were theoretically I could do the mastery reps.

This is the way I do it as well.  Elements I know I can achieve mastery on, I just do the week 9-12 cycle.  Just to work through it.  If it's really easy (bench dips, all of SLS except SE2) I do a micro-cycle of week 11.