How to manipulate increased volume and promote better recovery

Hi,

 

I am now on 3rd week of the micro-cycle and noticed how harder it is for the body. It is the last - 11th week for some of the elements before deload week so I did 5x10 and 5x15 sets for a total of 4 elements (sPL, SL, HBP and RC).
It is the second day after training session and I am sooo sore. My usual training schedule looks like this:

Mon, Thu - F7 (Front Split and Middle Split routines respectively)

Tue, Fri - HS

I am now thinking to take an extra off day so Wed and Thu would be rest days and Fri, Sat would be training days but then there's deload week and I don't know if I should start it on Monday or Tuesday because of the extra off day this week. Would this change do any harm to deload week if starting on Monday?

 

I assume this is not a single time accident that I have 4 elements at the last week (mastery week) and will occur later in the future. If this has happened to you, how did you promote your body's increased demand (if there was one like that) for recovery? I added more vegetables to my meals, drink more water and sleep at least one hour more. I also take magnesium, calcium, vitamin d, fish oil and multivitamins but nothing like protein, creatine, BCAA and other supplements of that nature (actually never did, so wonder if that could promote a better recovery).

 

Any feedback would be very appreciated,

 

Thank you for you time

 

 

If you're not recovering then it means it's maybe too much for your body, so perhaps try switching to a split routine of 3-day foundation or 4-day foundation? I know that they say 'you have to do F7' as a single warm-up in order to be ready for the rings series. But I for one would be pleased enough to simply complete Foundation 4, let alone anything beyond that. 

Yes, it's tough when a lot of your elements are in week 11 at the same time.  It gets to be a lot of volume, and you're body needs a lot of fuel to recover.  It doesn't sound like you've increased your fuel accordingly.  Make sure you're getting enough carbs, fats, and protein.  Carbs and fats replenish the energy you burned.  Protein repairs and builds new tissue.  (Non-starch) Vegetables, vitamins, fish oil, etc. are important, but they're not the fundamental ingredients to recovery.

Hey guys, thanks for your time and feedback

 

Today I feel much better than yesterday, I did a lot of movement (tree climbing is my favourite) throughout the day and it feels very much refreshing.
My daily meals (usually 4 main meals with multiple snacks in between, rarely 5 or 6 main meals) consist of those foods:
Different kinds of poultry, beef, buckwheat, various vegetable salads, plain vegetables, brown with white rice (usually together), a great variety of fruits, eggs, pastry (limiting this one), fish (usually salmon), plenty of milk, buttermilk, cottage cheese, various nuts, cocoa, seeds, increasing water intake (now around 2 l per day).
I consider my diet to be a decent one, rarely do I eat anything apart from those natural foods and I usually get from 3000 to 3500 calories from carbs, protein and fats a day.   That is why I started to think about additional supplementation to aid recovery especially on those hard weeks like this one, but I don't know if this is the way to do it (again, I don't have any experience with extra supplementation).
I decided to go according to the plan and will post an update later this week here.

How do you eat specifically around your workout?

Well, about 50-80 minutes before workout I have a meal, high in carbs and moderate protein. Drink about 0,5 liter of water, have a fruit. Then, when I begin a warm up, I start drinking cocoa which lasts until about a middle of a workout. Sometimes I take a couple of grapes every 10 minutes or so. Usually I also have a banana before the last 3 elements. After I finish a workout, I get a blend of milk (or buttermilk), yogurt, peanut (or other nuts) butter, cottage cheese, banana or kiwi and stevia or sometimes honey/agave nectar. Shortly after that (30 - 45 min) I have a meal high in protein like salmon/turkey and brown rice with veggies. Rarely I have a cup of strong black coffee.

Over time, your exercises will spread out. probably fairly quickly.  Of course deload weeks will stay synced, but once you get to more difficult exercises and have to repeat microcycles, this will no longer be an issue.  Or maybe your work capacity will increase to adapt to the schedule

So the next workout was quite hard like expected. I did HBP PE1 first and still, the last set was bloody hard. Broke tempo at rep 8 and the last two were pushing through limits (mental perhaps). But deload week made me realize that the 3rd week of a micro-cycle maybe should be slightly harder that the others because the first workout of a deload week and I felt all elements were easy to do except HBP so I might have been pushing too hard on this one and need to repeat this from 4x12 week.
Really, it was so satisfying and mind refreshing to be able to effortlessly complete deload week sets and reps (except that HBP 5x8) so that I made a conclusion that even though 3rd week sets and reps/time are quite a challenge, deload week gives you this sensation that you did everything right if you don't feel like working as hard as on a regular week.

My guess is that this is where a better recovery is promoted at its best.