Having a hard time keeping strength levels up

[Nate Dawg]

I have noticed looking back over the past year I have a hard time keeping my strength levels up over time, I know you cant be at your peak all the time, but it seems like I have a hard time where I will peak out, start to drop strength and overtrain my CNS so I take a week off and then when I come back, I feel better and am stronger than the large drop in strength I had the previous week, but my strength just doesnt seem to recover very fast and takes forever to get back, I still havent got my strength back from about 7 weeks ago. While training natural I know gains will be much slower, but this is all while being on cycle.

I always like to go as heavy as possible on my compound lifts and have a hard time backing off a bit when I know I should be, and I think this is part of what is hurting me. I cant lift for more than 5 weeks without having to take a week off due to strength levels dropping rapidly, usually I peak around the 4th week, the 5th week is about the same or a little lower and I just feel sorta out of the groove and not right while lifting, then the 6th week is just like BAM Im down 20lbs or more on lifts and everything feels like a ton of weight.

I will post the training routine that I am doing now to give a better idea of what I am doing:

Monday: Chest
Flat bench: 1 balls to the wall set of 4-6 reps, pretty much to failure
Incline dumbell bench: 2x10-12 to failure
Flyes: 3x12
Side raises: 3x15

Tuesday: Legs
Squats: 2x4-6 to failure, wait several minutes and hit a 20 rep set(puke)
SLDL 3x6-8 heavy as possible
calves

Thursday: Bis/Tris
close grip bench: 2x3-6 heavy as possible
Skull crushers: 2x6-8 to failure
Barbell curls: 4x6
preacher curls: 3x10

Saturday: Back/Traps
Hang cleans: 3x3
Bentover rows: 3x5-8, 1 set is all out to failure
Pullups: 4 sets to failure
Shrugs: 4x10
Behind back shrugs: 4x15

I really dont know exactly what I am looking for, just someone with some experience on this and why it seems I cant train more than 5 weeks straight, thats ridiculous, my immune system breaks down and just crazy tired all the time at the end of that period. I took this week off, and for about the past 10 days I had been sick.

I think part of the problem may be training to failure alot and just frying myself, I just get so fired up and want to blow all the weights up lol and have a hard time stopping before that. I will give an example of my bench workout:

Week 1: (back from week off) 335x7/345x4
Week 2: 345x6
Week 3: 355x5
Week 4: 365x1 prolly could have got 2 but was pissed and racked it, felt like 405. One other thing to note is that sunday night, benched on monday, didnt get to sleep till 5am and got up at noon, so I got enough sleep, just didnt get to sleep early enough, also ate shitty on sunday as in not enough food.

So thats one example, guess I only made it 4 weeks lol, I think the sleep was a big factor, but still shouldnt have been that bad I wouldnt think. About 8 weeks ago I hit 385 for a triple and then hit 400 for a single on bench, so I dont know whats going on. As I said earlier, I am on cycle, when I hit the 400 bench I was running test/tren/anadrol (pretty good stack lol) and the last 4 week period above I was running test/deca/dbol. Thought I should mention that, the tren does help with strength immensely though.

I have been thinking of going to DC training and giving that a shot. Strength is my main priority, and size second, but lately even though I am on cycle and I know for a fact my diet is on spot, Im not gaining any weight, been plateaued for the last ~6 weeks. Any opinions on the strength gains from DC, I was going to alter it a bit to be more powerlifting oriented, no smith machine crap in there.

This is a pretty long post, but if anyone could help me out and give me some good advice, I will appreciate it more than you know!!! Thanks guys!

Nate

 

[Anthrax Invasion]

Stop training to failure. It's that simple. That shit will burn your CNS and run you into the ground pretty damn quick. Make sure you sleep enough, eat enough, and drink plenty of water. On top of that, drop your volume. There's no need for flyes and side raises. Drop the isolation bullshit and train like a man. Or a woman with testes.

 

[blut wump]

I used to work out pretty much the same way. I'd have 4-6 week spurts and then have to take a week out. Occasionally, I'd mess that up and find my weights plummetting or injuries popping in and have to take a longer break. It sucks and it sounds like you took the step I was near to taking of going on aas.

What you need is a good progressive overload routine. Take a look at the 5x5 which has become very popular on here. It's changed the way a lot of us work out and, in methodology, it's the way the real athletes rather than most gymrats work out. I started the routine last January and ran it for the basic 9 weeks. It's changed the way I work out almost entirely and I now think nothing of going three months without a break. Even my breaks are now just a drop in workload rather than taking a week out. I've also been getting very steadily stronger month to month too.

Here's the link to the main page which has some good links on training theory:
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showthread.php?t=375215

The single-factor program is here which might be the best way to start this type of training although many dive straight into a dual factor method:
http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showpost.php?p=4497774&postcount=15

 

[King Cobra]

Are you eating enoug green leafy vegetables and fruit? Consuming nothing but fish and protein shakes will line your intestines with sediment over time, reducing the amount of nutrients you absorb into your blood stream.

 

[Anthrax Invasion]

Are you eating enoug green leafy vegetables and fruit? Consuming nothing but fish and protein shakes will line your intestines with sediment over time, reducing the amount of nutrients you absorb into your blood stream.

Okay buddy. Where do people come up with this garbage?

 

[Guinness5.0]

As far as diet, you aren't eating enough if you're trying to gain weight. It's physics - if you eat more than you burn some of it's gonna stick around. Whether it's fat or muscle is determined by the level of stimulus you apply.

Have you considered WSB (westside barbell) training? It's tough to do better than that for strength gains. Also, I'd def. ditch the once a week/bodypart split and get two sessions per muscle in there. Like the others said, drop the fluff, quit hittin failure EVERY time, eat more, and you'll blow the fuck up!

And I love tren too

 

[Madcow2]

I always like to go as heavy as possible on my compound lifts and have a hard time backing off a bit when I know I should be, and I think this is part of what is hurting me.

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I really dont know exactly what I am looking for, just someone with some experience on this and why it seems I cant train more than 5 weeks straight, thats ridiculous, my immune system breaks down and just crazy tired all the time at the end of that period. I took this week off, and for about the past 10 days I had been sick.
----
I think part of the problem may be training to failure alot and just frying myself, I just get so fired up and want to blow all the weights up lol and have a hard time stopping before that. I will give an example of my bench workout:

Picking out these from the above and looking at your program it's safe to say you have progressed to the point where going in, getting under the bar, and working hard isn't enough anymore and can't be tolerated for long.

Most people here plan out their programing to make systematic progression over time in the big lifts. They tailor workload to not overly fatigue themselves and allow for the fastest progression possible. Generally those who blow up and screw it up, start too high and can't get a good progression going (which is in essence what you are doing by always training to failure and pushing yourself with the heaviest possible weight). The progression is the key, not just getting under a heavy weight 1x and working hard. This is the essence of progressive overload - and outside of BBing (which has relied largely on drugs to compensate for poor training knowledge over 30 years), this is basically the way the world trains.

The first thing you should do is better understand fitness/fatigue (dual factor) theory. It is accumulated fatique that is overtraining and that is frying you out. This is a really good clear article (don't worry about the programs at the bottom, I have a better explanation of the first one here anyway and the guy that is largely responsible for it posts here, Glenn Pendlay, and is one of the best S&C and OL coaches on the planet) http://www.higher-faster-sports.com/PlannedOvertraining.html

This is an example of a program organized like this. Think of the stimulus as a block of training, rather than a single workout, and recovery not between workouts but between stimulative (loading) blocks. Recovery does not have to be linear workout to workout, delayed adaptation is very real and consistently reproducable. Here is a pretty solid program and it works very well for strength as well as hypertrophy if you eat (which is really the key as people mentioned above as no weight gain = no caloric excess. If caloric excess was there you'd at least have gotten fatter).: http://www.elitefitness.com/forum/showpost.php?p=4764723&postcount=381

 

[Nate Dawg]

Alright thanks for the help guys, I appreciate it!! I know I just need to try and not make such big jumps so fast, the body just cant handle it. As far as diet goes, this is what I have been doing for the past 12 weeks or so, havent figured the totals or breakdown, its pretty similar to the diet I was doing previously but this one has more carbs since I was trying to gain weight, I would think it would be plenty of food. I am a college student, so my daily calorie expenditure is relatively low, I walk around 2 miles a day going to class and such, and then weightlifting, thats about it as far as physical activity goes. I have a super fast metabolism and gaining weight has always been a huge struggle for me, right now I am weighing 209 in the mornings, not sure of bf, but have veins in abs and quads, pretty much everywhere, so its fairly low. Heres the diet:

Meal 1:
10 scrambled eggs (5 whole/5 whites)
1/2 cup cheese
3 oz ham
1.5 cups granola cereal
1.5 cups fat free milk
16 oz orange juice

Meal 2:
10 oz hamburger
1.5 cups brown rice

Meal 3:
8 oz chicken breast
1 can of yams ~90g carbs

Meal 4:
8oz chicken breast
1 cup brown rice

Meal 5: Pre workout
50g whey protein
1 cup oats

Meal 6: Post workout
50g whey protein
1 cup oats

Meal 7:
12oz tuna
1 can yams

Meal 8:
16 oz milk
12 egg whites

I am going to go to a 3 day a week program and look over the links and see what I find. Thanks again.

 

[Nate Dawg]

Thanks for the links blut wump and madcow, tons of good info there!