October 13, 2025
Pepitas Edition
On Starting Strength
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Healthcare: A View from the Inside –
Internist Dr. John Ford sits down with Rip to share his experiences and discuss the medical services industry and the quality, cost, and delivery of healthcare. -
Training for Life – Yours and Your Baby’s by Victoria Diaz –
Training isn’t just for sport or aesthetics. It’s for life. I began barbell training in the summer of 2016, around my 22nd birthday. I weighed 149 pounds, and my starting numbers were… -
Conditioning with the Prowler –
Rip discusses using the prowler, a loadable tool that can be pushed for different distances to efficiently apply stress. -
Hook grip vs. Straps by stef bradford –
All sorts of things show cycles of popularity and trends, from hairstyles, slang, avocado toast, and even Pantone’s color of the year (it is 13-1023 aka “peach fuzz” for 2024, if you care to know… -
Strength Training Culture by Jim Steel –
The strength training culture is an interesting one. There is a general feeling among older, experienced lifters that they should give back to the activity that has given them so much…. - Weekend Archives:
An Initial Visit to the York Barbell Club by Dr Ken Leistner –
Though plagued with Alzheimer’s Disease, my ninety-three year old mother had enough awareness to ask, “How can you continue to write so much about the same bullshit?” - Weekend Archives:
The Power Clean by Mark Rippetoe –
When I first started lifting seriously, I had the good fortune to meet Bill Starr in the weight room at what was then Midwestern University in Wichita Falls, Texas…
In the Trenches
Get Involved
Best of the Week
Late stage novice regressing on squat – what to do next
5pointer
I am nearing the end of my novice stage, I have been doing a HLM type set up for the squat for about 2 months now, making steady progress of 5 lb /week. However the past 2 weeks I have started to regress. 2 weeks ago on the medium day I squatted 270x5x3, then I had to miss a training day that week, so last week did 270 again and only got 5,4,4 (I thought perhaps this was due to missing a day) and then yesterday attempted 270 again and only got 4 reps then backed off to 250 for the last 2 sets.
So now I am wondering if I am starting to get overtrained on the squat… and what to tweak next? Looking at the gray book at the end of the novice chapter, should I just back off the squat 20 lbs and then keep going? Switch training to every 3 days? or do 3×3? I am already doing top set and 2 back off sets on Friday, light day 2×5 on Wednesday and then normal 3×5 monday.
My presses are still moving forward normally with 1-2 lb jumps and sets of 3
Age 33 male, 6ft, BW low 170s
Squat 270x5x3
Bench 202x3x5
Press 135x3x5
Deadlift 320×5
PS I know I still need to gain weight, trying my best but it is slow
Mark Rippetoe
Your bodyweight is the obvious problem.
5pointer
What bodyweight should I be at before I can expect to put any more weight on the bar?
Mark Rippetoe
268.5 pounds.
Alexander Dargatz
You didn’t overtrain, you failed to recover.
Gaining bodyweight is not only part of the program because heavier = stronger, but also because it is an indicator whether you’ve eaten enough to recover from the strength training. If you didn’t gain weight, you didn’t eat enough, simple as that.
5pointer
That is a fair point, let me then ask a different question than before: how much weight do I need to be gaining per week in order to continue making progress? No one has asked yet how much I am gaining, I have only said my current weight. Granted you are probably right and I am probably not gaining enough, at only about 1lb per week currently.
I will probably lower the 3×5 squat day by about 20 lbs and march on with the same programming. I have taken everyone’s feedback to eat more food in order to make sure I recover properly.
Best of the Forum
Best NLP lifts
keiithg8
Hey Rip, it has probably been answered before, but what are the best sets of 5 you have seen from someone on the NLP?
Mark Rippetoe
Squats in the 500s, presses in the 200s, benches in the high 300s, deadlifts in the high 500s.
JFord
Some egos just got deflated. Some of us mortals however will be inspired by what a few rare humans are capable accomplishing.
Credit : Source Post
