Strong Lifts 5x5s Not Working Me Enough

S

santigarcia

0
Hello everyone, my name is Santiago, I'm new here, I'm 6'2", 171 pounds.

I have a some experience of lifting weights from the tail end of when I was in the army 7 years ago. I have recently started doing Strong Lifts 5x5s (5 sets of compound exercises, 5 reps) after being pretty inactive (weights-wise, I've done cardio) since then, finished my 3rd set last night with a starting out weight of 20kgs on the barbell. I work out at home.

My problem is I don't feel like the exercise is taking enough out of me, I understand it's not a total failure routine but I feel fine throughout and after the whole routine. I don't feel any aches or anything the next day either.

I'd like a bit of advice if possible please, should I put more weight on the barbell, do isolation exercises after the 5x5s to tire me out more or just stick with what I'm doing and concentrate on my technique for when I'm lifting heavier weights?

Thanks in advance,

Santi.
 
If your technique is perfect and you feel the routine is not taxing enough, you need to increase the weights. How much rest are you taking between sets?
 
SXIPro said:
If your technique is perfect and you feel the routine is not taxing enough, you need to increase the weights. How much rest are you taking between sets?
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply, SXIPro.

I feel my technique is good, I've used youtube videos to compare and I have my wife spotting for me and telling me if I'm doing anything wrong.

I leave it 2 minutes - 3 minutes between sets.
 
If all else fails, try 60 seconds between sets. Use a stopwatch, don't just guess "well, that was about a minute". But I'd go heavier eeights first for sure.
 
Stronglifts is supposed to be piss easy when you start out (at least, as far as I'm aware it is - it's more or less a bastardisation of Starting Strength which I know for certain is suppoesed to be piss easy starting out). You start out with very light weights, do 5x5 with perfect form, and then next time you train, you increase the weights a tiny bit; rinse and repeat. It seems like a joke in the first week, but let's take squats as an example, since you'll be doing them more than anything else.

Let's say you start every exercise at 20kg - the empty barbell - on the first session, and you add 2.5kg every session (the least you can add without micro-loading. For squats, you'll be doing this 3x/week, so you're adding 7.5kg/week. So at the end of each week, assuming you have no stalls and don't have to reduce volume at any point in the first 3 months, your squats will look like this:

1: 5x5x27.5kg
2: 5x5x35kg
3: 5x5x42.5kg - you've now increased weight by more than 100%
4: 5x5x50kg
5: 5x5x57.5kg
6: 5x5x65kg
7: 5x5x72.5kg
8: 5x5x80kg - you've now quadrupled the weight you were lifting
9: 5x5x87.5kg
10: 5x5x95kg
11: 5x5x102.5kg
12: 5x5x110kg - you've surpassed the 100kg mark, a feat most people will never, ever do.

Trust me, it gets hard. Really hard. I'm yet to witness anyone, anywhere, ever do that sort of work in real life. On youtube, maybe, but never in person. I assure you that if you can last that long, you won't be complaining that you don't feel sore enough - you'll be too busy focusing on things that actually matter, like being bigger and stronger.
 
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