Powerbuilding Workout Week 5
I got back on track with the powerbuilding workout this week. See which muscle groups increased and which decreased.
Week 5 of the powerbuilding workout was about testing the water to see if I could get back to training biceps without causing injury. And, it turns out, last week’s overtraining was not due to too much volume on arm day after all.
As I suspected, the real culprit was the pulling movements such as upright rows, and face pulls on my shoulder day. The bicep work in those compound exercises was too much when combined with my arm and back workouts.
With some minor adjustments to exercise selection, I was able to successfully increase the volume for my hypertrophy muscle groups and the load for my strength muscle groups.
Here are the changes from week 4 to week 5.
Powerbuilding Workout Week 5 Overview
| Training Goal | Volume | Load |
|---|---|---|
| Hypertrophy | +30% (30 sets) | +3% (2 lbs) |
| Strength | -0% (0 sets) | +5% (4 lbs) |
The only issue this week is that I accidentally undershot my total number of sets for shoulders as I removed upright rows. But this didn’t show up in the total volume because I had missed an entire bicep workout in week 4.
I also noticed that my average reps are not increasing with the added volume for most of the hypertrophy muscle groups. This could indicate that the number of sets is approaching the maximum recoverable volume.
Additionally, I hit a definite wall on leg day with heel-elevated squats. The added 20 pounds felt like 50, and I got significantly fewer reps.
The table below shows each muscle group’s total volume (sets), average load (weight lifted), and average reps.
Powerbuilding Week 5 Muscle Groups
| Training Goal | Muscle Group | Volume | Average Load | Average Reps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hypertrophy | Triceps | +9% | +2% | -2% |
| Hypertrophy | Biceps | +118% | +0% | +1% |
| Hypertrophy | Shoulders | -8% | +0% | +8% |
| Hypertrophy | Calves | +11% | +6% | +0% |
| Strength | Chest | -0% | +8% | -4% |
| Strength | Back | -0% | +1% | +0% |
| Strength | Quads | -0% | +6% | -7% |
| Strength | Hamstrings | -0% | +7% | -3% |
| Strength | Abs | -0% | +0% | +4% |
In the table above, you can see how my workout volume went down for my shoulders. But I’m not that disappointed because it saved my biceps.
I completed both bicep workouts for 48 sets, which is more than double what I had done the previous week. So, as I suspected, it wasn’t purely the arm day volume that caused the excessive soreness the previous week.
According to my Oura ring, my recovery and resilience are still at a very high level, and I don’t believe I’m near the overtraining threshold. But, based on my workouts, I can tell that my progress is slowing down and perhaps reaching a point of diminishing returns.
Still, next week is the final week of progression, so I plan to add two more sets for hypertrophy and push slightly heavier loads for strength. Stay tuned to see how the final week goes!
