Taking a break to cut

[itsbruce]

I'm in my 12th week of the programme and am planning to take a two week break to trim the few pounds of fat I added in the last months (and to take a holiday from ever-increasing weight ). But when I say break, I don't mean a rest so much as a change. The basic idea is

• Trim the calorie intake slightly.
• Stick to 3 days a week in the gym.
• Keep doing 5x5 squats in each session. I dropped back from 92.5kg to 75kg this week so that I could concentrate on form, so I'm significantly under max weight. Plan is to keep progressing back up if I can maintain form. I may well microload (only 1.25kg extra each time).
• Add cardio back in. I've mostly stopped cardio because of pressure of time (and because I've wanted to concentrate on strength gains), but I plan to do at least 30 minutes of cardio on each gym day during the break.
• Work on pull-ups or push-ups in each session.

Insane or sane? I mean, if I were really going to have a break, I'd go back to my old 5-days-a-week gym habit And I like squats.

[atypical1]

That actually sounds like a very solid plan. Make sure and track your progress on both your BF and your lifts as well as your caloric intake. But overall I like your approach.

james

[btg522]

That is what I am doing right now, and it seems to be working.

It is really hard to see how BF% is decreasing, but I think I can see my veins/abs a lot more clearly since I did what you are doing. However, My BF has not decreased according to a resistance scale or calipers.

[JohnAnthny]

I'm in my 12th week of the programme and am planning to take a two week break to trim the few pounds of fat I added in the last months

Im glad I came to this thread. I too have just ended first 12wks of SL5x5 and realize I need to work on trimming BF as it hasnt gone done as much as liked due to eating a lot and going for size/strentgh gains in the gym. Your plan IS solid and I am now contemplating dropping squat weight a little for 5x5's and just doing pullup/chinup work every workout along with DOING some serious cardio.

It would def be a switchup. Perhaps im succumbing to some posts where people dont want to go to the gym when the squats start getting heavy and tend to make excuses. It may end up being a great Body fat loss routine for 2-4wks.

[scotty678]

I'm at a similar point although I'm more like 10 weeks in, I've decided to drop squat weight too as I've just added more cardio to my regime. I'm also stalling pretty significantly on squats so will be dropping that weight and focusing on 5x5 form. Primary goal is to lose body fat so will need to sacrifice some strength gains to get BF down. Not planning on stopping lifting, just backing off the weight.

JohnAnthny- like your point about making excuses about the squats getting too hard because they're heavy- I think though, eating at a deficit along with added cardio- you have to be prepared to sacrifice some weight on the bar as the goals would be conflicting....IE- strength gains vs fat loss.

Any thoughts on that?

[nothingasfate]

the plan is good but i'd suggest you take a break for one week.after 12 weeks of continuously heavy lifting it'd really do a world of good if you just take it easy and just concentrate on cutting down on calories.you'll feel stronger and you'd be able to make changes like adding cardio to your program in a better physical state.then you can really judge what is working and what is not working as your body would be fresh again to be pounded into shape.

[klauitzsex]

I cut after a long tenure of SL and the anabolic diet, and I wish I didn't

Progress was good, couple of stalls but lift wise everything was great. I was scared of a lil bit of Bf%

So I went back to a normal carb based diet, cut for a few weeks, had some non-weightlifting related injuries (which DID affect my weight lifting!) so I had a good 3 weeks off, with a few more weeks of intermittant training. I'm back into 'bulking' now and my Bf% is higher than ever and I'm having a real hard time with squats. I used to laugh at 90k while front squatting...WHILE CUTTING! I did 85 twice last week just to make sure form was fine, and it's bloody hard! Do'able, but I used to chuck around 90k no probs. Guess its back up the ladder again!
During my down time though I've worked on a great bench technique, which was my only downfall exercise.

I would keep going with the strength gains if I were you, I certainly don't look like a dude that squats and deadlifts in his spare time. I'm just gonna bulk til i'm in the high weights now, bf% isn't gonna ruin progression for me again.