27/3/17
Age: 23
Height: 170cm
Weight: 67kg(as of 3/17)

Hi, I've been lifting for abit over 2 years now(cumulatively. it's been 3 years since i began but I took about a year off in between due to a severe wrist injury) and I've never really had clear goals since the beginning up until about a few months ago where I got to know a lot more about powerlifting through watching youtube videos and such. Used to watch the Hodge Twins for general bodybuilding advice and for the laughs but later on I started watching Omar Isuf, and later Silent Mike, Mark Bell and others and really got interested in powerlifting. I realised that after awhile, the whole 'aesthetics' just didn't mean anything to me anymore and I wasn't really training with a purpose. Now, I have a very clear goal, gradually building up my strength in the 3 main lifts and hopefully in a few years, I'll be attending powerlifting meets and such.

So, although I've been lifting for a couple of years now, up until a few months ago, I've only been training my upper body(yes you know them leg days? I skipped ALL them leg days). I had this mentality that I didn't want my legs to grow big cuz for some reason I hated the look back then. So, I guess in the sense of powerlifting(Bench, Squat, Deadlift), you could say I'm a beginner except benching. Started squatting(with a smith machine as my nearby gym doesn't have a squat rack ) about 3 months ago and I've only started deadlifting bout 2 weeks ago(deadlifted 2 sessions so far).

Well, I just discovered this section in Lowyat and seems like a good idea to document my progress. Gonna update once in a while(probably when I hit new volume or one rep max(ORM) PRs) Here are my current stats:

Bench: 100kg(ORM)
Squat(Smith Machine): 80kg(5x5, ORM not tested)
Deadlift: 110kg(5x5, ORM not tested)

Hello and welcome! The past weekend I competed in a powerlifting meet, it would have been great if you were there to spectate. Powerlifting is a really fun sport and I hope you'll continue to have fun training for it. What training program are you running right now?

Hi! Definitely will go to one someday, be it joining or just spectating. Yeah I agree it's a lot of fun. 2 years ago I would definitely say it looks boring and where's the fun in moving something around for a little distance. But now I see that it's satisfying not in the sense of like a game as in other sports but in the sense of what happens in the background, in every training session, all the research and the smart, consistent effort, all leading up to the lift on the day itself. Watching new weights(PRs) go up after grinding through and through for only you know how long just feels amazing. And it's probably why people keep coming back to grind some more. But I'm kinda deviating a little bit too much haha. I'm not on any specific program right now. Still trying to figure that one out. I'm not a beginner anymore when it comes to the bench but I'm still very much a beginner when it comes to the squat and deadlift so I'm not really sure what program I should run.

I currently workout every other day. Rotating like this: Heavy Bench Light Squat Day -> Heavy Deadlift Light Bench Day -> Heavy Squat Light Pull Day -> back to Heavy Bench Light Squat day.
(i only deadlift once a week as I'm still getting accustomed to it, my lower back gets really sore after deadlifts even though I put quite a lot of emphasis on my form and I think it's ok.)

Heavy = I try to lift as much weight as I can for a 5x5 for that lift followed by accessories with higher volume lower intensity(like 4x6 or 3x8) for that lift.
Light = I basically do the same thing 5x5 followed by higher volume accessories but I back off on the weights on all movements.

It'd be great if someone could shed some light on how I should improve my programming cuz I'm kinda in a fit over what to do haha.

The next meet MPA is organizing is in August. It's their annual Strength Assembly Meet. There's also an IPF sanctioned full power meet in May I believe, though I'm not so sure. Push Pull FB page usually have info on that.

As for programming, 5/3/1 might be something you would enjoy. Especially with the Boring But Big accessories. I would suggest my own DUP program but that involves a lot of squatting and deadlifting volume, which is not something I'd suggest someone to get right into if you've never squatted or deadlifted much before. Feel free to give it a shot though. I gained 35kg in my total running the DUP program then my meet prep, in 7 months, while cutting. So I can attest that it works for me. I'm gonna run a new program more focused on hypertrophy and conditioning next week as I enter a long off season. I'll post it up when it's ready so give it a look if you want to. It will be DUP as well and contains deathly amounts of submaximal volume work.

Maybe next year I'll consider going for a meet but even then I have my doubts cuz I'll be in my final year as a med student, schedule's gonna be hectic haha. Yea 5/3/1 sounds like a good place to start for me. I'll look into it some more. Thanks man

Been a while. Schedule is hectic anticipated but we gotta do what we gotta do. All right so I've kinda got a new goal now on top of powerlifting and that's to improve my vertical jump. Not sure why I don't really even play basketball but I've always wanted to dunk a basketball and standing at 170cm it'd be really satisfying to do it.

So, on to programming, I'm running a modified Madcow's 5x5 currently, still hitting the 3 main lifts but I've diverted some of the volume into doing cleans and calf raises because I'm trying to improve my vertical leap in hopes of dunking some day. The way I see it squats and deadlifts are gonna develop my legs and posterior chain pretty well, calf raises although playing a minor part are gonna bring my calves up, and the cleans are gonna be there for bringing that triple extension up, which is basically what's required in a jump.

I've been letting my weight slowly go up for awhile now and currently I'm going through a cut. I'm 69kg now(was 71kg when I decided to start the cut about a week ago) and I'm hoping to reach somewhere around 63-64kg in 6-7 more weeks, maybe a bit more, maybe a bit less, totally just depends on how I feel. The cut is purely driven by the fact that I'm getting abit too fat so yeah, nothing complicated there, once I hit a point where I'm happy with how I look it's back to bulking.

I'm probably gonna take a couple of weeks off powerlifting here and there too to focus on plyometric work(specifically for jumping) to bridge strength gains into my actual vertical. There's no hurry in the powerlifting game cuz I know I'll be in it for a long time so it's okay to stall progress for the sakes of other goals.

Here are my numbers now(tested)

Weight: 69kg
Bench: 97.5kg x 5(5 rep max)
Smith Machine Squat: 107.5kg x 5(5 rep max)
Deadlift: 150kg(1 rep max)