Here's What Happened To My Strength After 3 Months Off From The Gym.

If you’ve been out of the gym since mid-March, you’re probably, like me, wondering, “what’s going to happen to my strength when I get back to the gym?”

While the data is minimal when it comes to relevant studies relating to detraining in these circumstances, I decided to take it upon myself to test my own strength in the name of science.

I was able to test my 5 rep max (5RM) two days before gyms were required to shut down in NYC.

Now that we’ve been stuck in quarantine for over three months, we at least have some data we can use to gauge how my strength has been effected after 3 months without any powerlifting.

That being said, although I wasn’t weight lifting, I didn’t become completely inactive.

TRX and Bodyweight Training from Home

Something we need to take into consideration is that I didn’t completely stop training. There were roughly 4 of the 12 weeks that did go untrained due to minor injuries and being sick, but other than that, I was still doing bodyweight and TRX workouts.

Day 1: Full body Metcon (3-4 rounds of 3 different movements per circuit)

Day 2: TRX upper body (3-5 sets of 10-20 reps depending on the movement)

Day 3: Full body Metcon (3-4 rounds of 3 different movements per circuit)

Day 4 (if time): Full body MetCon or TRX leg day

Some Minor Set Backs In Training

Prior to quarantine, I had tested my 5 rep max (5RM) to be at 135 lbs. I was sitting around ~145 pounds bodyweight at this time. This, I believe, would have been a PR for this weight (but not a total PR).

My first day back, I started with a bench session to re-test my strength to see where I was at. Obviously, I was hoping to have not lost any strength, but that’s highly unrealistic.

That being said, something important to note as well is that for the past two weeks, I was dealing with a minor injury in my back (or what I believe to be an injury; no assessment was done). I was unable to rotate my trunk without experiencing back pain.

The week I went back was the first week I was feeling pain-free and able to move with more fluidity. 

Re-Testing my Strength After 12 Weeks Without Powerlifting

Knowing all of this, after 12 weeks without powerlifting, I ended up hitting 125 pounds for my re-tested 5RM on day one. I believe this day I was sitting somewhere between 147-150 pounds, so slightly heavier than before quarantine.

That would mean that I’ve lost roughly 10 pounds on my 5RM, but my theory is that, being detrained, my body or my CNS, has forgotten how to properly handle this weight.

After this session, I experienced DOMS for the next 3 days. This is one of the results of being detrained and entering the “alarm phase.” It’s also likely that, due to the alarm phase, my strength will naturally be lower during this phase, but once I’ve surpassed this phase, I will see increases again, and relatively quickly.

I plan on re-testing my strength for the next few weeks to see how quickly my 5RM goes back up and how much time it takes after 3 months without training to get back to where I was.

Conclusion

With little research as to how much strength is lost in circumstances such as these, we now we have a better idea as to how much strength will be lost and how quickly it may take to build it back up.

Stay tuned for next week when we re-test my bench 5RM for the second time, as my body begins to adapt to training again.