Press Stalled Today

[pbjorge12]

Hey,
So today my press stalled at 115 lbs. I hit 2/0/0. WTF, right? It just felt damn heavy. (On the positive side, Squat just hit 245 today and everything else is still moving up) Recovery has been good but last night was a bit iffy on sleep - between 7 and 8 hours. My next attempt for this is on Friday so I'll see what happens. For now though, I was doing a little hypothesizing (uh oh).

Remembering something Gant (maybe Justin?) said on the crossfit boards about the bench press being critical to bringing up press numbers, it made me wonder if my press is just going to keep stalling until my bench goes up.

Right now I've successfully benched 155 and pressed 110 for my worksets. Using Rip's strength standards, it is obvious that my BP and press are pretty damn close. Perhaps too close for comfort?

If I failed my press workset this friday, my thought was to do a week (3 sessions) without the press. This would hopefully tack on another 7.5-15 pounds to my bench press and increase the headroom I have between the bench press and press.

Is this completely stupid?

[JC400]

You want to improve your press by working on your bench? Won't be as affective as improving your press by working on you press!

taking a week off pressing may lead to an improvement but I would guess it is more likely to be with reducing fatigue and getting extra recovery rather than the actual extra benching.

2/0/0 is a big stall which would suggest something is not quite right. How much are you increasing by each session?

[Sgsolberg]

PB:
One thing I noticed is that you made a 5 lb jump (you stated you had completed presses at 110). This is too much for a novice to jump, and you need to read the main forum. 2/0/0 indicates that if you have recently hit 110, your recovery is not as good as you think and you have a major issue.

Tell us your weight, height, sleep for the past 5 days, and how much you eat (and what).

[misspelledgeoff]

your press is pretty high relative to your bench press (70%) but not outside of normal range.

I would not skip presses for several weeks but would instead microload the press at 2.5 per workout. this will effectively give you the "headroom" you want while still training the press.

[pbjorge12]

I've been taking 5 pound jumps each session until now without much trouble. Perhaps it is simply time to start microloading... Or maybe 7-8 hours of sleep just is not enough (you can never have enough sleep).

I'm right about 180lbs, 5 ft 10, sleep for the past 5 days has been 9+ hours except Saturday night which was 7.5 and Sunday night which was about the same. I drink GOMAD, 4 apples a day, and as much meat and fat as I can find. I should still probably eat more.

Edit: Microloading seems to be the consensus. I will start.

[Sgsolberg]

Keep eating more...

[tennisgod]

I don't think you should worry about a single missed day. Bad days happen. I pressed 54kg Monday last week and on Friday got stuck on 55kg (3rd rep final set). I attribute it to just a bad day, and will re-attempt tomorrow.
Playing around with the program (especially considering it was a single bad day) would probably attract the wrath of Rip.

[Mr.City]

How was your form? For me, the press is a very technique driven lift. Bring the bar down too far or too out and you've killed the lift.