I have never been a big fan of deloads. It always seems like wasted training time to me. However, I do know they are necessary.
When competing I'd program them in somewhere between every 4 to 6 weeks. Now that I'm not lifting in meets anymore, or at least if I do, not nearly as competitively, I have found less of a need to deload. In addition, considering my biggest goal has been fat loss and not strength, my training percentages have been on the low side.
With lower weight percentages, I was not overreaching with my training volume. The effort and intensity was certainly there, but it didn't beat me up too much. Plus, I'm really good about recovery. My nutrition is on point, I sleep well, stretch, roll, get massage, etc. In other words, I take better care of my body than most.
I honestly couldn't tell you the last time I deloaded. I think my body is now in revolt over that fact. I am now very aware I need a deload. Do you want to know how I know it's time, because EVERYTHING felt heavy last week. It's not uncommon to go in and train one day and have something feel heavy. It could be due to a little less sleep the night before, a stressful day at work, or just a case of saggy diapers. You just chalk that up to a bad day.
What I am talking about is having every lift for the week feel like an RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) of 10. That beat up feeling compounded for me with each training session of the week. I guess there is a thing such as overtraining. Perhaps I'll have to keep a more educated eye on my programming now that I'm working on trying to get a little bigger and stronger.
So this coming week training percentages and volume will be cut nearly in half. In addition assistance work will be done in circuit fashion. It will be light with a quick pace. Treadmill work will all be done at around a 60% target heart rate zone for recovery. I'll get in extra stretching, rolling, and contrast work.
I'll be curious to run last week's numbers again next month and see if there's a difference in rep maxes. I'll report back and tell you how effective the deload was, if at all. Thanks for reading.