In order to give myself a little more control, I thought about the following DB program. (The theory being that heavy DBs can be dropped with a lot more safety than can a BB loaded with plates.)
Bent over DB rows
Chins
DB presses/pushups
Split leg DB squats
Overhead DB press
Single leg DB deadlifts
But what kind of a rep scheme should I go with in order to maximize intensity and encourage growth, because if I go with DBs for safety, I’m going to be limited in weight.
Fair enough. I didn’t mean to be condescending, and I don’t know what it’s like to be in your situation of putting on bodyfat real easily.
Chris Shugart has written a lot about it… he calls himself a Former Fat Boy. You might want to check out some of his stuff. But basically, from what I gather you’re going to have to be extra careful about when and what you eat.
Good luck!
[quote]testup wrote:
@ dankid
Any suggestions how to protect the knees while squating? My biggest problem is that my knees grind, and sometimes threaten to give out. So, I tend to rely on the leg press to avoid the possibility of falling and doing damage to my spine.
I thought about using the power rack pins to lock the squat bar in the down position and then getting under it (basically starting in the down position of the squat) and then pushing myself up. It might give me a little more control, but I don’t know.[/quote]
It really depends on what is wrong with your knees, and how bad they are, and I am no physical therapist. But there are a few things you can do.
First off, as far as safety, and worrying about collapsing, use the power rack and set the pins where you can drop if you need to.
As for starting at the bottom. These are Anderson squats, and IMO they put alot more stress on your knees and back, because you dont get to use a stretch reflex, and often times cant get alligned just right.
Try box squatting. Dont do it where you sit all the way down onto the box, but use it at as a guide, and try to learn to push your but WAY back. Dave tate has some articles and videos on this, check them out. The goal is to try to keep your lower legs completely perpendicular to the ground. Along with this technique change, stronger glutes and hamstrings means that less force/stress will be on your quads and knees. But again this really depends on what is wrong with your knees.
IMO, even if you had to start squatting with just the bar, and build up from there, you’ll be a lot better off in the long run than just using leg press.
And if all else fails, maybe you can just do deadlifts for heavy stuff, and then leg press for higher reps.
i don’t understand the concept of making a workout insanely hard and taxing just for the sake of making a workout insanely hard and taxing. Especially if you don’t know a whole lot about training and program design.
Anyone can “design” a really “hard” program. ill make one now
30 sets of squats
run 46 miles
50 sets of sqauts
1 set of bench
2 sets of wrist curls
I guarantee that will be incredibly difficult, doesn’t make it a great program, in fact id say its a pretty fuckin terrible program.
Seems like theres a lot of “here’s a crazy hard workout” threads and i just don’t really get it…
[quote]testup wrote:
In order to give myself a little more control, I thought about the following DB program. (The theory being that heavy DBs can be dropped with a lot more safety than can a BB loaded with plates.)
Bent over DB rows
Chins
DB presses/pushups
Split leg DB squats
Overhead DB press
Single leg DB deadlifts
But what kind of a rep scheme should I go with in order to maximize intensity and encourage growth, because if I go with DBs for safety, I’m going to be limited in weight. [/quote]
In my expeience, going with just DB’s wont usually work. If you are the type of person that we mentioned above that can grow on high volume or something like just pushups, then you might get good results with all DB’s, but for most of us, we need more overload on the prime movers, and this requires less stabalization.
Exercise selection is ENTIRELY individual. Some people can do exercises that others cant, and some get a great benefit from some exercises while others cant.
Here is an example of some “great” exercise:
Squat
Deadlift
Lunges
Stepups
Good mornings
RDL’s
Bench
Dips
Shoulder Press
Rows
Pullups
Im sure I missed something in there, but heres how it varies. Some people cant, and shouldn’t do dips. So they dont do them. Some cant do shoulder press. For me, goodmornings dont seem to be a good bet, but RDL’s seem great. You’ve gotta figure out what YOU can do.
KK, and then almost all of the above exercises can be done with DB’s, but here is my opinion on that. It is almost always better to use barbells than dbs, except for a few exceptions.
You are already training a similar movement with barbells heavy, and using DB’s will train more of the stabalization aspect. EX: If you are benching heavy with BB’s, you might rather use DB’s for incline bench, to get some stabalization instead of bb incline.
Sometimes more BB work is just too demanding. If you are doing squats in your workout with a BB, and then later in the workout you have lunges. I always feel lunges can be overloaded better with a BB, but it may be too demanding, and then the DB variation may be what you should do.
So it really comes down to choice, but anytime you are looking for more overload, remember that movements that require less stabalization are better. EX: vary few people will have success with just training DB lunges, as compared to someone doing just BB squats, or just BB lunges.
As for programming. This is also entirely individual. In general, you’ll want to train the “main” BB movements in the 1-5 rep range, with about 75-90% of your 1RM, and maybe occassionally do more than 90% but it isn’t completely necessary. The other movements like lunges, DB press, etc. in general should be trained in the 3-12 rep range, with weights that will put you at or near failure, but occassionally really high reps of 20-100 reps can be beneficial if they have a purpose.
You are probably going to need an individualized program, because you have some limitations, and you are like me and have program ADD. I suggest you start with either starting strength, or WS4SB. Do it for a little bit and then start making your modifications. Another thing you can do, is take a minimalist approach to the “main” parts of your workout.
The most important aspects of a program IMO are that you are training the main movements for strength. So as a minimalist approach this would be, (bench, squat, deadlift) You could follow a 3 day program, where each day has a main lift that you train for strength. After that, you do whatever you want for 20-30 minutes. You can hit arms, or lunges, or cardio. It really doesn’t matter as long as the three main lifts are improving.
Good luck man, i think you are on the right track. Just keep it enjoyable, and you’ll be successful in the long run.
[quote]stevo_ wrote:
i don’t understand the concept of making a workout insanely hard and taxing just for the sake of making a workout insanely hard and taxing. Especially if you don’t know a whole lot about training and program design.
Anyone can “design” a really “hard” program. ill make one now
30 sets of squats
run 46 miles
50 sets of sqauts
1 set of bench
2 sets of wrist curls
I guarantee that will be incredibly difficult, doesn’t make it a great program, in fact id say its a pretty fuckin terrible program.
Seems like theres a lot of “here’s a crazy hard workout” threads and i just don’t really get it…
[/quote]
Lol, that is a random program for sure. I think its just human nature to think the harder and more crazy a program, the better. which to an extent is sorta true, but you need to be PROGRESSING toward a insane workout, not starting with one.
If you build up to 30 sets of squats with 300lbs 30x5, this could build some crazy legs and some good conidtioning. If you started at 300 for 3x5 and built up to this over the coarse of a few years, it would probably be good. But you also have the fact that somewhere along the way, you would have been better off adding weight instead of volume.
Because what is better
30x5 @ 300
OR
5x5 @ 500
???
You need volume, but not at the expense of intensity.
But ya, making up some crazy workout, THAT YOU CAN ALREADY DO, is just a good way to burn up muscle or hurt yourself.
I wrote a better program when I was 17 when I didn’t know anything…
That program fucking sucks dude.
^^^^ two totally unproductive comments. Good job, troll-nation
It’s nice to day dream, but you need to wake up and do something sensible. No offense. Good luck with whatever program you choose. I’d try something along the lines of what Waylander suggested - go to T-Cell and read what the big guys do… progressive resistance, ramping using a moderate volume with moderate-to-heavy poundage, etc. Now that’s a super program /thread 