Can We Start a Roundtable? Legs.

Bigger Stronger Leaner
1

Hi,

I was a reader back in the Alpha Cell days, and IMO the best thing they had going was their roundtables, which still make for good reading. Thought we could have something similar for bodybuilding/hypertrophy.

Just interested to hear what is working well for others.

I’ll just list two thoughts I’ve had recently and see whether it’s something others are interested in discussing.

The Power of 20?:

For me, lately I’m starting to think there might actually be something to the whole 20 rep squat set thing. I’ve done other protocols like the JM 3x15 and used to run BBB, which had me working in the 13-15 rep ranges. But these past couple of weeks I’ve been experimenting with having a 20-rep set thrown in to my squat work, and I’ve at least had much more DOMS.

For example, yesterday I used two squatting movements: first, back squats and later in the leg workout with heel-elevated smith machine back squats.

And the 20-rep set doesn’t have to be a finisher, imo. Yesterday, my back squat work sets were 365x20, 405x11, 430x6, then 405x2x5 with 3-second descents and 365x(can’t remember) for two sets with 3-second descents.

I sort of liked having the 20 rep set first because it did a great job of activating my glutes and quads for the subsequent sets and also served as something of a “pre-exhaust” for the heavier loading sets.

I did a similar protocol for the heel-elevated squats later but with way less volume because of the fatigue that had built up during the workout: just 295x20, 350x2x12-15, then back to 295x10 with slow descents but not as anal about the three seconds.

Heel-Elevated Back Squats:
I have a home gym at my apartment, and the apt complex itself has some other stuff like cardio equipment, machine leg press, and a smith machine with weights. The only thing I really miss that I can’t do with my current setup is hack squats, and I’d been looking for a replacement. These are a really great replacement. I like doing them on the smith machine because the restricted range of motion allows me to focus on hitting the quads without fear of falling forward or having my knees go too far forward.

2

Two other thoughts I should include to get thoughts:

Effect of Running:

In college, I was a long distance runner (as a serious hobbyist, not a NCAA athlete). Ran 3:03 marathon last year of undergrad.

It’s taken me years and years to stop running. And in fact, I sometimes go back to it. It has always had a severely negative effect on any leg hypertrophy. Set me severely back during the second half of 2013, to the point where I realized I needed to make a decision and (…for the 4th time) gave it up. Hard to give up though when it’s a big part of your life at an earlier point.

Back Squats and Maintaining Muscle Mass:

I was studying for the bar exam this summer and wanted to conduct an experiment on myself: I knew I wanted to focus on upper body strength and was (gulp) getting back into running a bit because I had no other access to cardio equipment. So I decided I would try a Chest/Back/Shoulders(Legs) split whereby the only leg work I did was squatting to see whether I could retain leg musculature by just squatting. Maybe it would have worked better had I not been running, but it didn’t work. Legs withered (and squatting strength dropped over time as well) due to the running and the lack of leg volume.

3

I’d love to hear more about your thoughts of runnings effects on leg hypertrophy. Do you feel that growth resumed once you stopped running? I ran for 15 years before I started lifting and I am having the damndest time trying to get any growth out of my legs. I took my front squat up to 315 from 225 and saw no increase at all. The one thing I do seem to be having some luck with is knee extensions with a 3 second hold at the top of the movement, but that’s just a tiny little bit of growth of the VM.

What do you think?

4

I ran for several years before I started lifting too.

I saw zero leg growth when I was doing 5x5, admittedly for only a short period. I saw some leg growth when I was doing 20 rep squats, which I did for just about 4 months straight.

My max squat is only 270ish, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but I’ve actually seen more leg growth in the last two weeks of squatting to 5x a week than I did with anything else prior. Squat to a training 1RM and work sets. However, it’s only been two weeks, which is a few months short to be able to say anything significant. What I’ve seen at this point could be mostly inflammation.

It’s probably important to point out these are deep but upright Olympic style squats.

Currently, I’m planning to keep it up and see where it takes me.

5

[quote]LoRez wrote:
…but I’ve actually seen more leg growth in the last two weeks of squatting to 5x a week than I did with anything else prior…[/quote]

So, if I’m understanding correctly, you’ve been squatting 5x a week for the last 2 weeks?

6

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:
…but I’ve actually seen more leg growth in the last two weeks of squatting to 5x a week than I did with anything else prior…[/quote]

So, if I’m understanding correctly, you’ve been squatting 5x a week for the last 2 weeks?
[/quote]

Six days a week. Squatting to a training 1RM (which has fluctuated within a 20lb window) for 5 of those days. Those were followed with work sets. 6th day only to 80% of the weekly max with no work sets. 7th day off.

EDIT: yeah, I did say 5x. When I originally wrote that sentence, it was “squatting to a max 5x a week”. Then I rewrote it without adjusting the number.

7

Legs grew like crazy my freshman year of college doing the Russian squat routine. I’ve had some chronic pain issues with my back/hip flexors over the last 2 years. My back is almost 100% and my hip flexors are improving greatly (That you, ART practitioner). I’m finding squatting ATG for 5 heavy sets and 2 light sets and performing 4x15-20 leg extentions with a 3 second hold at the top is really helping.

My problems is:
I really love smith mock hack squats but the guide bar on every smith I’ve ever used starts bending when you have 140 pounds added if you aren’t pushing straight up, I can’t seem to get comfortable on the leg press after I started having hip flexor issues. I feel like my hip is getting pinched when me knees get to my chest. I’m having a bitch of a time getting any grown near my knee. It’s all teardrop and upper quad. What do you guys do?

8

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:
…but I’ve actually seen more leg growth in the last two weeks of squatting to 5x a week than I did with anything else prior…[/quote]

So, if I’m understanding correctly, you’ve been squatting 5x a week for the last 2 weeks?
[/quote]

Six days a week. Squatting to a training 1RM (which has fluctuated within a 20lb window) for 5 of those days. Those were followed with work sets. 6th day only to 80% of the weekly max with no work sets. 7th day off.

EDIT: yeah, I did say 5x. When I originally wrote that sentence, it was “squatting to a max 5x a week”. Then I rewrote it without adjusting the number.[/quote]

The issue is that you’ve been doing that for 2 weeks, there is no way in hell you can ascertain that the growth you’ve noticed is due to what you’ve been doing the past 2 weeks or the previous 3 months.

9

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:
I’d love to hear more about your thoughts of runnings effects on leg hypertrophy. Do you feel that growth resumed once you stopped running? I ran for 15 years before I started lifting and I am having the damndest time trying to get any growth out of my legs. I took my front squat up to 315 from 225 and saw no increase at all. The one thing I do seem to be having some luck with is knee extensions with a 3 second hold at the top of the movement, but that’s just a tiny little bit of growth of the VM.

What do you think?[/quote]

Over years of hampering my progress (IMO because of my running), I’m fairly opinionated on this:

This is just IMO, but I think running leads to a thicker trunk (“engine”) and smaller appendages in general.

Your running background is more extensive than mine: my running “career” (whatever that means) was only around 5 years. First, you should understand the fairly obvious point that your body has likely adapted to have far more of the slow-twitch fiber distribution than fast-twitch (or at least that you are likely of the population that is slow-twitch dominant), which will make hypertrophy more problematic.

The larger point though is one of adaptation. To adapt to the stress of running, the body has certain incentives: displace upper body mass in the interest of efficiency, reduce leg appendage mass because of the effort requried to lift the leg. It’s always misleading to some degree to look at the elite athletes in any event, but their physiques are instructive insofar as they show the adaptations that the training type induces.

Your question is an even more interesting one though, and one that I honestly have no idea what the answer is. Another way of putting your question is whether there is some “point of no return” with training at which point the body is so conditioned to supporting a certain type of adaptation (small, lean efficient legs with no fast-twitch musculature to speak of), that the body is either unable to only very limited in its ability to adapt to other training stimuli.

Be interested to hear if someone has a more informed view on this, as I have no idea to be totally honest.

10

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

What do you think?[/quote]

I do think that running background has had one benefit: I’m very good at 20-rep squat sets relative to my maxes haha. I hit that 365x20 as about an 8 in difficulty on a 10 scale, but I can probably only squat around 460-470 for a one rep max (most I’ve ever done is 445 for reps). I want to eventually do a set of 405x20–been wanting that for a good long while.

11

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:
…but I’ve actually seen more leg growth in the last two weeks of squatting to 5x a week than I did with anything else prior…[/quote]

So, if I’m understanding correctly, you’ve been squatting 5x a week for the last 2 weeks?
[/quote]

Six days a week. Squatting to a training 1RM (which has fluctuated within a 20lb window) for 5 of those days. Those were followed with work sets. 6th day only to 80% of the weekly max with no work sets. 7th day off.

EDIT: yeah, I did say 5x. When I originally wrote that sentence, it was “squatting to a max 5x a week”. Then I rewrote it without adjusting the number.[/quote]

The issue is that you’ve been doing that for 2 weeks, there is no way in hell you can ascertain that the growth you’ve noticed is due to what you’ve been doing the past 2 weeks or the previous 3 months. [/quote]

It’s good you reiterated that. That’s what I’d said in my original post too.

12

  • for natties I think it is necessary to hit legs hard with heavy weights and volume with decent ROM (squats, leg press and/or hack squats). Lighter pump stuff and shitty ROM just isn’t enough for legs. Most people fuck this one up I think.

  • having separate sessions for quads and hamstrings. If you train with with high intensity and high volume, this is almost necessary I think.

  • High frequency heavy squatting works pretty well for size as well, as I discussed in the other thread, but it is often not too practical for people. However, for people with shitty legs upping the frequency of leg training is a great approach. The legs as most other muscle groups can take A LOT more training stress than you think.

  • Ime running didn’t reduce my leg size significantly, even being in a caloric deficit for 4+ months. I was doing 40-90min of cardio per day towards the end of the cut.

13

[quote]DoingWork421 wrote:

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

What do you think?[/quote]

I do think that running background has had one benefit: I’m very good at 20-rep squat sets relative to my maxes haha. I hit that 365x20 as about an 8 in difficulty on a 10 scale, but I can probably only squat around 460-470 for a one rep max (most I’ve ever done is 445 for reps). I want to eventually do a set of 405x20–been wanting that for a good long while.[/quote]

Obviously very different ends of the spectrum, but I was able to do 215x20 with a max of 235.

My background is 6 years of track/cross-country through middle and high school. Lots of slow-twitch fibers.

14

[quote]LoRez wrote:

[quote]DoingWork421 wrote:

[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:

What do you think?[/quote]

I do think that running background has had one benefit: I’m very good at 20-rep squat sets relative to my maxes haha. I hit that 365x20 as about an 8 in difficulty on a 10 scale, but I can probably only squat around 460-470 for a one rep max (most I’ve ever done is 445 for reps). I want to eventually do a set of 405x20–been wanting that for a good long while.[/quote]

Obviously very different ends of the spectrum, but I was able to do 215x20 with a max of 235.

My background is 6 years of track/cross-country through middle and high school. Lots of slow-twitch fibers.[/quote]

I agree with both of you. I can definitely hit more reps at a given weight than my 1RM would suggest.

15

[quote]infinite_shore wrote:

  • having separate sessions for quads and hamstrings. If you train with with high intensity and high volume, this is almost necessary I think.
    [/quote]

Interesting. I just read Amit’s article and he advocates the same thing with what seems like a good amount of volume per each.

I may give his program a go for a bit.

16

[quote]infinite_shore wrote:

  • for natties I think it is necessary to hit legs hard with heavy weights and volume with decent ROM (squats, leg press and/or hack squats). Lighter pump stuff and shitty ROM just isn’t enough for legs. Most people fuck this one up I think.

  • having separate sessions for quads and hamstrings. If you train with with high intensity and high volume, this is almost necessary I think.

  • High frequency heavy squatting works pretty well for size as well, as I discussed in the other thread, but it is often not too practical for people. However, for people with shitty legs upping the frequency of leg training is a great approach. The legs as most other muscle groups can take A LOT more training stress than you think.

[/quote]

Infinite, “heavy weights with high volume” and very high frequency seem like a recipe for bad things once one has moved past the 400lb range or so with working weights. Looking back at your log, you used heavy weights and high frequency, but not necessarily high volume frequently. I agree with you though to the extent that you were primarily referencing people with “shitty legs,” which I take to mean people who don’t have that initial base of strength yet.

For me, it was really around the 400lb working set mark where I had to stop doing 3x/week with true leg workouts.

ATM I do one traditional “Leg day” then another day where I limit overall volume to squatting in the less-than-15-rep range and do assistance work that’s hard but does not involve intensifiers (e.g. drop sets). Can’t really comment on effectiveness though as I’ve only been doing it for a month or two.

To your point on high frequency and the body adapting, I just have a hard time thinking that 24 hours is enough for the body to not only recover but also supercompensate where loads are very heavy and volume is high. EDIT: Additionally, I believe the research I’ve read points to 5 days as the optimal recovery time after really hitting a muscle group hard (e.g. there’s an old T-Nation article by Clay Hyght that’s on point here).

Though a lot of this may depend on your definition of “volume”–in that respect, we may be speaking past each other (or at least I am speaking past your point).

17

[quote]aspengc8 wrote:

[quote]infinite_shore wrote:

  • having separate sessions for quads and hamstrings. If you train with with high intensity and high volume, this is almost necessary I think.
    [/quote]

Interesting. I just read Amit’s article and he advocates the same thing with what seems like a good amount of volume per each.

I may give his program a go for a bit.[/quote]

Yes, but worth mentioning that Meadows is convinced that there is benefit to be had from training both at the same time due to their antagonism. This is probably one of those things that’s either “both will work if done properly” or “it depends on the person.”

18

531 BBB was the defining workout, for me, with regards to increasing leg mass. Just keeping the exercise selection simple and the reps high, was enough to spark some life into my ‘West of Scotland’ legs.

Taking up road cycling this year has also gave my legs a welcomed growth spurt. Have done 1000km so far this year and the old pins are looking jacked!

19

Some random thoughts on leg work:

  • RE: 20-rep squats: Taking three deep breaths between each rep, starting from the first, is an overlooked but useful old school trick. Let’s you go just a little bit heavier and forces you to pace yourself for the full 20 reps instead of going balls out for the first 10 and then try to catch up and rest enough to gut out the last 10.

  • Leg curls immediately before squats (“Meadows-style” for a pump) works well and feels good.

  • Front squats immediately before back squats also works well and feels relatively-good, but isn’t for beginners as it’s easy to over-fatigue everything too soon.

  • Leg curls are more important than leg extensions, whether we’re talking about size, strength, or certainly knee-health.

  • Single-leg exercises and the leg press get a bad rap that they don’t really deserve.

  • If you can reach, touch the working hamstring during standing leg curls for a cool boost to the mind-muscle connection.

20

[quote]DoingWork421 wrote:

[quote]infinite_shore wrote:

  • for natties I think it is necessary to hit legs hard with heavy weights and volume with decent ROM (squats, leg press and/or hack squats). Lighter pump stuff and shitty ROM just isn’t enough for legs. Most people fuck this one up I think.

  • having separate sessions for quads and hamstrings. If you train with with high intensity and high volume, this is almost necessary I think.

  • High frequency heavy squatting works pretty well for size as well, as I discussed in the other thread, but it is often not too practical for people. However, for people with shitty legs upping the frequency of leg training is a great approach. The legs as most other muscle groups can take A LOT more training stress than you think.

[/quote]

Infinite, “heavy weights with high volume” and very high frequency seem like a recipe for bad things once one has moved past the 400lb range or so with working weights. Looking back at your log, you used heavy weights and high frequency, but not necessarily high volume frequently. I agree with you though to the extent that you were primarily referencing people with “shitty legs,” which I take to mean people who don’t have that initial base of strength yet.

For me, it was really around the 400lb working set mark where I had to stop doing 3x/week with true leg workouts.

To your point on high frequency and the body adapting, I just have a hard time thinking that 24 hours is enough for the body to not only recover but also supercompensate where loads are very heavy and volume is high. EDIT: Additionally, I believe the research I’ve read points to 5 days as the optimal recovery time after really hitting a muscle group hard (e.g. there’s an old T-Nation article by Clay Hyght that’s on point here).
[/quote]

  • You are mixing things up. I was referring to two different ways to train legs: (1) high frequency, high intensity but moderate volume (5-7x/week) like a Oly WLer basically would, (2) traditional balls-to-the-wall BBing leg training with high intensity and high volume 2x/week, separating quads and hams.

  • Who said that I’m after full recovery and even super-compensation between session? You are right that that won’t happen. It goes more into to the direction of the two-factor theory of training. I recently did a 3-4 week sumo deadlift “spec” phase where I pulled 5-7x/week heavy at moderate to high volume (floor and/or block) and the hypertrophy effect on my glutes were ridiculous (wasn’t even a goal). I’m convinced that this works pretty well but it is quite an extreme approach.

  • I personally haven’t noticed a problem with such an approach as I got stronger (beyond the 400lbs mark).