Got a couple of questions maybe some of you can help me with. To those of you who do box squats, do you train at home or in a commmercial gym? I can just picture myself walking into my college gym twice a week with this box. I can just imagine them giving me some rant on how i can’t do them due to “liability reasons”. How do you all get around this? I was figuring make some kind of box and then try to just leave it at the gym somehow.
I don’t know how many of you train Westside style, but i have a question about the accessory/supplemental excercises. In the Periodization Bible Pt 2 it says Set/Reps for supplemental/accessory excercises 5-8 sets of 6-15 reps. Is that total or per excercise? So say i am doing dumbell extensions and JM presses for my supplemental excercise, should both of them total no more than 8 sets?
I work out in a commerical gym. I simply use the aerobic stackable steps with a thin foam pad used for stretching over the top for my box squatting. If you need to adjust the steps up less than the height of stacking another step, you could either add additional foam pads or set the steps on a couple plates (with a pad in between so the step doesn’t slip).
The rep ranges that Dave Tate gave with the accessory/supplemental exercise is for each exercise, not total. Warning though, make sure you are doing no more than 4 or 5 exercise per workout, and this includes the core lift of the day. As far as the box for box squats, if you can build one and bring it in, do it. Who cares if they think you are weird? Ask first and if they are cool about it, build a good box. You don’t need to bring it in twice/week, though. Your Max Effort SQ/DL exercise should consist mostly of Good mornings (about 70% of the time).
I also use the stackable steps, adjusting the height so I am slightly below parallel. But I’m hardcore and don’t use those wussy foam pads Tehehe. I get strange looks but no one says anything, they think it’s one of those weird girl excercises. I’m more worried about the reaction I’ll get when I come in dragging a chain behind me like some Dickens character and hang lt from the ends of the barbell.
Heya T-freaks. I’ve heard much about Westside-style trianing but have never seen a thorough description or overview. I know it is strength-oriented, but does it have hypertrophy benefits as well. Can someone please fill me in? Thanx. Lata.
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I use the aerobic steps that Matt talked about, but I think the foam pad is unnecessary. You don’t want to squish down into the box, and you shouldn’t be hitting it hard enough to make you sore if you use plain plastic. The sets are per exercise, but I have had great results as a natural trainer by limiting the number of sets of accessory work. For example on Max Squat days, I might do 6 sets of box squat, 4 sets of good mornings, then a few assistance exercises for hamstrings, calves, low back, abs, but only 1 or 2 sets per exercise. I did try it both ways and had better results doing a few less sets than in the system.
The amount of assistance work you perform depends on your level of training and work capacity. If you have low work capacity keep the sets low for assistance work. As your work capacity increases you can add extra sets and extra workouts as well. Trainees who workout multiple times per day and as much as 15 times a week didn’t start out that way, they worked up to it.
M.B. Eric…yeah the westside program can put some size on you for sure. At Westside the avg lifter gains something like 30 lbs in a year It’s pretty high volume for a powerlifting program and can really drain the nervous and adrenal system if you’re not careful with it…It doesn’t lead to the type of fatigue that bodybuilding programs lead to so that’s why if you decide to try it you really need to know your body and pay extra attention to nutrition and recovery.
Monkeyboy, couldn’t possibly explain WSB here. Suffice to say its a powerlifting training protocol that emphasizes bar speed and training of week points rather than progressive overload. And it works.
Go to Elitefitness’ or Deepsquatter’s site for a look.
Westside is an excellent program for building strength, and even better because it is adaptable and changing, you can stay on a Westside program for vast periods of time, since you’re always doing something different. It does cause hypertrophy. If you are concerned about hypertrophy, you can modify the program somewhat to reflect this. For example, one of my extra workouts will be a strictly bodybuilding back/biceps/forearm workout. If you want to increase Squat, Bench, Deadlift, and wouldn’t mind some size, WSB is for you. If you want size, and oh yeah, it might be nice if squat/bench/DL went up, then it is NOT the program you want.
i use to train at a commercial gym (one of the power***** in michigan - doesn’t matter which because they are all the same) when i first started doing box squats. they had some low benches so i was box squatting a little high. i brought some chains in there one day and the dumbass out-of-shape cigarette smoking owner, who i’m sure didn’t know what i was going to do, threw a fit and wouldn’t let me use them. last time i trained there. found another gym where about 5-10 people train westside style. the gym has several boxes for different heights and plywood to make more adjustments. the gym also has boards already assembled for board presses and two sets of chains. i’m in heaven.
BTW (although this might actually be another thread) I am planning on hiring an Olympic Weightlifting coach to train me. I think I want to train at both PL and OL… I know that it is a classic case of jack of all trades, master of none, but hey… it’ll be fun, I think. Anyway, I am considering ways of creating a combined WSB/PL and OL routine. I figure I’ll just go back and forth between the two – 4 weeks of PL on a WSB system followed by a 4 week OL routine. I might add extra light or low volume w/o during the PL routine for the Olympic lifts and add a light or low volume extra PL lift during the OL phase. Anyone out there tried to combine PL and OL? If so, what has worked for you and what has failed?
