Deadlifts Every Day

I know I tried a 3 week program where I did:

Bench
Weighted Pull-Up
Deadlift

With about 85-90% of my max, singles until the reps got hard, as in the bar stalled out and I had to grind it out. Usually it was about 8-9 singles. The first two weeks went really well, but the second day of the third week my performance declined noticably. Overall I got a net benefit, but next time I’ll probably only go 5 sessions total: M/W/F of week 1 and M/W of week 2.

I would recommend doing it every now and then, I hit PR’s on all three lifts after doing this.

[quote]Garage Dweller wrote:
Also… what do people think would be good short- and medium-term goals for the deadlift and overhead press (using perfect form for both; no straps etc for the deadlift; and no leg involvement for the overhead press).

600 pounds for 5 reps in the deadlift, and 300 pounds for 5 reps in the press?

Does that sound too ambitious? I’m ready to give it my best shot.[/quote]

There aren’t many people walking around who can do either of those things. I would think it would be more difficult to achieve the overhead press numbers, actually. (Especially if we’re talking military and not a push press.)

Either way, don’t get disappointed if you don’t achieve either of those goals in the next decade.

Bear

All who are complaining.

“2 a day” and working same body part every day are techniques which have worked. They are not designed to be 110% every session. Usually done for creating extra stimulous or breaking out of a rut.

I can imagine one might use one of these technques only for a couple of weeks in a year.

All who are complaining.

“2 a day” and working same body part every day are techniques which have worked. They are not designed to be 110% every session. Usually done for creating extra stimulous or breaking out of a rut.

I can imagine one might use one of these technques only for a couple of weeks in a year.

[quote]Garage Dweller wrote:
600 pounds for 5 reps in the deadlift, and 300 pounds for 5 reps in the press?

Does that sound too ambitious? I’m ready to give it my best shot.[/quote]

Short to medium-term goals??? Yes that is ambitious. I agree with the guy who said he wouldn’t be surprised if after 10 years of consistent training you couldn’t pull this off.

Dan John has (somewhere) talked about “greasing the goove.” Basically, training a movement every day for a period of time – a couple of weeks – varying the load and volumn. He has also said, quoting someone else of high esteem, “if it is worth doing, it is worth doing every day.”

Keep in mind that weightlifters perform some kind of pull and some kind of squat pretty much every day. They don’t often worry about overtraining.

I think if you want to train it on a daily basis then you shouldn’t have a specific workout time but instead just do it throughout the day.

For example, wake up, do a nice easy set of 10 reps and then get ready for class. Lunch time hit another set or two. Before dinner get a set in, and then put yourself to bed with another set. Do the same thing the next day. My old man used to do that with overhead pressing when he was young, but he’d have the bar set up with a weight he’d try to hit for 10 reps, when he’d get 10 reps he’d put more on.

Spreading it out over the day like this seems to make it easier to recover.

As an aside, if you just have a bar and nothing else look up some of the old time strength movements and do those with the other stuff: Steinborn squat, bent press, floor press, rows, cleans, snatches, jerks, OH squat, hack squats, deadlifts, etc.

Also, instead of investing any money in a bench put it towards some squat stands. Considerably cheaper than a full rack and it allows you to have the bar in a raised position to squat or press more than you can clean. You could also do yoke walks then.

Regards,

Sensless

Again, thank you all for your replies. I appreciate all the comments.

First things first: I agree, 600 * 5 for the deadlift and 300 * 5 for the overhead press (not push-press) are ambitious goals, and they’ll make good long-term goals (rather than short- or medium-term as I first suggested). Even if I don’t reach those goals, though, I’ll still be happy as long as I’ve given it all I have.

How many people can lift that much weight for those exercises?

Secondly: I agree that if you’re going to do deadlifts every day (or quite often) then the overall volume of the workout would have to be rather low. But this is what I would have done anyway. I was thinking along the lines of 2-3 sets of 5 reps for the deadlift and 2-3 sets of 5 reps for the press. No other exercises. It’s not a lot of volume, is it? I might do slightly more sets, but it’d remain the same two exercises.

Thirdly: do you think deadlifts and presses will suffice to make me extremely strong and muscular, without the need to utilise other exercises? I know other exercises would doubtless help, but I’d like to keep things as simple and uncomplicated as I can. Just 2-3 sets of 5 reps of deadlifts and presses each day seems to be about as simple as one can get.

I’ll be going down to the garage soon, after I’ve had my breakfast and given my stomach some time to settle, and I’ll do some deadlifts and presses…

I just think that, perhaps, if one takes the time to get used to it, and if one doesn’t do too many sets or exercises, then it might be possible to perform deadlifts every day. I know some people who have become incredibly strong without picking up a weight, through manual labour every day (or at least 5 days a week), and although weightlifting is completely different, surely the human body is resilient enough to do a couple of sets of deadlifts every day and thrive on it, once one has become used to it?

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

I know this has been mentioned above but pavel tsatsoulone’s “power to the people” book is all about deadlifting and pressing five times a week.
I personally achieved a double bodyweight DL and a bodyweight overhead press just by doing this program when I was a beginner ( 3 long years ago, so obviously im a Vet now!).

This book is gold for beginners because it goes over technique of lifting in general as well as specifics of the lift.
good luck.

Louie Simmons of westside barbell related a story to me once of how he missed a deadlift at a meet which cost him an elite total, he was so mad at himself he deadlifted every day ten days straight to punish himself, and who and behold, after a short back off period he hit a pr. not sure of how he structured the reps and sets and loads though. i do remember him saying that during this period of time all other work was pretty minimal.

[quote]jtrinsey wrote:
I know I tried a 3 week program where I did:

Bench
Weighted Pull-Up
Deadlift

With about 85-90% of my max, singles until the reps got hard, as in the bar stalled out and I had to grind it out. Usually it was about 8-9 singles. The first two weeks went really well, but the second day of the third week my performance declined noticably. Overall I got a net benefit, but next time I’ll probably only go 5 sessions total: M/W/F of week 1 and M/W of week 2.

I would recommend doing it every now and then, I hit PR’s on all three lifts after doing this.[/quote]

It’s pretty well known that training at or above 90% of your 1RM for 3 weeks or more will result in a decrease in performance. Thus the conjugate system (switching exercises frequently) or periodization…

What you’re proposing is doable, but maybe not optimal. You would be probably be better off taking at least one, preferably two days a week off as recommended by Pavel.

Will you get strong on this regime? Yes. Will you get big? No. Will you have a completely balanced physique? Probably not, but who is to say what a balanced physique is.

This is the sort of training the old time strongmen used to do. It worked for them. No squat racks and bench presses in those days.

The only thing you haven’t mentioned is your loading parameters. If you are doing sets of 5, probably start with around 70% 1RM, work up in small increments (5 lbs) and be prepared to drop a rep or two when the second or third set gets really tough. Then back off to your original starting weight plus 5-10 lbs and repeat.

Let us know how it’s going in six months.

Does anyone think that deadlifts will make the entire body strong - that is, they will make every muscle stronger?

Is it possible to become a ‘monster’ (metaphorically speaking) through deadlifts alone?

To ‘sharetrader’ (and everyone else):

Sorry, I posted my last post before I realised you had made a post just then.

Thanks for your comments.

Yes, a day or two off each week, or whenever I’m just feeling tired and disinclined to lift, would be a good idea.

Why don’t you think I’ll get ‘big’ from doing deadlifts near-exclusively? I’m not arguing with you. I’m just wondering why I wouldn’t get bigger if I increase my strength appreciably.

My ‘loading’: usually I just use the heaviest weight I can handle for a set of 5 reps, and I stop when I reach 5 reps on any set. If I cannot do 5 reps on a given set, I just do as many as I can before I can’t do any more.

So 5, 5, 4, 3, 3 for example (if doing 5 sets). Sometimes it’s more like 5, 3, 3, 2, 2 if the first set takes a lot out of me.

I increase the weight quite often (too often), whenever I feel like the current weight isn’t very challenging any longer.

Thanks for your comments.

I don’t think you’ll get big if you’re only doing 2 or three sets. If you are going to do 5 as you suggested in your last post, then maybe. But you might run into trouble with overtraining if you do 5 sets as frequently as you are suggesting. Particularly if you are going to the limit as much as you say. Top weightlifters do this but they usually have some “assistance”, as well as optimal nutrition, rest, recovery methods etc.

You would get strong without getting big by increasing neural efficiency. Basically this means you use more of the muscle you have. Untrained individuals only use 20-30% of their muscle even doing a maximum lift. Even top weightlifters only use around 50%.

Thank you. I understand what you mean by neural adaption and so on rather than actual muscle size increases.

I was actually thinking of 5 * 5, which is a set-rep scheme that I like, but as you said, wearing myself out might become an issue if I am doing 5 sets of flat-out deadlifts every day.

I suppose I will just try to do as many sets of deadlifts as I can without wearing myself out, whatever that number might be (probably 3), and see how my body responds, before deciding whether to overhaul my programme again.

Thanks again for your comments.

Well…
I started an westside Routine and I’m doing Speed Pulls od dynamic Effort day,I’ll perform various forms of Pulls occasionally on ME Day and I’ll do technique work with just 50kg on tuesdays and thursdays.
IU hope that’ll getm e some big numbers :slight_smile: