[quote]Ruggerlife wrote:
Cephalic_Carnage wrote:
Ruggerlife wrote:
Overall comment:
I’m still liking this program except for only squatting once a week. I’ll be doing two more cycles before switching to a peaking plan for my November competition. Part of the reason for the higher than usual increases (ie. bench increasing by 10lbs and squat possibly by 15lbs.) is that I am trying to gradually increase the intensity to transition nicely into the peaking cycle which will include gear and heavier weight).
If your deadlift technique/form was fine, you could just go with 2 squatting movements instead of 1 squat and 1 deadlift… But that’s obviously not possible here (at least not yet).
What do your squat and dl days look like again?
Hey C_C,
Welcome to my log, make yourself at home.[/quote] As long as you do the cooking and cleaning and all that, fine 
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Yeah, I still need to work on my deadlift, although it is coming along nicely. I never realized how far forward I was with the bar until I tried deadlifting in a suit. I quickly learned that when you get out of your groove in a suit, you don’t get back in. haha. It’s good motivation though.
[/quote] The only experience with PL gear that I have is with convict double-ply knee sleeves.
It was a 2 hour struggle to get them on (I lost half the hair on my calves while doing so and most of my patience) and another 2 hour struggle to the death to get them off again without having to utilize sharp implements.
Lost the remaining half of my lower leg hair in that battle, got a giant calf cramp due to the lack of blood supply to my calves while the sleeves were on and I haven’t touched the wicked things since then.
Well, I did try once to fit them over my arms, but that didn’t work out either.
Someone could have warned me… I had no idea you powerlifters are that much into S&M… Now I get the whole gear thing… It’s not about putting up more weight after all… [quote]
I’ve played around with the squat and deadlift days a bit trying to see what works and allows my lower back to recover in time. For squat day I was originally doing: [/quote] Are you doing standard 5/3/1 frequency (3 sessions per week, 4 different workouts total) ? If so, then that alternative template I set up a while ago should work for you and allow a little more focus on your lower body stuff… [quote]
Back squats
Pedley Rows [/quote] Do you mean Pendlay rows, or is there actually a variant called Pedley ? [quote]
Good mornings
Chin ups
Abs work
But after a while I noticed my lower back wasn’t recovering[/quote] Well, that must have come as a surprise 
[quote] so I switched up the good mornings for front squats and the Pedley rows for Kelso shrugs (leaning against a incline bench). I also noticed that I sucked at the rows and wasn’t really getting anything out of them.[/quote] Rowing for backthickness is a lot like forcefully trying to get into (raw) bench position (bottom part) but you’re doing it bent-over etc and you’re not trying to overarch… Scapular retraction etc is important there, and don’t go too heavy… All my local trainees turn rows into a bicep/brachialis exercise when they do that, may be your problem as well. [quote] I was thinking of trying the Yates Rows (I think that’s what their called; barbell row with supinated grip, elbows tucked, and body on a ~45-60 degree angle[/quote] More like 70 degrees [quote]). What are your thoughts on them? I was also thinking of trying a supported barbell row against my incline bench, but I’m not sure if the range of motion is there or not.
[/quote] Imo nothing beats kroc rows, you may have progressed a little too fast and thus your technique is going down the drain = less effect on the back and a lot more arm flexor involvement and momentum.
Yates rows are kind of nice for learning how to row “correctly” because most people automatically retract their scapulae etc with that particular grip. Also fries the traps pretty good.
If you decide to do them though, don’t rest-pause them and go maybe try a set of 12 or better 15… If you get it, up the weight for a second set. If not, do the same weight on the second set… Try rotating those with kroc rows.
Keep your setup etc so that you don’t get much bicep involvement though… It’s not a bicep exercise, despite the grip.
I have done them on and off, figure that the way you guys set up for benching, those may really help a lot more than regular BO rows…
Are you doing Kroc’s on a bench or with your stabilizing hand on the DB rack? [quote]
For Deadlift day, we had:
Deadlift
SLDL
Kroc Rows
Ab work
[/quote] Pretty tough… Hey, that may be another reason for why kroc’s aren’t working out as well anymore… Hard to do them justice after deads and SLDL.
I have a different 5/3/1 assistance template in my training thread, where back is trained on bench and OHP days and lower body days get arm flexor assistance (deadlift day also gets quad assistance and abs and calves if you’re a bodybuilder or just want to train them, squat day gets ham assistance, abs, possibly calves).
You could try that variant after your meet and see how you like the setup. [quote]
The only change here was recently I’ve added in some barbell shrugs after Kroc rows, partly because the Kroc rows don’t seem to be fatiguing my upper back as much as they used to. I’ve also started doing the Kroc rows in 2 parts, sort of a makeshift rest-pause. Since my grip is giving out first I put on a strap but don’t wrap it around the dumbbell, rep out and then quickly wrap the strap around the dumbbell and bang out a few more. I’ve only done it once, but it seems to have worked a bit better. My problem may have been my grip as the weight went up (June 80lbs, nor 110lbs). [/quote] Just do them with straps the one workout and go heavier, then without straps but for higher reps the other workout… That’s what Matt is doing as well, I think… Works ok for me and it’s less complicated
(he’ll do something like 175x40 or whatever the one session strapless, I think, and 300x12-15 or whatever the other session with straps… Although I’m not sure if those 175 are really without straps.[quote]
Let me know if you have any comments/suggestions. Even though I only have one more cycle planned, I really like this training set up and plan on using it again as soon as I can.
As an FYI - The upper body template has really worked in adding strength and size. I have one more cycle to do and then I’ll give you an update. But just to give you an example, my CGBP (2-board/rest-pause) was a total of 16 reps with 185lbs on June 12 (Cycle 1, Week 1), last Friday (Cycle 3, Week 3) it was 13 reps total with 245lbs. And it’s still progressing. [/quote] Nice to hear that! Any negative things you noticed? Btw, might want to try rack chins/rack pullups instead of regular pullups and RP them… Far easier to actually progress and your lats will probably grow a lot better then… = bigger bench (hopefully) and it’s easier on the tendons. [quote]. Are you deloading your assistance work whenever you deload your 5/3/1 work or did you just keep going? The rest-pause works best when you deload every 8-12 weeks or so for a week or two, no RP, short of failure, possibly lower the weight and all that. Keeps the reps high during your actual training phases and progress comes easier…
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