I’m in a really weird place with them. There’s a part of me that wants to be good at them (as stated less than a week ago). But then I think of all my goals and it’s not in the top three and it actually goes against the others.
Bigger delts
Bigger upper chest
Awesome deadlift
Power Clean 275 again
Be athletic and able to run and jump
I can’t add muscle everywhere so I have to try to shift muscle from my lower half to my upper half. Putting in the work to have a decent squat interferes with goals 1 thru 3.
I’m an idiot.
On the plus side, I’ve managed to stay consistent with everything by my squat stuff all year.
I think you told me recent something along the lines of “sometimes you just need to walk away from a lift for awhile.”
This is probably your time. Honestly, if you’re driving your deadlift and power clean up, with your leverages and hating squat anyway, it may not even really go down.
Devils advocate, is the squat helping drive your dead up?
Great work on the deads today - love the stupid idea work and can fully empathise with the nausea inducing training, might have to try grapes next time!
I doubt it’ll go down much more than it is. Half squats might actually work better…or a pin squat from the half squat position. That would strengthen my catch position for the clean.
Not at the moment. It may have helped in the past.
I usually go for the Starbursts but thought grapes would be healthier. They worked.
Well for the vast majority of people a better squat will help with power cleans. But as a tall, long legged lifter your leverages are different. We cannot clean or front squat like the tiny legged chinese.
But yesterday again I was listening yet another coach about how the mental and physical aspect are linked. If you hate these, don’t do them, you can improve your leg power differently.
Usually when something is working it’s better not to change it right? Unless it drives you insane probably
As I get older, the thing I appreciate about squats is that they improve my overall knee health. It seems counterintuitive, but the more I squat, both in volume and weight, the better my knees feel.
They also help with push presses. Even if I am not really doing them right now.
SQUAT
135 x 5
165 x 5
195 x 5
225 x 3
255 x 1
285 x 1 This is the start of 5/3/1 Training Maximally. If this were squat day then I should do a couple of Joker sets and then 3-5 sets of 5-8 reps at about 70%. But it’s not squat day; it’s deadlift day and I feel better on deadlifts after doing some squats. It’s a strange phenomenon for someone who loathes squat training. SHOULDER REHAB
“No Money” for three sets
Face Pulls for two sets
Super Set
DEADLIFT
275 x 5
325 x 3
365 x 1
395 x 5 x 5 sets CABLE PRESS DOWN
60 x 15 after first work set of deads
60 x 15 after second work set of deads
60 x 15 after I was done with deads because deads suck worse when your triceps are tired/pumped
POWER CLEAN
185 x 2
205 x 2
225 x 1
235 x 1
255 x 1 x 5 sets
Super Set
CLEAN PULL
305 x 3 x 3 sets REV DB FLY
25 x 15 x 3 sets
BARBELL CURLS - TRIPLE SET
65 x 10/10/10
Lifting Time: 1 hr. This session is a doozy and I cut some things. It was also my lunch break and it ran a little too long. Oops.
I’ve been feeling pretty good about my training and then I remembered that you’re doing 10x10 on stuff and it almost makes me puke just thinking about it. Today’s 5x5 was tougher than I would have liked but it’s also the third week of 5s and I’m building up to max again. It’s not supposed to be easy.
Saw your post about getting bored with the forum, just wanted to encourage you, firstly your input is always valued and secondly, I enjoy and I think most others do, routing for people. Your journey has been great to watch, you are putting in solid work and it’s nice to see a long productive spell with no injuries, getting stronger all the time and physique is on point too!
I’m hanging in there. In these forums, you get what you give. I just haven’t had much to give lately so I haven’t been generating any discussions or activity. It’s my own fault. I don’t know why but I’ve kind of zoned out lately. I’d blame it on work but work hasn’t exactly been difficult. We were always on call for potentially stressful stuff but it didn’t pan out so I just ended up sitting around a lot. It was a strange experience. I did nothing, but it wore me out.
Hopefully I’m starting to shake that off and get back to my old self. Lucky for me, I never missed a beat with training. I think I missed one session and I’ve adopted a new split that doesn’t have assigned days and I’m loving it. I find myself wanting to train on off days so that’s probably a sign that I’m in the sweet spot.
