Both Poliquin and Alessi are very strong proponents of maintaining certain strength ratios between certain muscle groups for optimal hypertrophy, strength gains, and injury prevention.
However there seems to be a slight discrepancy between Poliquin and Alessi's recommendations.
Poliquin does note ratios depend on specific sport and goals.
However for an average weightlifter he recommends Ham strength be at least 80% of Quad strength.
Alessi on the other hand recommends leg extensions be 400% of leg curls. This seems to be a huge discrepancy.
Alessi also mentions one arm DB rows should use a weight 150% greater than that used for front db raises. That seems too little. I use 80lbs for db rows for 8 reps. That would imply I'd have to use about 52 lbs for my front rows.
What does anyone else think about strength ratios, and whose ratios do you trust more? Poliquin's seem much more on the money, but thats just me.
definitely important to maintain some strength balances. imbalances can lead to injuries in the knee, shoulder, etc. plus, they can hold back performance.
i have no specific studies that i can think of now though.
i would think 400% of leg curl for leg extensions would lead to knee problems. sprinters are much closer to even quad/ham strength.
i’d think db rows would be more like 2.5-3.0x front raises.
Yes, those ratios do seem off. I’d be doing front raises with 100 lb. dumbbells. You’d have to ask him though, perhaps you are somehow mistaken.
I believe Dr. Squat said his hamstrings were stronger than his quads when he squatted his 1000lbs.
That definately jives with Westside principles.
Yes, his hams were way stronger.
If you’re some sort of competitive athlete, I can see the emphasis on certain strength ratios because there has probably been a lot of research to find out what’s optimum for best performance. I.e., a sprinter needs X amount of quad strength to Y amount of ham strength, etc.
But if you’re just a recreational athlete, as most of us are, and are simply interested in looking good and being healthy, I don’t think that you really need to worry about particular ratios much. So long as you have a decently-designed program and practice some sort of periodization you’re probably going to be okay.
I can point to scores of people I know who have been training for decades, none of whom worries about specific strength ratios, and none of whom has suffered much because of that lack of attention. If you do have an imbalance in your program, your body will let you know, and it generally won’t be a really debilitating injury - more like shoulder pain that goes away with some rotator cuff work and a little more emphasis on your teres major.
I’ll be dammed if I can do anywhere near a leg extension that I can do with leg curls. My hams are waaaaaaay stronger. At least in a single jointed movement. The rows vs front raises sounds totally wack. Maybe he ment combined weight. So 80 lbs one arm row equals 53 lbs. divded by two 26.5 lbs. Actually that still seems like a lot. Me confused. 
I am not so much concerned about performance as I am about how strength ratios will impact future strength gains.
-
We all know you’re only as strong in a particular lift as the weakest link in the chain.
-
Your body has a mechanism by which it inhibits hypertrophy of a muscle if it is disproportionately strong/weak to its antagonist counterpart. I.E., if your chest is too strong compared to your back, your body will reach a point where it will not allow further hypertrophy of your chest thus putting a stop to further chest strength gains. It does this to avoid shoulder injury - its a natural survival mechanism. Look around the Gym. Many weightlifters should be displaying rounded shoulders. This means their chest is too strong in proportion to their backs - the chest pulls the shoulder forward, and the back isnt strong enough to keep them in place. This puts pressure on the your delts, and will degrade your performance.
As such, if you do keep tabs on these ratios, and realize your chest is too strong for your back, you can lighten up the load on your chest, emphasize back and possily rotator cuff work. This will bring your body back to harmony, and weak links will disappear, if weak rotators or weak lats were negatively impacting your bench press, f.ex. Also, since your shoulders will be back in their place, nerves wont be impinged anymore, which will allow even greater performance at the gym, which will further translate into optimized hypertrophy.
Poliquin covered this VERY well, and Alessi, while I dont agree (or perhaps misunderstood) with his ratios, also did a good job of bringing this important topic to the forefront.
Gotta disagree with you here, Diesel:
"We all know you’re only as strong in a particular lift as the weakest link in the chain. "
No argument there. But all that means is that you have to bring up that weak link and then you’ll be able to lift more. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to improve the ratio of that muscle’s strength to another muscle’s. If that were true, it would mean that you could squat more by either (a) bringing your hamstring strength up (which is true) or, alternatively, (b) bring your quad strength down so that the quad/ham ratio became more ideal. Obviously, weaker quads aren’t going to help you have a better squat.
“Your body has a mechanism by which it inhibits hypertrophy of a muscle if it is disproportionately strong/weak to its antagonist counterpart.”
With all due respect to Poliquin, Alessi, et al., I have to view this assertion with some scepticism. How has this been tested? I think that it would take something like having someone train, say, biceps for years under a certain protocol, with no triceps training at all, see how large their biceps got; then, when there was no further increase for a given (very long) amount of time, start training the triceps and see if they then experience further hypertrophy in their biceps. (And you would have to have some pretty sophisticated measuring exquipment for that - just taking an upper arm measurement obviously wouldn’t do it, since the triceps mass would have increased.) To my knowledge, nothing even remotely like this has ever been done.
Also, regarding your other point about strength gains being limited, if you look at how powerlifters train (and I’m including the Westside guys with this), while a lot of them do train their backs quite a lot, I’ve never seen (or heard of) anyone using their bench weights for a barbell row, for example. And a lot of them do walk around with their arms propped out at large angles to their torsos, indicating a strength discrepancy. But they still manage to increase their bench and get bigger on a regular basis.
I don’t doubt that CP’s and Alessi’s tests have quite a lot of merit. But again, I think that for the average (or even above-average) recreational athlete, a program that is simply well-balanced will do the trick without worrying about specific strength ratios.
…
What, no discussion on the above?
Uh oh, now my feelings are hurt… 
diesel23- A correction if I may: The pecs and lats are both internal rotators which have their proximal attachments at the bicipital groove of the humerus. This means that rounded shoulders does not nessecarily equate to weak lats, if the lats are strong and tight, they will also cause a internal rotation of the humerus and a rounded shoulder look. This has more to do with a weak rotator cuff, rhomboids, and mid traps.
I agree with char-dawg that ratios are more suited to athletes, and therefore will change depending on the endeavor.
The best thing I took from Poliquin’s ratios back in the day when he published his info, was the comparison of CG press to external DB rotation. This has validity in athlete and non-athlete alike.
All in all, I believe postural analysis is a more effective tool to judge imbalances than strength ratios.
I have included this topic in an upcoming article.
Mark, you KNOW your stuff. I’m very impressed.
Say, if a guy like me, who’s motivated to get past all the obvious stuff and learn all the indepth stuff and get the ‘behind the scenes’ facts, what books do you recommend?
Is there a book on postural analysis? That will certainly be a very interesting topic I wil bevery interested in.
What books would you STRONGLY recommend for a Personal Trainer?
Char, that is certainly a good point… it certainly makes you consider the validity of Poliquin’s recommendations. It’s still interesting that all of my ratios fit like a puzzle with the exception of my chinups and reverse curls.
Char, I very much enjoyed your post. It’s a rarity indeed to read any challenge to Poliquin and Alessi.
DI
Aw, shucks. [Digs toe into ground…]
Marc’s right. I’m a prime example of myfascial rrestrictions holding back strength gains.
Postural analysis is good, along with understanding your anatomy and how the various muscles work. If you learn ART, this gets very simple and advanced at the same time. Remember, muscles can adhere to other muscles which will change movement patterns. Strength ratios are a waste in my opinion.
Keeping your shoulder girdle moving well and strong along with your hip area should be fine. External hip rotatores, hip flexors, hamstrings, pec region, rear delt, rhomboids, and traps will allow you to properly pursue strength gains.
I think one thing that people are missing in regards to Poliquin (and maybe Alessi, though I am not sure) is that the ratios are just one thing among many tests that are used. Charles does ART, postural analysis, etc. as well. It’s all part of a system. Also remember that Charles stated that these ratios are just observations, and not any sort of law, so you must be careful in how much stock you place in exact percentages. Finally, while postural analysis is good, I think movement analysis is more important. One can have a postural discrepency (i.e. pigeon toed sprinters) that when viewed in motion either does not hinder performance or simply “disappears”.
As far as I understand: in advanced trainees, Alessi expects
the one-arm dumbell row to 450% of front raise.
(does it mean a large number of us are adv trainees)
Also, in one of his articles, he
notes that a trainee should be able to hold one-fifth of his body-weight in a
90 degrees position while standing.
Regarding the ratios, I got all messed up while trying to apply both Poliquin
and Alessi. Assuming that both of them are right, then 100 percent of BP (as
per Poliquin) should equal 1.8 times body-wieght.
Here are some ratios I got after combining both Alessi’s and Poliquin
structural recommendations:
BP: 1.8
Row: 1.8
Incline Press: 1.5
CJ: 1.8 bw
Front Squat: 1.5 bw
Snatch: 1.5 bw
Back Squat: 2.0 bw
Deadlift: 2.0 bw
Snatch-Deadlift: 1.5 bw
Behind Neck Press: 1.152 bw
Supinated Chin-up: 1.448 bw
Curl: 0.828 bw
Reverse Curl: 0.540 bw
Lying Triceps Cul /head crushers: 1.3248 bw
External Rotation: 0.162 bw
Internal Rotation: 0.216 bw
FR: 0.4 (for advanced trainees?)
Front-raise hold: 45-90 sec at 0.2 bw
Overhead squat: 0.5 bw
I’ll take a rest, calculations boggle my mind
Exactly Sully. I think that the ART and postural studies are the most important. There’s also the level of the trainee. Are they a newbie or are they advanced? What has their training been to this point. You’ll often find those haven’t done squats yet guys.
Charles was an instructor at my first seminar in ART. He knows his stuff, but does have the reputation for being pretty heavy handed with ART. It’s probably from his clientele. The amount of tension you need for a muscular patient can be up there. I personally prefer a strong man to treat me. You need to get the tension right, or it won’t happen treatment wise.
A few things that come to mind:
-I believe that the internal and external rotation figures are based on 8RM.
-The back squat and deadlift numbers seem quite low. For instance, I can deadlift 2.6 times my bodyweight, but wouldn’t even come close to considering myself “elite” or anything along those lines, as my glutes are weak.
-I’ve always thought that the BTN press figure was a bit high, but there’s so much variation in how far down people go that it’s a tough call.
-EC