Squatting and deadlifting

SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish

Seems most of the posters on this thread subscribe to what amounts to fairly modern lifting practices and seem to believe that those modern lifting practices are the only valid ones. Daily lifting was not unusual before the 1950s/1960s and, believe it or not, there were strong guys before the mid 20th century. More recently you can find lots of olympic lifting folks doing cleans (with more weight than most here are probably deadlifting) and various types of squats heavy on a near daily basis and programs like the smolov squat program are based on heavy, even high volume, daily lifting (yes, I can acknowledge that it is an advanced program).

While I can agree with jimmmer that the OP may not have the best handle on things and has the potential to mess himself up that is also a strong possibility with a more modern 2-3x per week plan. Something like Power to the People is intended to guide someone without a whole lot of experience. If the OP really wants to go the daily lifting route there are plenty of options out there for him to do so safely.

Well first off, someone should get a good foundation of consistent regular exercise in a more easy to follow way, and then playing with it is fine. Next, how you lift makes a world of difference. If you are not doing maxes, of course you can do more frequency. But first you have to get straight with what you actually want and spend some time seeing what actually works best for your body. That means time, trials, consistency and observing how your body reacts. This guy is starting off, and he is not a professional athlete already in the high percentages in strength with a large background of time spent, muscle built and trainers to track and give him therapy daily. Once you spend the time and if you are dedicated, yes you can try a program like smolov's, but thats not a beginner program, and the more background/time spent building your lifts before you do that program, the better results you will get.

So, since he's no experienced athlete, doesn't have a lot of time and experience lifting, no trainers, therapists and coaches looking over his shoulder and treating him, this is what we go by. If you want strength primarily, this increased frequency type of workout is not the way to go, and in fact, for top level atheletes either, they don't train with many sets over and over every time, they do less sets and reps, know their maxes and get close to them.

Now, you bring up hyped stuff like Pavel and use it as justification for a new lifter increasing frequency, who has no idea of his ranges, and maxes as an example of lifting heavy every day, this is also very misleading, and completely against what Pavel says. If you pay any attention, Pavel actually advocates the "less is more" general idea like I said, NOT increased frequency and reps like the OP wants to do! Pavel advocates essentially more "efficient" workouts, so you spend LESS time, LESS reps, and get more out of it by increasing maximal tension, but you need a good foundation and to know what your maxes are to utilize this. Lets give you a quote for example on his idea of what and why a powerlifter did his lifts as he did, showing he agrees again with maximal lifts with less reps, not increased reps and frequency:

"Look at Ed Coan. He can do a set of three in the squat with 875 pounds, but he could have done five reps. He does three and calls it a day. If he was dumb enough to listen to these high intensity idiots, he would have used a lighter weight, say 660, and done 12 reps to failure. Then the ambulance would have to be called because he would have blown out a hamstring. That would be the end of the greatest powerlifter in the world. "

"So the next time you get brainwashed by the HIT Jedis, go into a powerlifting gym or a weightlifting gym and watch how the best people train. You’ll find a ton of weight, very low reps and no failure. Why low reps? Safety. It’s the tension of the supporting muscles that protect you. Low reps are generally much safer even if you’re using a heavy weight.

Twenty-rep squat programs are great. They’re worth doing once in a while, but don’t make it the mainstay of your training. You can’t have the focus with so many reps. You don’t respect the weight and you get hurt. People squat heavy with no problem, then blow out their backs loading a 45 pound plate. Why? They don’t respect the weight. It’s hard to respect something light. When you learn to keep your whole body tight — and you can only do it when the reps stay low — that’s when you can really achieve maximum safety. "

SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish

OP, PM me. If I can find my copy of Power to the People I would be happy to send it to you. Even if you don't use the program there is a lot of good info in the book. Note that you really should give any plan you try at least a few months.

Thank you, that's very kind of you, but I think I've found a copy of it online. It will be a while before I am able to read through it, so I won't be trying anything like it for a while at least.

Sounds good, especially getting a foundation first part. And when you do try it, read what he actually says first, not what people say about him or say he says, he actually advocates lower volume and higher weight, REDUCING training time, which if you do, you can increase some frequency.

Kirk_R

SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish, I must not be clear as you have completely misinterpreted what I've said. My recommendation to the OP if he wants to do daily deadlifting is to check out Power to the People, which is a good program for beginners with a lot of other good info on lifting. My other comments are to the posters who seem to have a limited view of what valid programs are, e.g., calling daily lifting stupid and dangerous.

JoRocka

They don’t respect the weight. It’s hard to respect something light.

people say this about sport bikes too...

It's the dumbest thing ever I think. I guess it's just easier to say respect something than to say- go out- do this for years- and educate yourself- as you get better- you can try new things. But it takes years of learning and it doesn't come over night.

jlclabo

i didnt read every post so i dont know if anyone else has suggested this, but you definitely need to add some dynamic stretching to your daily routine. every day.. multiple times a day. foam rolling will also help to release the tension from the muscles that are in an imbalance. any form of stretching that promotes thoracic extension will help with the upper back rounding you have. and just as a tip, if you dont have good posture as of now, what makes you think more deadlifts and squats with poor posture are gonna help? all it will do is further promote bad motor engrams. you need to correct the imbalance in the proper way before progressing any further with poor form. i am in no way an expert, never will be, but this is just my honest opinion......

SoLongAndThanksForAllTheFish

Maybe I did misinterpret you Kirk, I did clump reaction to responses together. Alone, that program may be OK, but I just wouldn't recommend it at all for him right now, and some I know of seem to get the wrong message out of that book.

My response is based on what has been said: the fact he's a relative newbie, he doesn't know what program to do (so we dont know what reps/sets he thinks he will do), he says his core is weak, and he says he has injured the area previously and claims he "have a lot of muscular imbalances and I'm trying to use my own routine to correct these". That's a very bad foundation to say its OK to do one lift daily every single day (which is probably about what the average person will take home from it), and yes I'd say that it is dangerous, especially since a back injury is probable.

His posts sounded to me like he's still changing what he's thinking as we post. And still I wouldn't really recommend that lifting style for a beginner, but more for someone who has done some foundation work already and needs a change, yes its an opinion.

Stretching is great too as the poster said above, just don't do it before lifting heavy, but after

Kirk_R

Some people you can't help unless you're standing there in the room with them keeping them from doing stupid stuff...

debvilla55

What is deadliftingt training?

jimmmer

What is deadliftingt training?

The most awesome exercise known to man (or woman).

Fullsterkur_woman

What is deadliftingt training?

The most awesome exercise known to man (or woman).

True story.

Mighty_Rabite

That's way too much load per week, IMO.

I barbell squat and dead lift only one session per week each (I do other supporting leg moves) and even during my current phase of cutting down, I have at least maintained strength, if not built.

Huffdogg

volume has very little to do with strength gains. the intensity of training is far more important. If you keep your frequency high, you can get away with low volume with no problem.

I'm going to disagree on your comment on volume and strength gains. While western programs tend towards lower volume and higher intensity ones from the east (e.g., Sheiko) tend more towards volume and "moderate" intensity. Both methods have produced world champions. Higher volume is going to tend to bring about neural improvements more quickly than low volume.

Bulgarian is now somehow Western?

Huffdogg

Mehdi from Stronglifts has mentioned that he's been doing a squat everyday program by Matt Perryman for a while. I'm not a part of his "inner circle", but I'd imagine the info on that program is out there if you want to look for it.

Perryman's Ebook is only $7.

Kirk_R

Bulgarian is now somehow Western?

Why are you mentioning bulgarian?

trojan_bb

Terrible idea.

Try deadlifting 5x a week and then evaluate your progress. I think you'll quickly see why it's a bad idea. Squatting is easier on recovery than deadlifting. I've read countless logs of guys who tried frequent deadlifting, made poor progress, went to once a week or even once every 2 weeks, and progress resumed.

Plus, everyone thinks they are invincible until they slip a few discs. Trust me, you don't want a slipped disc at 24. It impacts the rest of your life and makes training back that much more difficult. I can't even deadlift now because I herniated a disc at 21, have to resort to rack deadlifts from the knee.

Not even the Eastern routines have that much deadlifting.

Fullsterkur_woman

Such a shame, because I love deadlifts that much. I would happily do it every day, but seems like twice a week is as much as I can manange.

vanguardfitness

You're worried about a hamstring injury and you're doubling - tripling your volume on squats and deadlifts?

lol?

Huffdogg

Bulgarian is now somehow Western?

Why are you mentioning bulgarian?

Most high-frequency, high-intensity, low-volume lifting programs are inspired by Bulgarian Olympic training from the dominating era.

jimmmer

Mehdi from Stronglifts has mentioned that he's been doing a squat everyday program by Matt Perryman for a while. I'm not a part of his "inner circle", but I'd imagine the info on that program is out there if you want to look for it.

Perryman's Ebook is only $7.

Yeah - why would you pay Mehdi to learn about Perryman's ideas. Besides which it's a breezy read and it's nice to support the person who actually did the work.

I don't know about in the US, but here in the UK you'd struggle to buy a pint with that kind of money...

bradzahringer

I'd heard Wendler 531 was a bit outdated and there are better, more recent programmes, but this may not be true.

I run the 5/3/1 and it has been the best program ever. I compete in NAS. Strongman competitions ans this program has brought awesome gains. I have hit a 525 dead in competition and a 210 log press and now am training for my second one in march and i have hit so many PRs in the last week its crazy. Dont judge it til you have atleast ran a few cycles.