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Quote from: entropy on April 01, 2013, 03:52:49 am

But by next year, I should be thinking in terms of a 400 pound front squat while being a lean and cut 85kg bodyweight.

I don't want to be that person putting you down... but unrealistic expectations are often the cause for failure. 

Lol I know I will never realistically squat 400 whether FS or HB - esp while lean -- it's a ceiling for me, if I aim for it, i might exceed all expectations than if I set a lower goal. Aim for the sky  Ditto with the BW goal, 85kg lean is nuts, 80kg lean would be amazing really.

In a years time you want to add ~30 lbs of muscle and 150lbs to your front squat?  All while playing basketball, running and jumping?

I know I can frontsquat 130kg at a bodyweight of 72-73kg without a doubt. I recently worked up to ~125kg at around a fat 75kg bw. Adding 50kg to that while allowing my bodyweight to go up 13kg isn't unreasonable is it?  That's around 3.85kg on the bar for every kilo of bodyweight, not too crazy.

I anticipate I can get to 140-160kg efficiently once i'm done cutting and eating at a decent caloric surplus while staying around 75-80kg. And from there it's not a stretch to think I could add 20-30kg to the bar while adding 5-10kg of bodyweight. But yea i'll be a bit fatter than I expect, and I probably wont be a lean 85kg, just a very strong one. I'll have to cut to probably 80kg or so, I can see it happening though. I'm confident about getting around 2xbw ~ 150-160kg - anything above that will be a bonus.

Start small.  Your not a beginner anymore so gains are harder but still attainable.  Think in terms of adding ~20lbs to a lift over periods of 8-12 weeks.  Do this every so often and you will keep getting stronger.

I think I am still a beginner in many ways, at least in hypertrophy terms, ive been been on a caloric deficit for most of the time, not much opportunity to grow mass (and -> strength). When I went off the deficit, gains came easier. I know I can get to 140-150kg without any trouble just by getting off the diet. Not saying i'll squat 400 overnight, it might take a long time.

My motivation is high right now, lets see where it takes me.

Just got back from the tournament. Man it was nuts. Here are a few things for me to keep in mind

- It's not easy guarding bigger guys who have 2-10cm of height on you and 30kg of bodyweight! I did ok boxing out on account of my leverages/squat strength but I really need to add 5-10kg of mass before next year's tournament.

- Need to become a jumpshooter

- Need to have a 40" vertical

And trainingwise, i'm going to aggressively chase a double bw frontsquat and highbar squat. Going on a slight caloric deficit (10%ish) so I can keep training hard and keep pushing my lifts up hard.

But by next year, I should be thinking in terms of a 400 pound front squat while being a lean and cut 85kg bodyweight.

My conditioning held up very well.

I need to play more ball now, i'm addicted, was nuts having a crowd cheering while you're playing an intense match, shit's like crack, i want more now.

Woke up with my back tweaked, usual symptoms, pain in my left glute area. I shouldn't have strained those overhead presses. Really need to keep a rep or two in the tank on that fucking lift.

Quote from: entropy on March 22, 2013, 11:30:53 am

Quote from: LBSS on March 22, 2013, 10:19:51 am

more supplemental work for back? i know KF has made great use of rows and hypers.

Thanks. Perhaps in the future. I've added it to the TODONE list. I think I can get to my current goals without any extra non-squat assistance. But from there, say FS-5x115 will need to work on my upper back strength specially on that last rep. What I might do is add an extra rep on my backoff set. I usually do fives for those, might make those 6s. Might that work?

I'd caution against thinking like this.  There are two reasons why your upper back strength is limiting you. 

1) Holding heavy weight across the shoulder is causing your upper back to fatigue which causes your bar position to shift during multiple reps making the stress even worse.  This is often the problem when you are doing more than 3-4 reps.   

2) You are grinding a bit due to weak/fatigue quads and your instinct is to shift more weight to your hamstrings/glutes/low back and good-morning a bit... Of course you can't do this in a front-squat without dumping the bar so your upper-back has to dynamically fight the rest of your body to pull you back upright. 

####

In either case I would recommend against adding assistance work specific for front squats.  Remember, your goal is to jump high.  If its case (1):  Would upper-back work get you an extra rep or few lbs on your front squat... Maybe.   But you aren't trying to break the front squat world record, you are trying to become a better athlete.   For all the advantages front squats have for training athletes.... The big disadvantage is that the fatigue is almost unmanageable at higher rep ranges.   If you want to do higher reps, this is what back squat is for.   You just became an expert high-bar back squatter, now you can call on this ability to for your higher-rep back off work.   And yes, back squatting may require some assistance work down the road... and it might be unavoidable, but it will at least hurt your ability to get your legs stronger LESS than it will in the front squat.   

If it's case (2), then just let yourself get pinned if your upper-back forces you to with heavy weight.  When you do grind and feel upper-back activation though.... Keep your legs firing, cue the legs to fix the problem not the other way around.   Notice how when I do a high intensity front squat my back gets activated/bar slips forward and bar speed suffers.... However, I complete the rep not by having a strong back (my upper back is not very strong) but by keep my legs firing and standing up.   Keep your training simple.  It's working really well.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqCrz52UeBY" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqCrz52UeBY</a>

Appreciate the detailed logical analysis brother. I'll try to discover which of 1 or 2 it may be. I go thru the first 3 reps without any problem, it doesn't seem heavy or challenging. The 4th one is hard enough but it looks easy on video. By the 5th rep i'm conscious of this being the last one - so I take a few breaths trying to get mentally prepared to bust out the effort. At this point i'm feeling the fatigue. I want to rack the weight but I also want the PR. I push forward. While resting before the 5th rep, I'm aware that standing there with a barbell on my shoulders is fatiguing me further so I can't wait too long. I need to stay tight but my body isn't willing to expend that effort because it's saving it for the final grind out of the hole. I go down into the hole and come up quick, and then, at around 1/4 squat position im at a dead stop, my back has rounded and I ride the bar down to the pins. I have to remind myself then that I should have anticipated my upper back rounding and worked harder to stay upright but it never occured to me during the actual rep because I was so focused on just completing the rep.

I agree with you that instead of GM it up, it's better to fail the rep. Or at least try to finish it by pushing thru the legs. That's good sense. I don't make a habit of GM my front squats, I consciously keep form honest throughout the set.

Why I have been doing 5s. I like the idea of doing 2 heavy sets of 5 and getting my volume in quickly. I did a lot of triples initially but those things are a bitch mentally, especially when I squat 3x a week and doing heavy triples frequently just kinda sucks. It's fun once in a while, i dont mind doing a set or two once a month. But 5s just seem better, they're brutally hard, they carry over to 3s and they give a great workout. I like the challenge and the economy in total sets they provide. Having said that, you've made a good case for doing higher reps with backsquat and lower reps with front squat. I think when i've got my FS fives to somewhere decent say 125kg - i'll maintain that, and then do more triples and doubles while doing the higher reps with backsquat. That's the other thing. I fail frontsquats a lot more gracefully than backsquats. Backsquat failure is kind of sudden, abrupt and precarious - i've learnt now to ride the bar down anticipating failure rather than actually failing though. Whereas with front squats I can technically fail and still safely ride the bar down without any risk of injury.

Also your video is private!

more supplemental work for back? i know KF has made great use of rows and hypers.

Thanks. Perhaps in the future. I've added it to the TODONE list. I think I can get to my current goals without any extra non-squat assistance. But from there, say FS-5x115 will need to work on my upper back strength specially on that last rep. What I might do is add an extra rep on my backoff set. I usually do fives for those, might make those 6s. Might that work?

^That's a highly specialised situation dude, not regular training. I get the same effect out of banded swings, but I'm not going to put them into my regular programming! But you have a point, everything has a use, I just don't think the deadlift has a place outside the PL's training. If you need to recover for a sport etc then you have to choose the exercises which give the best bang for the buck (where the cost is recovery and perhaps injury). Having said that, my experience with the trapbar was very favourable. It got my front squat moving right away which had been stuck for a while, so it seems like a friendly exercise for athletes.

In other news, I was training every other day in the lead up to the basketball comp but i've burned out or something because yesterday I had a fever and even though I was tempted to train thru it, I thought to take the day off and see how I felt the next day. Better. But lots of shit going on in my life right now which is affecting me badlly. She's killing me. Not good.

On the bright side, i've been eating like a teenager back when I went to university, loads of carbs, loads of icecream. My body loves it. Sleeping better than before, my mood is great again, i have developed a ferocious appetite for life. And if you think i'd have gotten mad fat as a result, it hasn't happened. I think all the cutting i've done has made my insulin sensitivity and p-ratio very favorable. So i'm actually not gaining any weight while eating loads and training hard. But my muscles look fuller and i'm as strong as i've ever been. While weight is around 76kg now with all that glycogen storage. So it's pretty awesome. But here is the most crazy thing - my waist is now a legit 32" - like close to get into the 31"s, i look lean. I took Kingfishers advice to heart eat more to squat more lol and it's been working, PRs every workout afetr being stuck for weeks when cutting.

Oh and I forgot to reply to

dude the last BS vid you posted looked like best yet. it's like t0ddday said a few pages ago in this thread: before it just looked like you hadn't practiced it much. lots more confidence evident now.

Yea every time i've done the lift i've gotten better. My best attempt was the last one 6x112.5kg PR! That's better than I ever did with low bar and I had great form. High bar fits me like a glove now. It's uncanny, i went from backsquat retard to highbar stud overnight. I can't explain it. Can anyone?
 

Training
FS 4Fx110, 5Fx109.5
BS 6x112.5 (PR), 5Fx112.5
LBBS 6x85, 6x87.5, 6x90
OHP 2x4x57
BBALL TRAINING (60 made shots,conditioning, practising low post moves etc)

FS notes:
Yeah in hindsight the 1.5kg PR attempt last time was a bit too much. My form was perfect on the first 3 reps, and on the 4th, for some reason i came up on my toes, which meant I lost position on that rep and failed the set. This never happens to me, my heels never cup up so that was strange. If I hadn't come up on my toes I probably would have got the 5RM PR today, it didn't seem that hard otherwise.

The 2nd set form was good, and I came oh-so-close to grinding out the 5th rep but I couldnt get it up.  But really, if I had attempted 5x109.5 (PR) in the first place instead of 110 would have got it today, so that's what i'll do next time. No probs. I can def get 5x110 this week. It will have to be on the saturday workout.

BS notes:
Went for 112.5! Got the first set ok. And I didn't have the juice to do a 2nd set. I could have malcolm X'd a 5th rep at the high risk of snapping my shit up, but I didn't bother, I just did the eccentric and set the bar down on purpose with great control. That's still half a rep right? Haha. It's all good.

I have to say something, the high bar squat, I didn't choose HB, in fact on paper my favorite backsquat would be the low bar squat. But the high bar squat chose me. For real, it has dragged me kicking and screaming to becoming my favorite backsquat out of sheer pragmatism. I <3 HB now.

BBall training
I wanted to do sprint, sprint, jog intervals for 5 mins straight. But I simply couldn't last the full amount of time. My conditioning is pityful. Hopefully it improves a lot very quickly. Help.

also,  I think I did a windmill dunk but I don't believe it myself until I see it on video. nuts..

---

So now i'm training every other day. I want a highbar BS 6x115 (PR) and FS 5x110 (PR) by the last workout before I leave.

Quote from: entropy on March 17, 2013, 02:18:38 am

I was studying the front squat for the first time in forever and I ended up watching johnymnenomic on youtube. I remember watching his video when I initially started front squatting and I was very impressed with the way he maintained a vertical back.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NRmdtSvmQQ" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NRmdtSvmQQ</a>

This time around I noticed how wide his stance his. I bet if I had such a wide stance I could have nicer form with less violent movement into the bottom position. But I think at some point I decided I liked a narrow stance because it felt more comfortable and strong, and because it was more applicable to athletic endevours. I looked at my stance just before a jump and I pretty much have the same sort of stance in my squats as well.

I was also browsing pendlays forum and came across this post by one of the guys theree

Quote from: Koing

Oly squats you DO NOT WANT TO DIVE BOMB IN TO THE SQUATS. This WILL RUIN YOUR KNEES IN THE LONG RUN. Not a question of IF BUT WHEN.

NO COACH will tell a lifter to dive bomb in to the squat. Descent should be controlled and fast up. You want to get STRONG and not use the bounce in the squat to squat more.

Your knees will take a huge amount of a beating in the OLifts as it is.

This will hurt the smaller guys A LOT MORE. The smaller guys will have less muscle/ fat around the joints and will be able to get deeper and this will ruin your knees if you drop from a greater height in the squat. It really is a recipe to injure yourself longer term.

Ask Glenn/ Don about this. You do not want to drop in fast in the squats to get strong/ get use to the bounce. Practice the bounce by lifting and getting the timing. You will use less weight and you will be dropping from a lower height.

Koing

And it got me wondering, am I doing what Koing describes above? I really should get those knee sleeves as well.

No, youre not even close to dive bombing your squats.  Second, Pendlay is a HUGE proponent of catching a bounce at the bottom of the squat.  Watch any of Norths squat videos and you can hear him scream it on every rep. 

Good to know. I was worried that stretch/bounce i'm catching at the bottom was the divebomb which Koing was warning about. I guess I got that doubt from watching the squatrx FS video above where johnny goes into teh hole and doesn't catch the bounce. But he squats way differently from me, he has a very wide stance and he doesn't go as deep. I love his squatting though dont get em wrong but it's completely different.

Looks like youre still improving your front squat and athleticism, that vid looks great. Good shit.  Fastest way to stop those improvements is start changing shit up and get on some of those glute bridge/deadlift/cns efficiency pistol low bar glute hypertrophy rdl hyperextensions and stop focusing on the shit that actually matters. 

lol! made me laugh out in real life. yea no probs, i'll stay the course.

a 2 x bw front squat at your height will mean 30000000 times more for your athleticism than anything else you can do with a barbell.

shit. that's a sick goal, a double bw front squat would be too amazing. I think i'm closing in on 1.7bw right now but i've let my bodyweight go up a bit lately, and if i come down to below 75kg i'll be above 1.7. I can def see me getting around 1.8bw just by manipulating my bodyweight though - and that's without trying to push my lifts up aggressively. But once that's all done, i will have to bulk towards 2bw because there is no way i'm front squatting 150-160kg without gaining a load of mass.

Thanks lance.