Lagging Quad Strength

Hello everyone!

Before I start, my stats that I am sure I can do:
Max bench 115 kg
Max squat 115 kg
Max deadlift 170 kg

We can all clearly see the issue but the cause is simple, I got ACL surgery on both knees, the last one beeing 10 months ago (but it’s my other leg that’s lagging the most…), while I started lifting seriously a year ago. I finished recently the CT’s powerlook program with great progress in strength(3x108 bench, 3x90 front squat, 3x75 push press, 5x150 deadlift) and I decided to go for an upper/lower split, to have two days focusing on legs, and bring this part up, because I’ve only been training them for 7 months.! I’ve been doing it for a month, and even though the hypertrophy is great on my whole body, I have issues with my legs. My hams and glutes are great, but my quads are the limitating factor (I can feel it during the deadlift)

This week I very easily did my objective of 5x5 bench @80% but I couldn’t do it with the back squat today. I struggled so hard, staying like 3 seconds at the sticking point at the end of the second set. I had to decrease by five kilos. The workout was a struggle, felt my strength vanishing, and taking long resting times.

So maybe I adressed the problem wrong? Maybe only 1 leg day is what I need? Or maybe I should decrease the weight and put on more volume? Or ditch the back squat and come back to front squat?

Thank you for your answers

Are you trying to bring up your quads or your squat?

Yes you’re right. My quads

volume for quad growth. 10+ reps on everything. Go as high as 25 reps on front squats and leg presses.

It burns like a motherfucker but that’s what gets your quads growing.

Coming back from ACL reconstruction myself, I’d say a good way to get some more lower body volume without taxing the knee too much would be some prowler work. If you can, walk backwards with it and it’ll really blow up the quads.

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X2 on the prowler. If you haven’t got one, next best thing IMO is dragging something, a sled or even a tyre with heavy crap on it.