G’day everyone,
Just inquiring as to how many of the serious weightlifters here squat every day. I know a number of world class Olympic lifters who do this and have recently adopted the training style myself. I find that if I miss a day, I won’t be nearly as strong the following day.
Anyone else do this?
Cheers,
hm954
I squat 10-13 times a week.
Depends what kind of squatting. I’d say since MDUSA does it, it’s obviously possible for natural athletes. You just have to build up slowly and not max every day.
But I’m not a world-class coach, and there are world-class coaches who will say just start squatting to a max every day.
[quote]louiek wrote:
I’d say since MDUSA does it, it’s obviously possible for natural athletes.[/quote]
Are you sure Glenn programs daily squatting? I was the impression he prescribed something more conservative precisely because his athletes are clean.
So only people using ped’s can max every day?
[quote]Ed Ache wrote:
So only people using ped’s can max every day?[/quote]
No I don’t think so. I do think it’s easier for them to ramp into it quickly though. I think you can squat daily in some capacity just fine without PEDs. Heavy daily squatting will require lots of time easing into it though IMO, since it is worlds different that even squatting heavy 3-4x a week
[quote]Ed Ache wrote:
So only people using ped’s can max every day?[/quote]
That’s certainly not what I was implying. Simply that, from what I have read of his, he doesn’t believe that daily squatting is necessary, and that an athlete’s training volume is, in part, is affected by PED use (or lack thereof). A non sequitur, perhaps?
you can definitely squat daily and without PEDs, I would suggest approximately 5-6 days a week. most olympic lifters alternate between back squat and front squat every session and tend to periodize i.e. a few weeks of 5s, then 3s, 2s and finally 1s, usually at 80%+ of 1RM; some lifters favour front squats, some back eg 60/40 and some do max daily effort - whatever the system, you tend to have a mix of heavy, medium and light days; if you tried 100% of 1RM every day then you would end up injured etc unless you are a complete beginner. what sort of programme/routine are you following? missing a day should not make you feel weak the following session, usually quite the opposite 
I took my back squat from 185kg to 205kg and FS from 160 to 180 over a 3 month period by working up to a near max single 7 days a week on whichever squat I felt like doing that day (front or back). Also, without having made any other changes, dropped about 8kg of bw almost all of which had to have been fat. At the time, I would squat to max and then do the lifts and that was pretty much all I did. My body ached occasionally. I stopped doing it because I enjoy deadlifting too much to give it up forever, though it is certainly something I would consider doing again in moderate length cycles for a quick boost in squatting strength. For what it’s worth, I dove right in with no “break in” period. One day I just decided I was going to squat to max everyday and that is what I did. Overall, I enjoyed the experience/challenge and noticed that max lifts became very easy. Currently, I am squatting 3x a week.
Edit: I actually squatted everyday for about 5 months. I hit my last PR in the BS after 3 months though. However, my last FS PR came at the 5 month mark.
how long were your workouts when you were squatting every day? and what were the intensities?
do you think someone with around 10 months training experience could do the same thing? my squat is at 145kg and my FS is at 115.
how many reps of near maxes did you do each day?
[quote]mbag012 wrote:
how long were your workouts when you were squatting every day? and what were the intensities?
do you think someone with around 10 months training experience could do the same thing? my squat is at 145kg and my FS is at 115.
[/quote]
Me?
I don’t think it would be necessary/optimal for someone with 10 months experience to squat that often, at least not to max.
[quote]ape288 wrote:
I took my back squat from 185kg to 205kg and FS from 160 to 180 over a 3 month period by working up to a near max single 7 days a week on whichever squat I felt like doing that day (front or back). Also, without having made any other changes, dropped about 8kg of bw almost all of which had to have been fat. At the time, I would squat to max and then do the lifts and that was pretty much all I did. My body ached occasionally. I stopped doing it because I enjoy deadlifting too much to give it up forever, though it is certainly something I would consider doing again in moderate length cycles for a quick boost in squatting strength. For what it’s worth, I dove right in with no “break in” period. One day I just decided I was going to squat to max everyday and that is what I did. Overall, I enjoyed the experience/challenge and noticed that max lifts became very easy. Currently, I am squatting 3x a week.
Edit: I actually squatted everyday for about 5 months. I hit my last PR in the BS after 3 months though. However, my last FS PR came at the 5 month mark.[/quote]
Pretty much the same here. Had a 2 week layoff after having my car totaled. That’ll be 2 years in July. Since then I maxed my front squat daily for a year, went from 140 to around 160. Without back squatting it went from 160 to 170x2. I now back squat and front squat to daily. Back squat always to max, front not always. PBS are fs 170x1 (160x2) and bs 200x1 (190x2). Daily minimum bs at the mo is 190.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
[quote]Ed Ache wrote:
So only people using ped’s can max every day?[/quote]
No I don’t think so. I do think it’s easier for them to ramp into it quickly though. I think you can squat daily in some capacity just fine without PEDs. Heavy daily squatting will require lots of time easing into it though IMO, since it is worlds different that even squatting heavy 3-4x a week[/quote]
Aragorn is right on the money. It will take your body some time to get used to it. I tried squatting heavy daily for a couple weeks and just regressed and quit. My friend who is also a powerlifter told me about his experience with it though. He said it took a few weeks before he actually started making any progress on it, but after that he made the best gains on his squat in his entire life.
[quote]csulli wrote:
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
[quote]Ed Ache wrote:
So only people using ped’s can max every day?[/quote]
No I don’t think so. I do think it’s easier for them to ramp into it quickly though. I think you can squat daily in some capacity just fine without PEDs. Heavy daily squatting will require lots of time easing into it though IMO, since it is worlds different that even squatting heavy 3-4x a week[/quote]
Aragorn is right on the money. It will take your body some time to get used to it. I tried squatting heavy daily for a couple weeks and just regressed and quit. My friend who is also a powerlifter told me about his experience with it though. He said it took a few weeks before he actually started making any progress on it, but after that he made the best gains on his squat in his entire life.[/quote]
I would venture to say that past physical activity and training history probably play a huuge role in how long it takes your body to “get used to it.” As I said, I dove right in with no break in period and I was just fine. I believe Ed is saying he did the same thing (correct me if I’m wrong). However, I have been highly physically active on a near daily basis my entire life anyway, and leading up to daily squatting I had built my training capacity up over several years and was training the Olympic lifts everyday.
Yes, daily max squatting is a different animal, but it’s possible that my body wasn’t as shocked by it as say, somebody whose idea of hard training is 1 hour a day 3x a week.
[quote]mbag012 wrote:
how long were your workouts when you were squatting every day? and what were the intensities?
do you think someone with around 10 months training experience could do the same thing? my squat is at 145kg and my FS is at 115.
[/quote]
It didn’t take me all that long to squat, maybe half an hour including warming up. But all I was doing was going to max…e.g. bar x 10, 60x5, 100x3, 125x2, 150x1, 170x1, 185x1, 200x1 was a ramp scheme I used many times on the back squat. Then I would stop squatting and do the lifts which took a lot longer.
Initially I made huge gains, best of my life, but eventually I got to a point where my progress stalled on this. If I do it again, when my progress stalls like last time, I will begin adding in back off sets to increase volume. Drop 10-15kg and start cranking out doubles.
[quote]Ed Ache wrote:
[quote]ape288 wrote:
I took my back squat from 185kg to 205kg and FS from 160 to 180 over a 3 month period by working up to a near max single 7 days a week on whichever squat I felt like doing that day (front or back). Also, without having made any other changes, dropped about 8kg of bw almost all of which had to have been fat. At the time, I would squat to max and then do the lifts and that was pretty much all I did. My body ached occasionally. I stopped doing it because I enjoy deadlifting too much to give it up forever, though it is certainly something I would consider doing again in moderate length cycles for a quick boost in squatting strength. For what it’s worth, I dove right in with no “break in” period. One day I just decided I was going to squat to max everyday and that is what I did. Overall, I enjoyed the experience/challenge and noticed that max lifts became very easy. Currently, I am squatting 3x a week.
Edit: I actually squatted everyday for about 5 months. I hit my last PR in the BS after 3 months though. However, my last FS PR came at the 5 month mark.[/quote]
Pretty much the same here. Had a 2 week layoff after having my car totaled. That’ll be 2 years in July. Since then I maxed my front squat daily for a year, went from 140 to around 160. Without back squatting it went from 160 to 170x2. I now back squat and front squat to daily. Back squat always to max, front not always. PBS are fs 170x1 (160x2) and bs 200x1 (190x2). Daily minimum bs at the mo is 190.[/quote]
When I BS 201 I also hit 170 on the FS.
What is the minimum you would hit in the FS out of interest?
Koing
interesting comments Ape re maxing, were you actually doing 100% of 1RM every day? or were you doing daily max as I mentioned ie going as heavy as you could for that particular session? AKA bulgarian. my own training was arguably more russian and I was training twice a day 4 days a week and once on the other 2 days, 1 days rest. I know/have trained with quite a few very strong guys ie 300kg+ high bar back squat, c&j 200kg+ and they all tended to cycle percentages/reps - I know a few who’ve successfully done bulgarian but it was max daily effort as opposed to actual 100% every session, usually multiple sets at the top end eg 10 singles at 95-100%+ on a good day.
[quote]Charlietr wrote:
interesting comments Ape re maxing, were you actually doing 100% of 1RM every day? or were you doing daily max as I mentioned ie going as heavy as you could for that particular session? AKA bulgarian. my own training was arguably more russian and I was training twice a day 4 days a week and once on the other 2 days, 1 days rest. I know/have trained with quite a few very strong guys ie 300kg+ high bar back squat, c&j 200kg+ and they all tended to cycle percentages/reps - I know a few who’ve successfully done bulgarian but it was max daily effort as opposed to actual 100% every session, usually multiple sets at the top end eg 10 singles at 95-100%+ on a good day.[/quote]
I was doing daily maxes. I always forget to specify that lol. Like Ed, I had minimums that I would hit. I found it was almost always possible for me to hit within 5kg of my current max on any given day. The goal was to hit the minimum and if it was solid, then go for another heavier lift which was basically just gravy. If it was tough that day, then I’d stop there. The goal, obviously, being to gradually increase the “minimum” over time.
I wish I got to train with guys who could squat 300 and C&J 200 lol, you’re lucky.
Koing; 160. But I can do more if I do a “mr burns” fs.