Num Lock Edition

Starting Strength Weekly Report

July 18, 2022

On Starting Strength

War Movies – Rip and John Musser talk about the best war movies of all time.
Bodybuilding vs Strength Training – Andy Baker co-authored Practical Programming for Strength Training and The Barbell Prescription: Strength Training for Life After 40 with the founder of Starting Strength, Mark Rippetoe. Ray and Andy sit down to discuss the differences between strength training and bodybuilding.
Get a Better Front Rack – Starting Strength Coach Phil Meggers demonstrates a helpful stretch for you to get a better front rack position for the clean.
Health and Strength Training: Thoughts on The Way to Live in Health and Physical Fitness by Corey O'Malley – I had the opportunity to dust off my copy of The Way to Live during a recent flight. It provides unique insight for folks like myself who ruminate on the state of health, fitness, and effectively applying useful principles to help others...
Applications of Starting Strength and Practical Programming to Powerlifting Competition: Abigail Smashes the Glass Ceiling by Geoff Bischoff – Life is better strong than weak. Spend time under the barbell doing serious training and you will know this is true...
Weekend Archives: How Did You Become a Personal Trainer? by Carl Raghavan – I get this question a lot. What did you do? How do I become a personal trainer or a coach? Of course, they don’t usually want to hear the truth...
Weekend Archives: Strength and Conditioning - Conditioning and Strength by Mark Rippetoe – Most of the articles and books I write are intended for people just starting their training, for several reasons. First, there are more of you...

From the Coaches

3 Ways to Condition, Improve Your Work Capacity, and Burn More Fat – Robert Santana and Trent Jones discuss the value of conditioning in a strength program, and three ways to implement it based on your goals in this episode of the Weights & Plates podcast.
Is your focal point - or lack thereof - destroying your press? In this video - the sixth in Testify's series of Saturday Shorts on fixing the press - Phil Meggers quickly discusses and demonstrates how to solve this problem.
Raising your chest too early on the deadlift? Pulling around your knees? Well, that seems like a rather terrible idea, doesn't it? Let's fix it. Phil Meggers discusses this problem as well as how to solve it.
Pain & Injuries In Barbell Training | Part 1 – Listen to this episode of the PRS podcast to learn about why barbell training injuries happen & the athlete recovery process so you don’t lose ground.

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In the Trenches

grace clean and jerks 22 kg at testify strength and conditioning

Grace cleans-and-jerks 22 kg as she continues practicing her Olympic lifting. Grace trains with her dad, mom, sister, and brother-in-law at Testify Strength & Conditioning in Omaha, NE. [photo courtesy of Phil Meggers]

michael helps Holly rack the bar after a set of bench presses

Michael at a Saturday morning class helping Holly rack her bar after a bench press set. [photo courtesy of Arthur Frontczak]

abby smiles as she locks out a deadlift pr at starting strength cincinnati

Starting Strength Cincinnati member Abby smiles through a deadlift PR in the 7am session as coach Camisha, fellow member (and proud mom) Angie, and apprentice Tony look on. [photo courtesy of Lucas Schroeder]

roslyn lehman at starting strength oklahoma city

Roslyn Lehman at Starting Strength OKC. [photo courtesy of Greg Herman]

Best of the Week

Hey RIP. Am I condemned to never doing push-ups again?

ChessGuy

30 years ago I increased my pushup count from 35 reps to 50 reps by incorporating 2X8 dips.

Now I'm using a machine with a selectable counter weight to do dips. I'm stuck on 3X5 machine dips twice a week with 120lbs counter weight.. I'm 226 Lbs now as opposed to 1989 when I was 211.

Tonight I pulled 185 lbs X 5 and squatted 135 3X5.

Is it possible to be an upper body eunuch while having good results on lower body exercises?

I am 70 years old.

Mark Rippetoe

What are your bench and press numbers?

ChessGuy

My best bench ever was 150 and my best press was 72. Once I was stuck I stopped trying and the heal issues came into play.

I'm doing dips, squats, and deads twice a week. The squats and deads are coming along nicely after 8 workouts. Dips are stuck. I like them, though.

Mark Rippetoe

As long as you're having fun, carry on.

Best of the Forum

are my numbers good enough to compete?

sirlinx

So I just finished my LP with the only lift still going up being the deadlift, but because squatting 3x a week made me very tired and unable to process work (I work in front of a computer all day and my mind was not all there, feeling much better now that I've moved on) I decided to move on from my LP altogether. I'm mostly wondering because I'm starting to want to compete. There's a competition at the end of the year for just deadlifts, but I always thought my numbers were still poor especially when compared to things I see online. I just wanted to see where I was at and searched for strength standards online and came across two tables (one from SS), both tables are telling me I'm either late intermediate or pre advanced, which I find hard to believe since Monday of last week I was still running my LP. Now I ran a calculator to get my PR's, this is because I've never actually tried to lift singles and see what my PR was before, so I will post my actual working numbers as well as the calculator's estimation. Are these good numbers to start competing?

I'm 42, 165cm - 5'5, body weight 75kg - 165 lbs

actual working numbers:

squat - 3x5 141kg / 310.2 lbs
press - 3x5 60kg / 132 lbs
bench - 3x12 71kg / 156.2 lbs (I was benching mostly for hypertrophy because I benched at home alone and not at the gym)
deadlift - 5 reps of 152kg / 334.4 lbs

calculator estimations for PR:

squat - 159kg / 349.8 lbs
press - 68kg / 149.60 lbs
bench - 102kg / 224.4
deadlift - 171 kg 376.2 lbs

Mark Rippetoe

I don't understand your question. If you want to go to a meet, it doesn't matter what your numbers are because you are going to get beaten the first few times you enter. Competition motivates your training, and if you wait until you know you'll win to enter a meet, you're not a competitor.

sirlinx

I don't have any aspirations of winning, I just want to get some experience. But I don't want to get laughed at either. I have no idea if these numbers are good enough to start competing because I'm the only guy who trains for strength in my gym so there's nothing to compare them to.

Mark Rippetoe

Then go to a meet and watch. Nobody laughs at anybody who has the balls to enter the meet.

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