Strange Soreness

[zach_the_jew]

Hello,

I’m a 29 year old male, 6’2” ~205 lb. I’ve been doing SS consistently since Corona shutdowns ended here in Israel - February. I’ve worked up to a 170kg squat with good form thanks to the help of an SS coach - Zohar Yirmiyahu.

I’ve been having an issue recently with my squatting. It causes me very bad pain in my quads after getting to high(er) rep counts or after high intensity. It becomes difficult to walk, not to mention unpack presses etc. The pain stays for 45mins - 1 hour then goes away completely and my legs feel perfectly fine. It is a deep pain/bad soreness through the entire muscle belly of my quad and often radiates through into the knee as well, but it’s very distinctly a quad pain.

Been eating sufficiently - enough to keep gaining weight. Not sure how many calories but the weight on the scale is still rising. I’ve spoken with Nick D’Augustino (hope I got that right) and his ideas boiled down to electrolytes/hydration and overtraining. I’ve tried downing more water+salt (didn’t help) and Zohar and I have lowered the volume from intermediate (Sunday intensity - top triple and Thursday volume 4x5 @88%, so about 140 last time I did this split) to much lower volume - top single on Sunday + 3x3 on Thursday. Been two weeks and no change.

Wondering if you or anyone else has any ideas about this, what could be causing it and how to make it go away.

Thank you!

Attached is a video of my squat (not a perfect angle for form evaluation but enough to demonstrate my form shouldn’t be causing this. That is Zohar’s assessment as well)

Squat 140 x 5 - YouTube

[stef]

Bizarre. How do you explain transient pain that it is specific to one muscle group and one lift? Electrolytes and overtraining are systemic problems, but if you want to test against the former, don't supplement "salt." Instead supplement the electrolytes you're more likely to have problems with, potassium and magnesium. It wouldn't hurt to try massage targeted to the fascia if you can find someone competent.

[zach_the_jew]

Thanks, Stef. It is very strange. Nothing else causes the pain. It may be simply because the squat gets deeper into the fatigue hole for the quads than say a deadlift. Also runs through a full range of motion on the muscle.

When I said “salt” that was a proxy for electrolyte stuff. I’ve tried magnesium but it did nothing other than give me the runs. May have been too large of a dose and am going to try a smaller dose soon.

[stef]

I’ve tried magnesium but it did nothing other than give me the runs.

You don't fix a tissue deficit with short term supplementation. If it is Mg2+ and K+ it will take time to accumulate.