No deads in The Strongest Shall Survive

[howardw]

Hey Mark,

I recently bought The Strongest Shall Survive since it is something of a classic at this point. I've enjoyed for several reasons including injury rehab and a thorough disputing of the "squatting is bad for the knees" study.

I'm still surprised, however, that Bill does not include deadlifts. He states in a paragraph that they have a "high casualty rate" and just aren't worth the trouble (p79).

Obviously you've reached a different conclusion. Can you give more insight on his thinking and why you came to see things differently?

Thank you,

howard

[Mark Rippetoe]

Bill was specifically addressing a football audience with SSS. He felt that, given the limited attention span of most football coaches, he had to get as much out of 3 exercises as he could, and the PC was better than the deadlift for football purposes. Bill always recognized the limitations of the deadlift, and he had me very strong without doing them at all for years as a competitor. I use them for novices, but notice that I also recognize their capacity to overtrain a lifter and so limit their volume to one work set.

[Andy Baker (KSC)]

Funny this should come up about SSS. Reminded me of a post I wanted to write on here several weeks ago but forgot to. I read an article several weeks ago that Bill Starr wrote one time looking back on his classic book and how it could be improved upon. One of the things he stated was that in actuality, his "Big Three" (squat, bench, clean) should have been the squat, press, and clean. However, being that the book was for an audience of american football coaches, he knew that the program would not be taken seriously unless the oh so sacred bench press was included as a focal point, and not just used solely as an assistance exercise. Funny how nothing much has changed? In the never ending quest to find out "how much ya bench" you can still walk into any high school weight room in America and find a plethora of athletes benching with their asses 12 inches off the bench, three spotters with their hands on the bar, and the coaches calling it a "good lift."

[colnago]

I also bought starr's book. I was surprised about the big difference between your intermediate program Mark, Texas Method, and Starr's. His just seems so much lighter with :
1 x week 5rm attempt (and 1 previous workset with 9 % off the bar, not counting the other 3 "worksets", because of being so much lighter than your sets across weights ). And your's 1x week 1,2 or 3 rm attempt. These days are about the same.

A same light day more or less.

But leaving your "stress" day 5x5 approximately 80% of 1rm ( every of the 25 reps being very hard), and Starr's medium day with even the last and hardest workset of 5reps 7-10 % lower in intensity than your 5 sets weight across.

Is what it boils down to with your program filosofy that you are a big believer of building strength through fatigue (3-5 worksets weight across) rather than intensity ( 1 workset, being a ramping 5 setter)?

[Mark Rippetoe]

If you had the book, you'd know that the Texas method is only one of three intermediate programs in PPST, with several variations of all of them. I don't advocate any one method, and Bill's is one of the programs in the book.

[colnago]

Well I am sorry Coach. Please read my post without the words Your's then.
Just wanted to know weather there is a difference in building strength through fatige or intensity and why they both work so well. Thought I had a terrific question, at least I'm very curious.
And just because I 'm not a very intelligent, accurate reader or writer doesn't mean I didn't bought your books. (Well your's and Lon Kilgore's)

[Mark Rippetoe]

Look, don't get so upset. You asked me an either/or question, and I don't think in terms of either/or for this level of programming. We detailed both approaches for a reason. And fatigue vs. intensity is a rather significant misinterpretation of the effects of the methods.