Two training questions

[Ryan Dell Whitley]

Mr. Rippetoe,

I have unintentionally become a "coach" of some sort to two of my friends. I don't like it, but they both want to be strong, saw me get strong, and asked for my advice. So I'm being a good friend, and they've both gotten pretty strong. I have two quick questions:

1) Trainee #1 is ready to move on to some intermediate programming. He has been doing SS, gone through a few (I think three) resets and has finally stalled. I was wondering where to start him on TM in regards to his squat. He got 355 last week during his last SS workout. I personally had to play with it for myself when I was in a similar situation. Any suggestions? I was thinking about maybe dropping him back down to 315 for the 5X5. Thoughts?

2) Trainee #2 is a pretty established intermediate lifter, and has just become my training partner for a highland games event later this year. Our main focus is power production, so we are doing TM with power cleans and power snatches. He has had some surgery on his wrist/hand and as a result cannot get a wide snatch grip. He has no issues with power cleans, so I was wondering if a clean-grip snatch might be a viable exercise (he can do this with no issues) or if I should just have him skip snatches all together. Any suggestions?

Thank you for your time.

[Mark Rippetoe]

1. That's a big drop, in the absence of a good reason. I'd just take him back to about 335.

2. If he CANNOT snatch, you'd better make sure his wrist is not going to get hurt doing the games events. If he cannot snatch wide, just focus on cleans and throws.