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Thread: 53 yrs old & twice a week sqauts

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jul 2017
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    ThunderBay Canada
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    Default 53 yrs old & twice a week sqauts

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    Just wondering if others have experienced the same twice weekly squat issue. I currently do the Mon/Thurs split as prescribed by Rip and also in Barbell prescription. I am slowly going up in my squat about every two weeks after staying with same weight for the two week period. When I squat on the Thursday again before other lifts I usually only do a couple sets with very very light weight. I am not recovered enough to squat at 60% on second day.....and yes the eating is coming along.... feed back on twice a week squatting from others appreciated.....

    TCM

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
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    Philly burbs, USA
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    Do you mean the p233 post novice program in PPST? I ran that (one top set + backoffs, rather than 5x5) for a long time at 50+ and never had major issues with doing light day closer to 90%, and adding a rep each week on the heavy day. How are sleep and T for you?

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Oct 2014
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    Everett, WA
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    470

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    Quote Originally Posted by TCM View Post
    Just wondering if others have experienced the same twice weekly squat issue. I currently do the Mon/Thurs split as prescribed by Rip and also in Barbell prescription. I am slowly going up in my squat about every two weeks after staying with same weight for the two week period. When I squat on the Thursday again before other lifts I usually only do a couple sets with very very light weight. I am not recovered enough to squat at 60% on second day.....and yes the eating is coming along.... feed back on twice a week squatting from others appreciated.....

    TCM

    I squat twice a week with heavy day on Wednesdays and light day on Saturdays. I am following the PPST pg 233 method of one workset and two backoff sets. My backoffs for squats is at 90%, I've tried 95% but then I can't recover. I too take about two weeks between increases in weight. Saturdays is also my deadlift day and I only do two sets of squats at 90% that day. I did try only one squat day per week but that simply wasn't enough to drive adaptation.

    My squat was really not going well until I read an article by Andy regarding the squat and people constantly doing resets with it and a comment he made on a forum post about why the squat vs other lifts seems so much harder. (For me it was all mental keeping me from progressing.) Since then I've gotten my squat from 225 to 260. Yes that's still low for a guy who's 5'10" and 180lbs but at least now I'm progressing slowly but steadily.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jul 2012
    Location
    Ohio
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    I'm 51, and squat 3x/week. It's just a matter of choosing the weight and sets to stay within your recovery budget. You can't go all-out every time.

    Sunday: 4 sets across, with a weight chosen so that the last set stops 1-2 reps short of failure. This is the hard workout, it leaves me sore for days.
    Tuesday: 2 sets of 5, at -20% relative to Sunday. Still sore here, this is light day.
    Thursday: 3 sets of 5, at -10%. The goal here is to not be sore on Sunday.

    In an intermediate program, you don't want to be fully recovered from workout-to-workout, i.e. you should be sore going into some workouts. But you have to manage things so that you do get recovered at regularly scheduled intervals, or you'll develop overuse injuries.

  5. #5
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    Apr 2008
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    Palos Hills, IL
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    61 yo here and I also squat 3x/week, HLM program, similar to cwd. I tried twice/week but it was difficult to make decent progress. I tend to do better with squats when the volume is spread out over the week and the frequency is 3x/week.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jul 2015
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    the Island of Misfit Toys
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    I switched to twice a week when I felt burned out doing 3 a week and then every third day (impractical). Progress on the Post Novice programme was okay for a while and then I just couldn't make the fifth rep, it was always the fifth rep.

    It would help to know what sort of weights you are working with and precisely how your program is structured.

    In another post of yours, you give some weights, but I don't know if they are pounds or kilos.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Jul 2017
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    ThunderBay Canada
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    Thank you fellow lifters....yep it seems I am on the right track then,...my second squat day is usually around 40 %. These feel great after the first set..and yes without the second day adaptation does not seem to occur for me... I thought I must go heavier..It also seems that right now a two week period on my top weight is needed, the second week with an extra set of three sometimes really drives up progress for the new weight the following week. Just wanted to check in with my fellow geezers...Thank you all....
    PS It is sad as almost no one up here in Canada has ever heard of SS. I been telling other lifters at gym....young guys just do bro science...old guys do cardio ...sometimes bench and if they squat...1/4 squats! Wish we had some SS coaches in the great white north! Ripp please come to Canada!! lol
    TCM

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Oct 2014
    Location
    New York
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    I've been squating 2x a week, on DL day I warm up with the bar,95/6 then 2 sets of 5@ 135, my main reason is that I found when I squat once a week the delayed muscle soreness kills my legs for two days.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Sep 2014
    Location
    Nova Scotia, Canada
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    524

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    I'm 61, and do a workout every three days and squat on both days. The light workout is at 90% of the heavy day weight. No problems, no DOMS. If I miss a scheduled workout by a couple days for whatever reason I do feel it afterwards.

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Apr 2012
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    Garage Gym
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    starting strength coach development program
    Squat one week and do Deadlifts the next. Continue to alternate. Doing this produced all time PR's on both lifts for me. I'm returning to this program on Saturday.

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