Q&A – 49

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Q&A

Leeuwer on  said:

Dear Justin,

My girlfriend is highly interested in growing muscle, powerlifting and losing fat. This is fantastic.

I moved her from a typical diet to a paleo diet. Currently, she is used to sprinting 2-3 times a week.

I wrote down the following training routine for her:

 

Workout A:

Squat
Press
Chins (5 x 2, one leg on a bench behind her, cannot perform multiple reps unassisted yet)

Conditioning: 10 minutes Jump Rope

 

Workout B:

Squat
Bench Press
Deadlift

Conditioning: 10 minutes Jump Rope

 

These are alternated for three weight training days a week.

I suggested she limits the sprinting to twice a week and performs a calmer jog or walk on the third day (since she trains dogs and does her training with them). These are performed on the days in between weight training.

 

The questions:

1) Is the chin-up progression all right for her the progress to doing singles or doubles on chinups? Once I know that she can perform at least two chinups, I’ll move her up to doing 10 sets of singles, etc. Is this a good idea?

2) Is the sprinting/weight training too much? Having them both on one day would allow for more recovery, but that is unfortunately not possible.

3) Based on your article on females and higher reps, I wondered how I should best program her sets and reps. Better to have her perform 3 sets of 10 or 3 x 5? Or would you advise alternating? She wants to gain muscle and firm up, first and foremost.

Thanks for any advice.

 

Dear Leeuwer,

Good to hear that your girlfriend is interested in strength training and muscle building. Before I get to your question, I just have a few general notes to consider. This doesn’t mean you have to blindly follow them, but I think they are relevant.

– I’ve written about developing a chin or pull-up for females exhaustively. “Programming Pull-ups” and “Developing A Pull-up” will give you all you need to know. I also suggest “Experiment for da Ladies” in this case. This addressed your first question.

– I’m not a huge fan of just simply alternating A/B workouts in a linear progression unless the person is brand new to lifting. The A/B alternate will have a trainee deadlifting three times in two weeks, and this will become a problem very soon. If she’s brand new, then run with it, but after 6 to 8 weeks, just have her deadlift on Friday and do RDLs on Monday (or whatever corresponding days).

– What kind of sprints has she been doing? If they are legitimate 200 or 400 meter repeats, then jump roping won’t be terribly stressful to her. In fact, I would consider jump roping as less stressful than yogging for the same amount of time. If she’s been doing legitimate sprints, the jump rope won’t have the desired effect you’re after.

– I’m not a huge fan of training on off days, but if she’s relatively new to lifting (and hasn’t been consistent before), then it probably won’t be a big deal if she does a bit of conditioning on the off days. Just keep in mind that if her progress stalls in a few months (and her protein intake is close to 1g per pound of body weight), then the conditioning on off days should be the first to go. Your second question indicates that it’s not possible to do the sprints on the same days that she lifts, so your current plan is fine until you guys run into stalled progression — which should not happen for several months. And assuming she’s new to lifting, I don’t think it’d be a problem if she sprinted on a third non lifting day of the week (like on a Saturday). You know what to remove if she has recovery problems.

– Since she is still new to lifting, just use a 3×5 set/rep scheme. It provides a happy medium between strength training and hypertrophy, and she cannot build muscle without strength. She will develop muscle doing this stuff, and you can even turn her “conditioning” days into high intensity circuits to give her more reps of muscle contraction. I think you did a good job creating her plan and suggest that you stick with your plan until February and then worry about changes then. I realize she wants to “gain muscle” and “firm up” first, but muscle building is not a fast process, even for guys. Improving body composition will help the “firm/tone” goal.

 

There haven’t really been a lot of questions lately. Feel free to drop them in the comments or on social media.

120 thoughts on “Q&A – 49”

  1. Hey everybody. Burrito PR this week. Also, I squatted 220 for a single and deadlifted 275 for three singles. Both PRs. I was short on time this week so I didn’t do the challenge. But I did stop rowing like a fish out of water douchebag, so that’s my contribution.

      • I wish. No, I PR’d on the number of Chipotle burritos consumed in a week. I’m suffering from some kind of meat fatigue. I’m tired of chicken, beef, ground beef, tuna, pork, lamb, turkey. Burritos are the only meat vehicle I currently enjoy. Anyone else know my feel?

        • Yeah – texture is the culprit here – throw in some crunchy stuff and rejoice. Tuna on ezekiel toast with almonds & celery or ceviche with orange/chile/cabbage/jicama/lime salad are a standby when I get the “texture gags.”

          If you can do mexican food no matter what Rick Bayless has some legit cookbooks that will get some new stuff coming out of the kitchen as well.

  4. Hey Justin,

    Many thanks for answering my question!

    – Concerning the pull-ups: I read the three articles and will focus (in her case) on the bottom ROM. She is almost capable of performing a single rep from the hang, now.
    The cues were something I missed before and will be of great help, since she is quite arm-dominant (used to perform equestrian vaulting) and tends to not involve her upper back.
    I usually have her do the band pull-aparts in her warm-up, by the way.

    – She’s completely new to the lifts, so I simply use the A/B workouts to help her perform the lifts very frequently at first. I’ll move her up to the DL / RDL rotation asap, once she hits a 50kg deadlift or so (which will be very soon). She also has some difficulty with using her hips on deadlifts/KB swings, so the RDL will help in that regard, I assume. But I’ll see first if the problem with not sort itself out with more squatting/deadlifting with proper cues.

    – Her sprints are not legitimate repeats, but more along the lines of interval sprinting. She basically runs for about 2 kilometres, sprinting and jogging based on how she feels. Would you recommend using kettlebell swings in her case, as conditioning? The reason I ask, is because of the difficulty she has with hip extension/activating her buttocks and swings felt very unnatural to her (interestingly, she is a natural squatter and bench presser).

    – Hopefully we can place the conditioning on the same day soon. For now, she sprints with the dogs on the days in between training. I am a bit cautious since she has a competitive personality and will probably overdo it, if not kept in check.

    – About the reps: will do that! I’ve had her do 3 x 5, followed by a 10-15 rep set (not to failure) for squats and presses, since I assumed that would combine the best of both world and since she’s not doing much in the way of total volume per training.

    – For the high intensity circuits on her off days, what would you recommend? I’d guess an easy complex like goblet squats + kettlebell swings or a squat followed by a press (with dumbbells), since these mimic the competitive lifts somewhat.

    She’s eating much more protein and fat than she’s used to now, so hopefully her recovery is adequate. Anything else I need to know? I tried to keep everything as simple as possible, so as not to scare her with overly complicating things.

    Thanks again.

    Leeuwer

    • Oh, well her fartlek intervals aren’t going to effect anything that much so she can keep them in. And I’m not concerned with the kettlebell swings but you can have her do them if you guys want. The real issue is getting hamstring involvement.

      The drop set of 10 reps or so isn’t bad, so if she likes it, you can keep it in.

      If she does true high intensity stuff, then I wouldn’t be a fan of having it on the off days. But in the beginning try to change less. I would just have her do the same running in addition to the lifting unless she was the one initiating the interest in the high intensity stuff. And any compound movements are fair game, but don’t program them wildly (FIT has specific recommendations on this).

  5. 2 weeks into a new mini strength cycle. Though I haven’t made any snatch or C&J PRs yet, this week was pretty nice, after all

    snatch balance (…and OHS): 80kg
    (high bar) BS: 115kg

    almost had a 90kg rack jerk, too, but couldn’t stay tight underneath.

  6. Justin, I thought this might make an odd, yet informative question/post. It seems that I’ve run into a problem that every man runs into: the roids…not the steroids, but the hemorrhoids. I have them and they’re really fucking up my workout schedule man. I really don’t know what to do about them, so I guess I’m going to go see Dr. Jelly Fingers in a couple of days to see what he says because this shit is unbearable (pardon the pun).

    So these are my questions:

    Does squatting and heavy lifting cause hemorrhoids? That’s what everyone keeps telling me and I deny it, but I really can’t attribute it to anything else.

    How should I go about my training until it gets healed? Squatting is pretty much out of the question when it gets irritated.

    Thanks for reading this man. I know it’s kind of a funny topic or whatever, but it’s serious man. I can’t, and won’t stop strength training, which is what I’m 90% sure the doctor will tell me to do. So what is your knowledge and experience on what to do in this situation?

  8. No PRs this week, but had my first consistent week of training in a while. Good to be back after feeling shitty, not eating well and being slightly unmotivated for a few weeks.

  11. Thought I’d take a nice deload week…until about 30 inches of snow fell. I spent two days shoveling it off my roof and driveway. I told my kids that when it comes down to it, that is why you should be strong, because from time to time life will require it. Many of the plows in our area broke because the snow was so wet and heavy, and we’re fairly rural so the phone book isn’t overflowing with snow removal businesses.

    • I’ve never had to do this and but will need to soon. Guess I should get a shovel.

      Maybe we can use barbells and pretend that we’re shoveling to prepare for the snow, right?

  13. Finally touched the rim on a 10 ft hoop and out squatted my shorts (ripped down the back). The people in the rack next to me started calling me Spongebob (because I ripped my pants).

  14. First time here.

    Been doing the basic Starting Strength beginners workout program. I do not do power cleans yet because I’ve been trying to get the squat, bench, press, and deadlifts down. Through watching videos and reading Rip’s Starting Strength book I feel like my technique in those main lifts is ok. Gonna video a session soon to hopefully have someone critique it.

    My first lifting session was September 11th and I’m still on my first linear progression without having to deload yet. Though I feel it’s coming soon. I do the standard 3×5 template. This is what I started with and where I am at now (all are PRs for work sets of 3×5):

    SQUAT: 135 lbs -> 235
    PRESS: 65 lbs -> 105
    DEADLIFT: 160 lbs -> 265
    BENCH: 95 lbs -> 145 lbs

    I do add in pull-ups at the end and can do two sets of 5 from a dead hang, no kipping. I’m 6’1″ and 180 lbs and have started drinking more whole milk and eating 3 full meals a day. Honestly, eating big and preparing my body to do GOMAD has been as hard as any lifting session. I have added 10 lbs a session to the squat/deadlift and 5 lbs a session to the two presses. Deadlifts still feel easy as my technique keeps improving, and 235 in squats was a lot easier tonight considering 225 was a struggle last workout. I focused on keeping my knees out and thinking “up” on my way down. My press is getting close to failure and my bench is as well.

    It was exciting as hell to be a beginner and have a guy come up to me tonight and ask me how I can squat so low with what he thought was a lot of weight. Considering 235 is a PR for me, and I didn’t think I’d get it tonight, it was pretty awesome. I haven’t felt this great in a while.

  16. Hey is there any chance you could have a ‘guide to eradicating shoulder internal rotation’. I’ve got a tight pec on one side and I cannot do a proper pull up without my shoulder going forward in the socket. I’m doing the following

    Lateral arm raises using dumbells
    Dips
    Barbell rows
    Rear dealtoid machine

    Along with lots of mobilisations from mwod. It’s a bitch to fix and the problem is not limited just to the pecs but also includes muscles in the neck and throughout the shoulder complex. KStar is excellent for mobs but often he doesn’t often explain good exercises to strengthen weak muscles.

    What is a complete system to eradicate this issue which I think is pretty common? I’ve excellent thoracic mobility.

  17. Squat – 405×2 (wanted 3, got bent over and couldn’t recover position on 3rd rep)
    Bench – 260×3, paused 255×1 and 260×1 in preparation for a meet.
    DL – 425×3

  19. How would you program for someone that is just returning to lifting after a knee surgery? Just a normal SS type program, or do I use alternatives for a while. I’ve read that front squats put less stress on the knee, so it might be wise to start with them?

    The surgery was to fix a torn meniscus. The surgery went great and PT is progressing nicely (if these things matter).

  20. low bar back squat, working sets (3×5) at 210lbs last thursday. doing a linear-type progression so went up to 215 today, got 4 sets of 3. previous 1RM for back squat was 215lbs high bar. bw of 164lbs, and i’m a 5’9″ woman. feeling like my goal 1RM of 300lbs is possible, maybe even as soon as next year.

  22. Pingback: Q&A – 51 | 70's Big

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