Shawn had about a month off from training. You know what that asshole did on squats in his first session back? 135 for 5; 185 for 5; 225 for 5; 275 for 5; 315 for 3; 225 for 10; (next two sets are front squat) 135 for 10; 135 for 6 — that’s a shit-load of work. His normal work sets last year before the holiday were about 325 (he’s using 5/3/1; front squats are his assistance work). His structures weren’t adapted to doing any squats, and he subjected them to stress that was greater than what they could have handled before the layoff even occurred.

Sure, it was dumb. But calling Shawn an idiot relentlessly isn’t going to help his crippling soreness. He told me, “Dude, I am so fucking sore. I had to FALL onto the toilet seat to take a shit earlier.” Instead, I gave him advice on what to do in his next training session to alleviate that soreness. In the research this is called The Repeated Bout Effect and it’s used to reduce Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS).



DOMS occurs as a result of doing something that the structures aren’t adapted to. This could include a significant change in volume and intensity, or it could occur from performing a new movement using structures through a different range of motion (ROM). For example, a CrossFitter would experience higher levels of soreness if they started squatting 3×5 at heavier weights than they handle in their met-cons. Conversely, a lifter would experience high levels of soreness if they tried a high repetition CrossFit met-con after being adapted to low repetition lifting (even more so since CrossFit will typically include new or different movements from the lifter’s normal training repertoire). DOMS typically peaks 24 to 48 hours after a bout of exercise. My personal experience and opinion is that the more adapted you are, the shorter the process to achieve peak soreness and subsequent loss of soreness (1).

For me, I can feel the soreness within 12 to 18 hours, and peak soreness occurs 18 to 24 before decreasing. When I was younger and doing bodybuilding stuff, I would routinely hit a peak of soreness at 48 hours. This may be due to a lack of adaptation or strength, but it could also be due to the fact that I did a lot more isolation work for the “body parts” that I was working that day as opposed to the lesser amount of work places on the specific muscles nowadays when I train my whole body each session.

The Repeated Bout Effect states that “subsequent bouts of the same exercise, repeated within several days to several months, do not produce as much damage as the first bout” (4). You can look at that from two perspectives. The first is that by doing very low intensity work (<50%) for a session, subsequent sessions will not produce as much DOMS (even up to 6 weeks after the initial bout of low-intensity work). The second is that if DOMS exists, then using some low-intensity work with the same muscles can help reduce their soreness. It's even shown that this adaptive effect is conferred to other muscles (3), but my assumption is that they are used in synergy with or stabilize the joints and structures of the movement performed (i.e. the external hip rotators may not apply hip extension in a movement, but their action will help stabilize the hip during the movement).
If we look at The Repeated Bout Effect as a preventative measure, then we would have begin our reintroduction to lifting after a layoff with a light day (something that I’ve suggested numerous times on this site). If we look at it as a treatment to crippling soreness — like Shawn’s situation above — then we can drop some light work into our next training session. Shawn will be training today — 48 hours after the squatting session. He’s scheduled to press with pressing assistance, yet I suggested that he squat the following: 135x5x2, 185×5 for one or two sets. This obviously doesn’t provide a stress to grow stronger, yet it provides a stress nonetheless via The Repeated Bout Effect. The research has observed the circumstances in which it can help alleviate soreness, yet the mechanism of how it occurs isn’t fully understood and it’s considered a phenomena. Some theories include neural, connective tissue or cellular adaptations as well as adaptation in excitation-contraction coupling or adaptation in the inflammatory response (2).

The trainee only needs to know how to prevent soreness since soreness can literally make it hard to take a shit, but it can also be debilitating to performance in the following training sessions. If you have extreme soreness due to a new movement or a change in work, then drop in some light exercises in a medium repetition scheme. Common soreness areas are the quads and groin from squats, proximal biceps tendon from dips, hamstrings from RDLs, or lumbar spine from deadlift (typically associated with severe rounding of the back). Muscles that are sore from squats or should just be worked with light squats, yet the other areas can be worked with related exercises. Light dumbbell flyes or push-ups could alleviate soreness in the upper body, and round back extensions (RBEs) or reverse hypers are best to use for the lumbar spine. Light good mornings, deadlifts, and RDLs could be used for hamstrings. Observant trainees will note that these exercises are often used in powerlifting programs as a preventative measure to alleviate soreness (especially in Russian programming — thanks Briskin).

Utilize these same methods if you have a training stoppage due to a meet, holidays, travelling, sickness, or injury, but use them in a light day and gradually increase the stress. I suggest taking a week and using Light-Medium-Moderate training days. Training isn’t a race; the more you can prevent injuries or overreaching, the more success you’ll have over a longer amount of time.

This is one of the few topics that actually has a great amount of quality research. Here are a few resources I used today.

1) Cleary, M.; Kimura, S.; Sitler, M.; Kendrick, Z. (2002). Temporal Pattern of the Repeated Bout Effect of Eccentric Exercise on Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness. J Athl Train. 2002 Jan-Mar; 37(1): 32–36.

4) McHugh, M.P.; Connolly, D.A.J.; Eston, R.G.; Gleim, G.W. (1999). Exercise-Induced Muscle Damage and Potential Mechanisms for the Repeated Bout Effect. Sports Medicine, Volume 27, Number 3, 1 March 1999, pp. 157-170 (14).

1) Cleary, M.; Kimura, S.; Sitler, M.; Kendrick, Z. (2002). Temporal Pattern of the Repeated Bout Effect of Eccentric Exercise on Delayed-Onset Muscle Soreness. J Athl Train. 2002 Jan-Mar; 37(1): 32–36.

The following was what loaded if you tried to access the site on January 18th, 2012. I saw some complainers whining that protesting was gay or that it didn’t accomplish anything. In this case, it did quite a lot. It raised awareness of a terrible bill that would have repercussions that the whiners would not enjoy if it passes. This isn’t to say that copyright protection isn’t important, because it is. There probably needs to be better legislation but SOPA was not it. In any case, if you joined the fight against SOPA, thank you; It’s rare that common folk will get together and rabble-rabble until they are heard.
EDIT: At least 18 senators now oppose the bill now since the protests.

If SOPA were to pass, you would load this website only to find out it was blocked. Please read why.

Today 70sBig.com is participating in the SOPA/PIPA boycott. The “Stop Online Piracy Act” and “PROTECT IP Act” are respectively House and Senate bills that falsely aim to reduce online trafficking in copyrighted intellectual property and counterfeit goods. In actuality this legislation invites Internet security risks, threatens online speech, hampers Internet innovation, bans or censors any website, and reduces our rights we have as internet users.

There’s a reason that other websites like Reddit and Wikipedia are participating in today’s boycott: the bills destroy every free right we have as internet users. Today 70’s Big wants to bring this to your attention so that you understand the implications of the bills and arm you with fire power in how we can help prevent them from passing. If we fail, this website (and many others) may be altered or banned from you.

First I want to share what a friend had to say about the bills. He works in and is knowledgeable about the information security field.

SOPA is the digital equivalent of politicians trying to slowly destroy the fundamental protections of our Bill of Rights through the guise of fear mongering that they’ve been doing with everything from organized crime to domestic terrorism. They market this supposed metastasis of problems with the internet such as digital crime and use it to say, “We need to control this and we’ll do it by basically taking your rights away, even if you don’t know it.” It’s humorous that they think they will solve problems because SOPA’s policies, when put into an actual technical implementation, will make it harder to distinguish the differences between their policy enforcement at network border gateways, real problems that service providers are having, or actual criminal attempts to subvert security and/or availability of network services. This is just one example of the bullshit SOPA presents and represents.

Philosophically, we’d be giving up our fundamental rights to do as we please on the internet. If I wanted someone telling me what I can or can’t do on the internet, I’d move to China, North Korea, or somewhere in the Middle East.

If this issue is confusing, maybe this video will clear things up for you:

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

Here are some links to help you learn more:
SOPA For Dummies
WordPress’ thoughts
Reddit’s thoughts
Reddit’s FAQ (explains both sides)
Wikipedia’s thoughts

Here are some links where you can actually DO something to help prevent these bills from passing:
Sign an anti-SOPA petition with Google
Stop American Censorship
Stop The Internet Blacklist Legislation (with information on how to contact and politely inform them that you will boycott them because of their support of SOPA)
Useful information for contacting your local representative
List of companies that support SOPA

Summary, TL;DR
Politics are rarely discussed on 70’s Big, but this legislation would not only affect this website, but your personal experience on the internet. Please review the information above and help us make a stand. It’s up to us to hold onto our freedom.

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
–Margaret Mead

San Francisco 49ers defensive end Justin Smith is a man. A horse. A horse-man. A centaur.





High-motor and aggressive defensive lineman are so cool.

I spent most of the Mondays in September and October talking about ways to get your lady friend into lifting weights. The goal wasn’t necessarily to brain wash her and turn her into a lifter, but to teach and implement quality barbell training and high intensity conditioning. Today I want to talk about transitioning from the “slow lifts” to the Olympic lifts. This will not be approached from the perspective of a weightlifter with the result of having a girl compete in weightlifting (although that’s cool). Instead, we’re merely going to add things to the program to have a general strength and conditioning focus that is fun.

By this time the lady in question will understand the utility in lifting and enjoy it. If she didn’t have any experience with lifting, it may be a good idea to get about half a year of lifting before worrying about this transition. Even if the gal has an athletic background, mastering the intricacies of body position while lifting can take time (every girl won’t be like Eva Twardokens or Lindsay Taylor). Pre-existing musculature, strength, coordination, injuries, and skill will dictate when the transition should happen, but if there is no lifting history and athletic history is limited to high school, then don’t rush it. Remember, the idea with gals who are skeptical of lifting is to progress them slowly yet consistently. In order to shift into the snatch and clean and jerk, here are some preliminary lifts to use for a while to ease the transition.

The Front Squat
The first amendment to a standard program is to throw in front squats about once a week. If she was already high barring, then this won’t be a big change, but if she was low barring this will help quite a bit. I’ve seen the front squat solidify positioning in the LB squat and develop quadriceps musculature faster than the low bar. Even more important is that it teaches a good rack position. The elbows should be up and in, and the bar can rest back in the fingers (as opposed to gripping the bar in the fists). Note that the elbows should be “in”; this puts the shoulder in external rotation to allow a good “chest up” position with the shoulders “back and down” in their socket. If the elbows are in, then she won’t need to think about any of that, but will need to maintain the “chest to chin” cue I’ve mentioned here before. The squat itself has the same cues as a high bar squat: “shove the knees out” and “heels out of the bottom” (shortened to “knees out” and “heels”). The rack position consists of passive cues that she shouldn’t have to think about (but should be corrected from day one) while the “knees” and “heels” cues are active cues that typically need emphasis while the movement occurs. The following position is a pretty good rack position, although I’d see if she can bring them “in” or closer together a little more.


Use the front squat every week, but not exclusively. If there are three training sessions a week, make one a front squat session. If there are only two sessions, then front squat on one of them. If high bar is already being used, consider front squatting before or after the HB squat on a volume-type day to teach the rack position.

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I hope everyone’s training is going well so far this year. Post your updates or weekly PR’s to the comments to celebrate PR Friday

Also, I don’t have confirmation on this, but apparently Allison Bishop (AllisonNYC for you CF vets) has allegedly committed to doing a max effort clean and jerk in a bikini if Donny Shankle gets to his fundraising goal (read the first part of this post). Now let’s get on with the bloody Q&A, eh?

sdanleyjr asks:

This week’s collection of articles has me all worried about balanced ham/quad development. If I look in the mirror I’d say I’m pretty quad dominant, however I just LBBS my way up to 405# before switching back to HBBS. If I’m doing all of the following once a week – HBBS, front squat, snatch, C&J, deadlift – should I be doing some RDLs as well?

Dear sdanleyjr,

I’m a huge proponent of RDL’s, especially for lifters who aren’t in the ‘later intermediate stages’ and beyond. I’d even to venture and say that the RDL’s will be better for your programming than the deadlifts — CRAZY TALK. It looks like you’re training for weightlifting, and heavy deadlifts are going to require significant local and systemic recovery. Not only are you using your limited supply of recovery credits on the expensive deadlift, but you may be inhibiting the clean, snatch, or squat workouts that occur after the deadlifting (even if they are the following week). If you’re primarily training to be a weightlifter, you’ll get good hamstring and lumbar musculature work out of the RDL and still have some zing for the rest of your program.

jaygreenshirt asks:

At the Chicago lifting seminar you discussed the phenomenon of one’s hamstrings sputtering during a heavy deadlift (you referred to it as ‘tut-tut-tut’). I can’t remember your explanation on this and was hoping you could explain it on the site. I recently pulled a one rep max deadlift and my hamstrings were tut-tut-tutting like The Little Engine That Could.

Dear jaygreenshirt,

It’s awesome to hear from you. For everyone else, Jay was one of two Jays at the Chicago workshop, and when I said the name “Jay”, my friend Jay S. kept saying, “What?” So I resorted to calling this Jay “Jay Green Shirt” since he was wearing a green shirt. Apparently Ellee still has him saved as that in her phone.

Anyway, this is a good question. The “tut-tut-tut” sputtering that occurs when locking out heavy deadlifts (watch the second rep at 625) is a neurological result of not being adapted to high levels of tension in the hamstrings. Assuming good mechanics (that would maintain hamstring tension), the intrafusal muscle fibers (in this case, the golgi tendon organ) of the hamstring are monitoring levels of tension in the muscle. If tension is too high, then the GTO will essentially shut the muscle off to prevent injury. Your conscious effort to pull the weight forces a resuming in the contraction, or “turning the muscle back on”. The GTO then senses high levels of tension and turns it off again. This back-and-forth could occur several times and feels like a stuttering lockout that I sum up as a “tut-tut-tut” (usually I mimic the move as I say it in a workshop).

So what the FUCK does all of that mean? You are relatively unadapted to the higher levels of tension that you were imparting on the muscle and it’s associated nerve functioning. How can this be fixed? Rack pulls are usually the go-to method of improving that ability to experience high tension. If you watched the linked video above of Chris first couple reps at a 600+ pounds, you can see it occur. Shortly after that I had him do rack pulls and he never had those tension issues again (see below for Chris pulling 655×2 the other day). RDL’s are also another good way to improve the hamstring’s ability to experience tension. The weight won’t be as heavy, yet the different mechanics will still stretch the hamstring and make it contract under tension. Regularly using both of these lifts will eradicate the tut-tut, yet also getting more reps with higher intensity deadlifts will help in the short term as well.

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