Thinking about taking a break from 3x5 squats

[nobody]

I've been doing SS for a while, learned the basic lifts, and increased my strength.

At this point my body has ballooned in size in the midsection, huge stomach and huge ass and thighs.

The squats are at a point where my shoulders are so fatigued from holding the weight against my back that it is becoming very hard to do press or bench press, even going up 2.5lbs each time.

I need some time for my upper body to catch up as I barely have any muscles up there, having been a soccer player and very slim physique other than my legs. I want a strong, nice-looking upper body, dammit.

So what should I do? Eliminate squats all together to stop my ass from growing? Do them once a week? Front squats? Switch the upper body exercises to some kind of body building scheme to satisfy my ego? Take a break from weightlifting and start swimming? I'm hoping for some advice.

[gzt]

Or... just do your damn squats.

[nisora33]

Question: is your upper body in proportion to your lower, I mean truly in proportion, and not in proportion according to the looney toons caricature of a man you see depicted in the muscle mags?

-Stacey

[BruteForce]

At this point my body has ballooned in size in the midsection, huge stomach and huge ass and thighs.

what is your height and weight? Where did you start weight wise? What are you shoving in your mouth on a daily basis?

[Mr.City]

How are you shoulders fatigued by holding the bar?

[Locutus]

How are you shoulders fatigued by holding the bar?

This. Are you sure your bar position isn't way too low? Have you experimented with grip width and/or elbow position? Have you tried high bar? .. and so on.

[WatsupHannity]

If you do a full-body routine, your body will grow in proportion. If you are squatting 400, benching 250 etc. your upper body and lower body will both be proportional, i.e. bigger than they are now. If your upper body is lagging it will grow faster than your lower body.

[cjangelo]

If squats are ruining your bench workouts, you can either
1. rest more so your bench workouts don't suck
OR
2. Bench first.

Whoa! I just blew everyone away. I know.

[ZKP]

Nobody

Is your huge Ass getting you down, friend? Why not forget about getting strong. Strength is overrated. What you want is to be beautiful. Nice looking upper body, firm and toned.......

Or are you chasing two rabbits at once and not catching either of them. Read around. You're not ballooned. Not your ass, or your thighs, or your stomach. Your legs are small. I'm sure of this. Maybe by soccer player standards they are, but by bearded man standards you need to keep eating and increase the volume on your dl a little to thicken out your back. And squat more. Give it time, don't hurry. Just because it's rocky sometimes doesn't mean anything needs to change. Stay the course.

[hatmanii]

If squats are ruining your bench workouts, you can either
1. rest more so your bench workouts don't suck
OR
2. Bench first.

Whoa! I just blew everyone away. I know.

Dude, this is the internet, reason and logic have no place here.

[cjangelo]

Dude, this is the internet, reason and logic have no place here.

It's not so much that as people notice a problem developing (eg. uneven muscular growth or uneven workouts resulting from fatigue) and take a fucking flame-thrower to their program when minor tweaks or revisions can resolve the problem.

How many times have you noticed a poster struggling with something and someone like Stacey steps up and offers a simple solution, eg. doing 5x3 instead of 3x5 on the press, and the problem is resolved? That's the way to handle it.

[TrackJunkie]

How much do you weigh, Mr. Balloon Ass?

[nobody]

I don't think squatting three times a week makes you a man. Obviously you guys are more interested in circlejerking than anything else. Whatever.

[Sami]

Sorry, what was that? Did I hear someone? Oh, it's nobody.

[nisora33]

I don't think squatting three times a week makes you a man. Obviously you guys are more interested in circlejerking than anything else. Whatever.


You asked a question, didn't receive the answer you wanted to hear, and then you accused everyone of mindless circle jerking. You've obviously already made up your mind what you want to do, regardless of what anyone else might say, so why do you fucking care what we think? Why even ask the question to begin with.

Thread closed, right?

[nobody]

The main question I was asking is for an alternative to 3 sets of 5 reps of squats.. which no one addressed... I doubt it will be. One person suggested doing bench presses before squatting. That's the only useful advice, but it's not even addressing the question. SS is supposed to be a balanced workout, but it doesn't seem to be working that way in my case, which is why I came to this programming forum for a way to alter it for my desires.

[coreJack]

A very useful question was asked, but never answered:

How are you shoulders fatigued by holding the bar?
Which relates directly to this:

The squats are at a point where my shoulders are so fatigued from holding the weight against my back that it is becoming very hard to do press or bench press, even going up 2.5lbs each time.

Ergo, if you can solve this problem of shoulders being exhausted by squats, you'd be able to progress on OHP and bench and get your upper body bigger.

[nisora33]

The main question I was asking is for an alternative to 3 sets of 5 reps of squats.. which no one addressed... I doubt it will be. One person suggested doing bench presses before squatting. That's the only useful advice, but it's not even addressing the question. SS is supposed to be a balanced workout, but it doesn't seem to be working that way in my case, which is why I came to this programming forum for a way to alter it for my desires.


You don't get it. Muscles are supposed to be in proportion. The muscle fagazines depict a cartoonish male specimen with upper bodies that grossly eclipse the lower. If that's what you expected to get from SS, you were deluding yourself. If you do the program as prescribed, and keep all the factors affecting recovery in check (these are all big IF's, because few people actually do it this way), then what you'll get is an upper body in proportion to the lower. You squat is supposed to be bigger than your bench, you deadlift is supposed to be bigger than your chin-up, etc., and in accordance with the amount of muscle mass involved on each of the various lifts, the squat and deadlift are the ones that will progress longest and fastest before stalling out. All of this is normal and natural, but you're not happy with it. Okay, fine. But no one's going to be happy that you're not happy because this is, after all, the SS forum.

Go ahead and put the bench and press first if you feel like it. That's one option, probably the best. Cut your squats back to twice a week and just try to maintain, if you like. Fine, that'll work too. But it makes me sick to suggest it.

-S.

[BruteForce]

The main question I was asking is for an alternative to 3 sets of 5 reps of squats.. which no one addressed... I doubt it will be. One person suggested doing bench presses before squatting. That's the only useful advice, but it's not even addressing the question. SS is supposed to be a balanced workout, but it doesn't seem to be working that way in my case, which is why I came to this programming forum for a way to alter it for my desires.

Sounds to me like you aren't eating or resting enough. But the bar resting on your back while you are squatting shouldn't have anything to do with your OHP. The bar sits on your rear delts, traps. Your OHP is front delt, tricep, some upper chest. If the bar on your back hurts your shoulders, use a pad, or try a higher bar position to compensate. But you will get a lot more physique and strength wise worrying about your squat than you will worrying about your bench or OHP. But again, refer to the bolded statement

[cjangelo]

This kid's a fucking idiot. Fuck him.

[Mr.City]

I used to have fatigue in my upper back when I squatted, however this was due to that fact I failed to keep my chest during the sets. This is usually done by a lack of proper cues or a tendency to look down all way too much.

[misspelledgeoff]

try this routine instead...


Monday: Guns

Dumbell Concentration Curls (3 sets of 12-15)

Preacher Curls with EZ-Curl Bar (3 sets of 12-15): I try to keep my range of motion to just the top 1/3 of the lift because it really helps me feel the burn.

Cable Curls with EZ-Curl Cable Handle (3 sets of 8-12): This is my main mass builder that I hit after I’ve already worked on shape.

Alternating Dumbell Curls on 60 Degree Incline Bench, Supinating Hands: (3 sets of 8-12): Another mass monster. These really work my lower bicep!

Tricep Kickbacks (3 sets of 15-20): ‘nuff said

Rope Pushdowns (3 sets of 12-15): The key here is to pull your hands apart at the bottom. If you can’t feel the burn with these, then there’s something wrong. These hit the “horseshoe” that the ladies salivate over.

Cable French Press Machine (3 sets of 8-12) Killer for size. These’ll put slabs of meat on the backs of your arms. Great for the long head of the tricep.

Close Grip Burnouts: (3 sets of ???): This is an excellent finisher. Just grab a barbell, or better yet, an EZ-Curl bar, and rep out, baby. No need to add any weight (maybe nickels if you’re using an EZ-Curl Bar) – just hit it for as many reps as you can muster. If you have a spotter, finish the set with 10 negatives. Have her lift the bar off your chest… you just lower it as slow as you can. Your girlfriend can thank me later for this one.

Tuesday: Pecs

After guns, pecs is the second most important muscle group. It consists of three different muscles, the upper pecs, the lower pecs and the middle or main pecs.

Incline Smith Machine Press (3 sets of 10-12): This works the upper pecs really well. It’s important to always start with inclines. Some guys work the flat stuff first, but upper pecs are what really draw attention. When you’re wearing a tight t-shirt, the upper pec’s are what really give your chest that “pop”.

Flat Smith Machine Press (3 sets of 10-12): Not much to say here. Use a weight that lets you get 8-9 reps, then have your spotter help you with a couple forced reps, then a couple negatives. Can you say “burn”?

Decline flyes (3 sets of 15-20): I don’t really like using dumbbells because, truthfully, they’re often a recipe for injury. It’s best to lock in your range of motion with a machine of some sort, but sometimes, the flyes machine doesn’t let you raise the seat enough to make it a true decline. Just be sure to use light weight on these. The idea is to control it and really squeeze your lower pecs together at the top. You know you’ve been doing good on these when you can grasp a ten pound plate with your meavage (male cleavage).

Flye Machine (3 sets of 12-15): You can go a little heavier on these because it’s a machine, but still keep it relatively light. This is a good shaper for the main pecs.

Cable Crossovers (1 set of ???): That’s right… burn it out. Every workout should end with a burnout set. It gets your metabolism going. If you want to be shredded, take my advice.

Wednesday: Guns

Repeat Monday or some variation of. As we talked about, guns are the strongest, most important muscle group and for that reason, they can tolerate more work than the others.

Thursday: Deltoids

Giant Set (3-way superset), side cable laterals, rear cable laterals, front raises with a plate (3 sets of 12-15 each): You want cannonball delts? This is how to get it done. Make sure to change the setup on the cable machine between subsets 1 and 2 as quickly as possible. You want this to be one continuous set for the best pump.

If you do your giant set the right way, you really don’t need to do anything more for delts. If you want, you can do a little bit of Smith Machine work, but make sure not to overtrain. If you get too much lactic acid in your muscles, it can disintegrate the fibers. Maybe just one burnout set with no weight.

Friday: Lats and Quads

No one really sees these muscles, so you definitely want to work them at the end of the week. If you live in a warmer climate and have your shirt off a lot, you may want to hit your lats a little harder than most.

Lats:

Wide Grip, Behind the Neck Pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12): These give you the V-shape. The wider you can grip the bar, the wider your V will be. It’s fact and has been written about in a lot of articles. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, bitches, it’s Lat-man.

Front Pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12): Again, think wide!

Machine Pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12, 1 burnout): Hopefully, your club has one of these Hammer Strength machines cuz it’s the BOMB!

Quads:

Be careful here. You don’t want big tree trunk legs. You’ve got to hit these just enough to bring out the tear drop and, if you’re lucky, maybe a few striations.

Leg extensions (5 sets of 15-20, 1 burnout): Keep the reps high for maximum pain. You’ll notice I put these down for 5 sets. Just concentrate on these. Most other leg exercises will make you too bulky, and jeans for big legged guys are hard to find, right, fellas? By all means, DO NOT squat unless you want to end up in a wheelchair with your knee muscles all torn up.

Leg curls (3 sets of 15-20): These work the back of your quads. A lot of people don’t bother with them, but it’s a little known fact that you can get striations in the back of your quads, too. Just keep it light to work on shape.

Everyday: Abs

Crunches on a ball (5 sets of 100): Get a ball at home so you can dedicate some time to shredding up your abs. Every other set, go side to side so you hit your intercostals and serratus.

[BruteForce]

try this routine instead...


monday: Guns

dumbell concentration curls (3 sets of 12-15)

preacher curls with ez-curl bar (3 sets of 12-15): I try to keep my range of motion to just the top 1/3 of the lift because it really helps me feel the burn.

Cable curls with ez-curl cable handle (3 sets of 8-12): This is my main mass builder that i hit after i’ve already worked on shape.

Alternating dumbell curls on 60 degree incline bench, supinating hands: (3 sets of 8-12): Another mass monster. These really work my lower bicep!

Tricep kickbacks (3 sets of 15-20): ‘nuff said

rope pushdowns (3 sets of 12-15): The key here is to pull your hands apart at the bottom. If you can’t feel the burn with these, then there’s something wrong. These hit the “horseshoe” that the ladies salivate over.

Cable french press machine (3 sets of 8-12) killer for size. These’ll put slabs of meat on the backs of your arms. Great for the long head of the tricep.

Close grip burnouts: (3 sets of ???): This is an excellent finisher. Just grab a barbell, or better yet, an ez-curl bar, and rep out, baby. No need to add any weight (maybe nickels if you’re using an ez-curl bar) – just hit it for as many reps as you can muster. If you have a spotter, finish the set with 10 negatives. Have her lift the bar off your chest… you just lower it as slow as you can. Your girlfriend can thank me later for this one.

tuesday: Pecs

after guns, pecs is the second most important muscle group. It consists of three different muscles, the upper pecs, the lower pecs and the middle or main pecs.

Incline smith machine press (3 sets of 10-12): This works the upper pecs really well. It’s important to always start with inclines. Some guys work the flat stuff first, but upper pecs are what really draw attention. When you’re wearing a tight t-shirt, the upper pec’s are what really give your chest that “pop”.

Flat smith machine press (3 sets of 10-12): Not much to say here. Use a weight that lets you get 8-9 reps, then have your spotter help you with a couple forced reps, then a couple negatives. Can you say “burn”?

Decline flyes (3 sets of 15-20): I don’t really like using dumbbells because, truthfully, they’re often a recipe for injury. It’s best to lock in your range of motion with a machine of some sort, but sometimes, the flyes machine doesn’t let you raise the seat enough to make it a true decline. Just be sure to use light weight on these. The idea is to control it and really squeeze your lower pecs together at the top. You know you’ve been doing good on these when you can grasp a ten pound plate with your meavage (male cleavage).

Flye machine (3 sets of 12-15): You can go a little heavier on these because it’s a machine, but still keep it relatively light. This is a good shaper for the main pecs.

Cable crossovers (1 set of ???): That’s right… burn it out. Every workout should end with a burnout set. It gets your metabolism going. If you want to be shredded, take my advice.

wednesday: Guns

repeat monday or some variation of. As we talked about, guns are the strongest, most important muscle group and for that reason, they can tolerate more work than the others.

thursday: Deltoids

giant set (3-way superset), side cable laterals, rear cable laterals, front raises with a plate (3 sets of 12-15 each): You want cannonball delts? This is how to get it done. Make sure to change the setup on the cable machine between subsets 1 and 2 as quickly as possible. You want this to be one continuous set for the best pump.

If you do your giant set the right way, you really don’t need to do anything more for delts. If you want, you can do a little bit of smith machine work, but make sure not to overtrain. If you get too much lactic acid in your muscles, it can disintegrate the fibers. Maybe just one burnout set with no weight.

friday: Lats and quads

no one really sees these muscles, so you definitely want to work them at the end of the week. If you live in a warmer climate and have your shirt off a lot, you may want to hit your lats a little harder than most.

lats:

wide grip, behind the neck pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12): These give you the v-shape. The wider you can grip the bar, the wider your v will be. It’s fact and has been written about in a lot of articles. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, bitches, it’s lat-man.

Front pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12): Again, think wide!

Machine pulldowns (3 sets of 10-12, 1 burnout): Hopefully, your club has one of these hammer strength machines cuz it’s the bomb!

quads:

be careful here. You don’t want big tree trunk legs. You’ve got to hit these just enough to bring out the tear drop and, if you’re lucky, maybe a few striations.

Leg extensions (5 sets of 15-20, 1 burnout): Keep the reps high for maximum pain. You’ll notice i put these down for 5 sets. Just concentrate on these. Most other leg exercises will make you too bulky, and jeans for big legged guys are hard to find, right, fellas? By all means, do not squat unless you want to end up in a wheelchair with your knee muscles all torn up.

Leg curls (3 sets of 15-20): These work the back of your quads. A lot of people don’t bother with them, but it’s a little known fact that you can get striations in the back of your quads, too. Just keep it light to work on shape.

everyday: Abs

crunches on a ball (5 sets of 100): Get a ball at home so you can dedicate some time to shredding up your abs. Every other set, go side to side so you hit your intercostals and serratus.

:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d:d

[Gary Gibson]

What's scary and sad is that except for a few of the more obvious bits of sarcasm, this looks an awful lot like the articles I took as gospel back in the 90's.

Geoff, did you copy this from somewhere and tweak it?

[misspelledgeoff]

Yeah I can't take credit for this. It was posted by a guy on Sherdog several years ago. And yes he was being sarcastic (the Strength & Conditioning forum over there is very similar to this forum in terms of goals and mindset).


What's scary and sad is that except for a few of the more obvious bits of sarcasm, this looks an awful lot like the articles I took as gospel back in the 90's.

Geoff, did you copy this from somewhere and tweak it?

[Mr.City]

There's no glute day, and if you're wondering where to squeeze the glutes into your schedule, it's Sunday because that's the Lord's day and he intended his day for the sculpting of glutes. Amen.

[misspelledgeoff]

Glute works makes you Big and Bulky. And that's a Sin.


There's no glute day, and if you're wondering where to squeeze the glutes into your schedule, it's Sunday because that's the Lord's day and he intended his day for the sculpting of glutes. Amen.

[nisora33]

Glad to see others shouldering the asshole duties.

-S.

[ZKP]

Glad to see others shouldering the asshole duties.

-S.

You're not alone....

nobody

I said to raise your DL vol a little. Read that part. The bar hurts your back, hence you need a stronger back. Use DL to get this. I figured you could take it from there.....There are lots of ways to accomplish this, and if you're gonna be squatting less (which is basically what you're saying), then throw in some more DL work rather than curls or pulley bullshit for your "nice" upper body. Go light, taking your CNS into account and just add a light DL day here and there and see what happens. The basic template will work just fine for you, and you don't need to modify it. But since you seem to lack patience and are going to change it anyway, here's an idea, do DL's.

PS. You don't need to squat 3 times a week to be a man.....what you need is a beard.............

[Chewie_jrc]

Geoff, nice post made me laugh. My Troll-o-meter is tingling right now. His shoulders are getting tired? Seriously? Just rest a little longer before benching, or as it was stated move it first. Get your rest, eat, drink your milk...you will adapt. Jesus this is too easy man, there are guys/gals cranking out this program with horrible situations and physical ailments and you're worried about "your shoulders getting tired".....wow.

[matclone]

The main question I was asking is for an alternative to 3 sets of 5 reps of squats.. which no one addressed... I doubt it will be

Doubting Thomas.

One thing you could try is to reduce your reps and sets. Work up to a top set or sets of 2 or 3 (with a corresponding increase in weight), instead of 3 sets of 5. This will maybe slow down the hypertrophous ass while keeping your strength up. Another thing you could do (as you suggested) is to try front squats one day per week and see what happens. Don't stop squatting.

Scale (for men):
Rep--Pct
1 1.00
2 .94
3 .90
4 .87
5 .85
6 .83
7 .81