OK, who's tall and does ATF squats?

[Imnotdutch]

The distance the bar has to travel doesnt really stop you going deep......it might mean that you have to use less weight that the lucky soab who has a short range of motion. But it doesnt stop you hitting depth.

OK, the bones are longer, but aren't the muscles, tendons, ligaments, the support structure in general, etc...proportionately longer too? They still go from 0-90+ degrees irrespective of length, don't they?

 

[Imnotdutch]

Are your legs long in proportion to your torso? If not, being 5'9" wont matter.

How deep is deep in your books? Different people seem to use different meanings for this.

BTW nice squat......for a girl Do you mean hitting parallel by going to 90'.......or do you mean your knee joint is at 90'?

That still doesn't make sense to me.

I guess, to answer your question, I'm 5'9'', I deep squat 225 for reps of 15 and my 1 rep max is 335, and that's only to 90 degrees. So, my point is, I don't have trouble squatting deep at my height, and my strength gains have been seemingly undetered as well.

 

[Texas Guns]

Spatts, are your feet flat on the floor or on the balls of your feet when you go hams to calves.

 

[SteelWeaver]

Thanks for the explanation Imnotdutch - I don't really know the exact mechanics of it - I just know that I have to be very aware of how far forward my knees are travelling, (well, like anyone, I guess) and that my hips lock up lower with a wider stance, like you said. I can go down, hams to calves, quite easily without a bar by leaning forward, but of course, that doesn't help me with a bar on my shoulders. Even with regular parallel squats I find myself leaning forward if I'm not very strict.

My extra 2 inches + are all in my legs, spatterson. I think my inseam is 34 or so. But technically, if you feel your torso is long, that should put my proportions at average (??). Which means I shouldn't have a problem, right?

Anyway - I did them! Full squats. Mainly just playing around, getting the feeling and the form. 45kg But I could feel them in parts of my quads I don't usually feel on squats.

My parallel squat is only at 77.5kg for 10 right now (on a good day). Your lifts are awesome spatterson!!!!

Here's a question: how much, on average, do people increase the weight on the bar over, say, a month? (natural/juicing) What would be decent gains?

How long did it take you to get to where you are spatts?

 

[SteelWeaver]

The distance the bar has to travel doesnt really stop you going deep......it might mean that you have to use less weight that the lucky soab who has a short range of motion. But it doesnt stop you hitting depth.

Doesn't shorter-boned people lifting more weight also have to do with the relative cross-sectional thickness of the muscles themselves? Relative to their length, I mean. I remember reading this somewhere.

 

[Imnotdutch]

Uhhmmm pass.
I only info I've read related to that was on the way glycogen and water loading, which would increase the volume of a muscle and its cells, can improve leverage. But I'm not sure....sorry. Mebbe Warlobo will know......he seems to know everything else

Doesn't shorter-boned people lifting more weight also have to do with the relative cross-sectional thickness of the muscles themselves? Relative to their length, I mean. I remember reading this somewhere.

 

[SteelWeaver]

Spatterson - that is incredible! How did you improve so fast?

I started with 2 plates and the bar - 60 kg - 135 lbs - for 10 to parallel in September.

I'm now at 77.5 kg - 170lbs - for 6-10 depending on if I ride my bike that day or not. I've been kind of stuck here for about 3 weeks.

I was a swimmer (preferably long-distance) as a child, so I guess I didn't develop much in the way of fast twitch fibers.

My upper body strength is about as pathetic as lower. Yet I'm putting on muscle, slowly. My lifts just seem to gain really slowly.

What are you doing for legs?

 

[SteelWeaver]

Nonetheless, I'm really impressed. Are you doing leg extensions as starters for pre-exhaustion? Or just warm-up? What sort of rep range are you working in? When I made my most strength gains seemed to be when I kept the reps around 5-8 for all my quad exercises. Now I'm staying around 5 or 6 for squats, which I do first, then move up to 8 and 10 for leg presses and leg extensions (with the drop-sets you mentioned once every now and then). Every once in a while I'll throw in a 20 rep set at the end of squats, or a tri-set once a month or so.

Tons of people talk about how higher rep ranges for legs will boost size gains - what do you think? And doesn't that compromise strength gains?

Entire leg on one day is exhausting, isn't it? But good exhausting.