The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#301

Post by mgil » Thu Apr 22, 2021 3:15 am

BenM wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 2:33 am Depends what you mean by 'stimulus'. Strength? Hypertrophy? Hypertrophy of what?

Deadlifts are all hamstring and back for me. If I want to grow my quads they're not helping much. For that I've gotta do something else. Like squat.
I’ll agree with this, for the most part.

That’s why I think if one were to choose a “deadlift-centric” program, you’d need squats still as an accessory lift and I’d probably recommend front squat, high bar, SSB, or belt squats all before low bar.

Also...

Putting snatch grip and sumo into the DL rotation will increase quad recruitment some. Trap bar helps with quad recruitment also, simply because it allows the weight of the entire system to be centered better and allow the quads to help with knee extension.

If one were to go to a DL heavy program, I’d probably focus more on conventional, sumo, trap bar, and snatch grip from the floor before going into deficits or block pulls or even RDLs. I think those other variants are because the squat is primary for lower body and you’ve gotta make up for DL weaknesses without crushing recovery.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#302

Post by BenM » Thu Apr 22, 2021 3:44 am

@mgil yeah I have no issue with saying that low bar probably isn't the best squat for growing the quads, I think for many people (even the not-particularly-strong like myself) the stimulus to fatigue ratio (to steal an Israetelism) is pretty high. Subjectively if I was to use soreness and DOMs as a proxy for growth stimulus I personally feel like all those other movements are better than low bar.

I'm not in love with conventional deadlift at all as a hypertrophy lift really. I only do them (and low bar) because it's cool to lift heavy ass weight* - I much prefer trap bar with the low handles (for quads) and RDLs or deficit work (for hamstrings) but then I guess there's an element of anthropometry that influences my personal preference. I've never learned to love snatch grip deadlifts, and haven't pulled sumo since I first messed up my hamstring doing it a few years back (an injury which is still haunting me). But I can definitely see why people like them.

*in as much as my mediocre lifts could be called heavy; especially with the current state of my current lower body, ie a little bit broken

This probably doesn't really relate to LP all that much except to say that a more efficiently programmed LP could definitely be done without low bar squats at all (or with far less of them) and would probably stop people busting themselves up so much, for me and probably many others it's the lift that smashes my recovery the most. I don't really get the broscience wisdom that deadlift is so much more fatiguing than squats, I personally feel like under normal circumstances (ie when I'm not injured) I could deadlift heavier and more often than I squat and not dig myself too deeply into a recovery hole, and I don't think I'm some kind of outlier.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#303

Post by mgil » Thu Apr 22, 2021 4:10 am

@BenM I agree.

I like sumo and don’t do them particularly heavy. They are great for hip/glute work and then some quads with a bit of reduction of hamstring recruitment. They play nice as a “light pull” and don’t require new equipment.

Trap bar is great simply because I can feel the “leg press” cue being effective there. I never felt that cue effective on conventional pulls. For me, that bar offset changes around the mechanics enough, I guess?

It’s pretty easy to make a weekly LP out of a more balance approach, even for novice trainees, provided that they can do a 4-day split.

Monday:
Heavy Bench
Heavy Deadlifts

Tuesday:
Light Press
Light Squats

Thursday:
Heavy Press
Heavy Squats

Friday:
Light Bench
Light Deadlifts

Thursday/Friday can be flipped if it helps with recovery.

Another thing I’d note is that increasing the pulling volume smartly and adding more strength and stability to the spine, posterior chain, and posterior upper back is an overall benefit for lots of modern desk operators.

I also think the functional (yes, that word) utility of the deadlift variants crosses over into the real world in greater orders of magnitude than a low bar squat. Even the getting off the toilet gimmick is mechanically more often like a good morning which is more like a hip hinge. If one is picking squats based on crossover to real world scenarios, it’s likely front squat well before the rest.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#304

Post by hector » Thu Apr 22, 2021 7:18 am

BenM wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 3:44 am . I don't really get the broscience wisdom that deadlift is so much more fatiguing than squats, I personally feel like under normal circumstances (ie when I'm not injured) I could deadlift heavier and more often than I squat and not dig myself too deeply into a recovery hole, and I don't think I'm some kind of outlier.
Programmed smartly, the fatigue for any lift should be manageable.
Maybe it's just a finer line with deadlifts so you get more people wrecking themselves.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#305

Post by dw » Thu Apr 22, 2021 11:32 am

A common theory which seems to agree with my experience is that the issue is how much you are concentrically extending your back under load (is that the right terminology?, I mean whatever the movement is that straightens a rounded back).

For me sumo DLs are far less fatiguing than conventional. I would say half as fatiguing or less. But I round pretty badly at even moderate %s of my 1 RM doing conventional DLs.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#306

Post by psmith » Thu Apr 22, 2021 12:53 pm

It's psychologically easier to yolomax (or at least yoloRPEtoohigh) on a deadlift than on a squat, at least for me. Maybe something to do with the walkout.

>front squat most functional
Zercher tho

cgeorg wrote: Wed Apr 21, 2021 9:57 pm
Deficit snatch RDLs.

I'm not sure if I'm joking or not. I don't think so though.

think I got this from a thread here and it would be my favorite exercise if the name wasn't so long and I didn't keep dinging my shins
Last edited by psmith on Thu Apr 22, 2021 3:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#307

Post by FredM » Thu Apr 22, 2021 1:55 pm

dw wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 11:32 am A common theory which seems to agree with my experience is that the issue is how much you are concentrically extending your back under load (is that the right terminology?, I mean whatever the movement is that straightens a rounded back).

For me sumo DLs are far less fatiguing than conventional. I would say half as fatiguing or less. But I round pretty badly at even moderate %s of my 1 RM doing conventional DLs.
It's really easy to be lazy and not get tight off the floor, which I think is incredibly fatiguing (basically what you just said -- having to straighten your lower back under load). I actually have a similar issue with pin squats for the same reason. I think a big weight on your back is a better cue to get tight than one in your hands.

Switching to TnG deadlift actually helped A LOT with this. So do SGDL variations for the second pull slot. I'm guessing sumo or trap pulls would too -- the problem area is definitely the lower back.

I think for most (obviously not all) of the population, Rip isn't wrong. You can handle more squat volume than pull volume. Might also make sense to choose squat variations that also help pull like box squats if you care more about pull but can't seem to handle the volume needed to progress. At least that's what I'm doing now.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#308

Post by Philbert » Thu Apr 22, 2021 9:24 pm

BenM wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 2:33 am Depends what you mean by 'stimulus'. Strength? Hypertrophy? Hypertrophy of what?

Deadlifts are all hamstring and back for me. If I want to grow my quads they're not helping much. For that I've gotta do something else. Like squat.
But have you tried deficit SGDLs?

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#309

Post by BenM » Thu Apr 22, 2021 10:29 pm

Philbert wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 9:24 pm
BenM wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 2:33 am Depends what you mean by 'stimulus'. Strength? Hypertrophy? Hypertrophy of what?

Deadlifts are all hamstring and back for me. If I want to grow my quads they're not helping much. For that I've gotta do something else. Like squat.
But have you tried deficit SGDLs?
Not according to my log. They don't sound like fun!

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#310

Post by slowmotion » Fri Apr 23, 2021 12:56 am

Philbert wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 9:24 pm
BenM wrote: Thu Apr 22, 2021 2:33 am Depends what you mean by 'stimulus'. Strength? Hypertrophy? Hypertrophy of what?

Deadlifts are all hamstring and back for me. If I want to grow my quads they're not helping much. For that I've gotta do something else. Like squat.
But have you tried deficit SGDLs?
Heh, deficit SGDLs might be something that maybe could work as well as squats. I'd rather squat, tho.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#311

Post by KyleSchuant » Thu Jul 28, 2022 3:23 am

This quote from this article by Rip made me think to push this thread back up.
A 470 squat seems crazy in 6 months, but I have seen it happen several times. It requires commitment, a certain genetic endowment, eating more than you want to, and pissing off all your friends who wanted your time.
Data we've collected from this thread and elsewhere we put in this spreadsheet.

Based on the criteria in the "WNDTP" article on StartingStrength.com,
this collects data based on doing the Starting Strength Novice Linear Progression (SS NLP)
showing the highest work sets people achieved before stopping, whether because of genuine stall, laziness, boredom, injury or whatever.
To qualify, they must have
- high/low bar squatted at least twice a week
- for sets of 5
- adding weight to the bar each time
- until they couldn't

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#312

Post by mgil » Thu Jul 28, 2022 3:55 am

Wow. Another shitty article from Rip. Color me shocked.

Rip is obviously hand waving with his claims, but there’s a very real chance he’s seen a few guys squat 470 after 6 months of training. They were likely genetic outliers (as he notes) that were also playing football or being coached by Pendlay for WL concurrent to their strength training.

So they were likely ~19yo dudes with plenty of free time that were getting supplemental hypertrophy stimulus elsewhere.

The data presented in that article does mimic reality. It’s poorly presented, in that I didn’t see the range of the data but whatever. The article with the data also states that the front squat significantly removes the hamstrings from the lift. Okay. Another reminder of how the “analysis” there is such shit.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#313

Post by wiigelec » Sun Aug 21, 2022 8:39 am

Thanks for the data set, would have been very helpful 8 years ago in formulating realistic expectations, but hindsight is 20/20 and no guarantees I would have bought into it anyway.

Previous sports or training: NO

Dates: 11/18/2013 -- 7/7/2014

BW: 181 -- 200
Age: 37 (at the time)
Height: 6'1"

Best x5 (PC x3)
SQ: 45 -- 215
BE: 45 -- 158
PR: 45 -- 96
DL: 45 -- 275
PC: 45 -- 121

Injury: NO

Stopped because: these were the best x5 sets, after that I started to reduce the reps per set to keep adding weight, which I know now is called "peaking" and not necessarily indicative of increased strength

No previous training means no competitive sports (marching band guy) and nothing previously in the gym that would qualify as anything more than "exercising". Started with the empty bar ala SL because I was scared of the "heavy" weights. First time I squatted 95 it scared the crap out of me LOL. I definitely drug it out by not adding weight every session (sometimes weekly) and resetting occasionally because the weight was getting intimidating. So yeah, definitely not doing the program.

All-in-all I didn't have any problems with the LP, it worked pretty good for me. Of course, at the time I was fully integrated into the "cult" and was, like many others here, under the impression that I was doing something wrong because I was so "weak" and my numbers were too low (I was under the impression I would be squatting 315 in a few months). Ran a few more "LPs" but didn't make any progress worth noting (just more peaking by reducing volume while adding weight to the bar), and got up to a quite fat 30%+ bf max of 215#.

Now if you want to start a thread on shitty intermediate programming, I'll be more than happy to vent on the many years of wasted time and no progress on frequently mentioned low-volume offerings such as TM and 5/3/1, which I spun my wheels on for the better parts of 6 years.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#314

Post by JohnHelton » Sun Aug 21, 2022 12:06 pm

Age - 44 (at the time)
Height - 5'8"
BW - 195 lbs -> 205 lbs
SQ - 290
BP - 225
DL - 350

No injuries and no coaching. I never stalled. I just got bored.

I lifted in HS and my first year of college, getting up to a 315 lbs bench (TNG) at 180 lbs my freshman year. Then I quit lifting weights and just drank beer. Subsequently when I turned 30 I became a runner (marathons). Then when I was 43 I started doing a bit of crossfit. I found that I just liked the lifting part and not the monkey business. That is when I found SS. I'm glad I didn't do the program in terms of grinding out the reps in the end. I moved from the NLP to coaching by Feigenbaum, which was all RPE based.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#315

Post by KyleSchuant » Mon Aug 22, 2022 6:02 pm

Thanks, wiigelec and John, for your data.

John: what was your press, and did you clean?

Averages (median, ie half are more and half less) for the men are,
33yo
5'11"
181-205lb BW, 27.9 BMI (in "overweight" or "pre-obese" category)
Squat 290, bench 190, deadlift 325, press 121

33 of the 104 guys report doing the clean, and their median was 154lb, or 44% of their deadlift.

67% had previous training of some kind, 21% were injured during NLP.

Of the coached people, 6 of the 39 or 15% got an injury during NLP, vs 17/65 or 27% of the uncoached (an "injury" being defined as something which stopped their run, and/or lead to major changes such as no longer pressing or benching).

The coached had an average 255 squat and the uncoached 299; so the uncoached went further but hurt themselves in the process. This could mean that weaker people are more likely to seek coaching and/or that coaches hold people back to avoid injury. This could also be selection bias in the data: the coaches reporting the data showed everyone, including those getting poor results, but people on their own are less likely to report poor results, the guy who struggled to squat 90lbs and then gave up probably isn't on this forum discussing it.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#316

Post by JohnHelton » Tue Aug 23, 2022 1:58 am

KyleSchuant wrote: Mon Aug 22, 2022 6:02 pm John: what was your press, and did you clean?
Sorry. I didn't clean, but I had a press of 140.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#317

Post by brkriete » Tue Aug 23, 2022 6:50 am

KyleSchuant wrote: Mon Aug 22, 2022 6:02 pm Thanks, wiigelec and John, for your data.

John: what was your press, and did you clean?

Averages (median, ie half are more and half less) for the men are,
33yo
5'11"
181-205lb BW, 27.9 BMI (in "overweight" or "pre-obese" category)
Squat 290, bench 190, deadlift 325, press 121

33 of the 104 guys report doing the clean, and their median was 154lb, or 44% of their deadlift.

67% had previous training of some kind, 21% were injured during NLP.

Of the coached people, 6 of the 39 or 15% got an injury during NLP, vs 17/65 or 27% of the uncoached (an "injury" being defined as something which stopped their run, and/or lead to major changes such as no longer pressing or benching).

The coached had an average 255 squat and the uncoached 299; so the uncoached went further but hurt themselves in the process. This could mean that weaker people are more likely to seek coaching and/or that coaches hold people back to avoid injury. This could also be selection bias in the data: the coaches reporting the data showed everyone, including those getting poor results, but people on their own are less likely to report poor results, the guy who struggled to squat 90lbs and then gave up probably isn't on this forum discussing it.
That's interesting. My results were slightly above average except for bench (I can't remember and I'm not going to look it up but I think I ended up at 315 or 335 / 185 / 365 / 135) which more or less tracks with the fact that I am 6'1" and dropped from 275>245 doing the program. I definitely spun my wheels at the end for a couple months especially on bench - resetting and then working back up using microweights takes forever and sucks.

I suspect the uncoached squats ending up so much higher could well be because it's pretty easy to cheat depth and pretend you're still making progress.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#318

Post by SnakePlissken » Tue Aug 23, 2022 7:09 pm

brkriete wrote: Tue Aug 23, 2022 6:50 am
I suspect the uncoached squats ending up so much higher could well be because it's pretty easy to cheat depth and pretend you're still making progress.
I'm pretty sure I did the same thing too. My squats were parallel at best when I did SS and the TM. The fact my 1rm squat hasn't increased in 2 years eats me sometimes until I remember that I actually squat below parallel with weights that used to make me wonder if I was finally going to hurt myself seriously bad.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#319

Post by KyleSchuant » Tue Aug 23, 2022 8:11 pm

If you feel ashamed of shallow squats, a glance over the social media of SSCs will cure you of your shame - they're actually paying to squat shallow.

Don't be ashamed. You did your best, now you're doing better. That's all any of us can do.

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Re: The Great LP Stall Thread of Shame

#320

Post by KOTJ » Tue Aug 23, 2022 8:37 pm

SnakePlissken wrote: Tue Aug 23, 2022 7:09 pm
brkriete wrote: Tue Aug 23, 2022 6:50 am
I suspect the uncoached squats ending up so much higher could well be because it's pretty easy to cheat depth and pretend you're still making progress.
I'm pretty sure I did the same thing too. My squats were parallel at best when I did SS and the TM. The fact my 1rm squat hasn't increased in 2 years eats me sometimes until I remember that I actually squat below parallel with weights that used to make me wonder if I was finally going to hurt myself seriously bad.
Wait, are you training for strength and you haven't increased you ERM in 2 years?

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