Front Squats Rule

It's a Saturday night on the long weekend and I am working on a nice bloat with my post workout steakfest. Today was a good result and I feel my strength and focus returning with each session. Though I have continued to struggle in the intense summer heat, which  really seems to pushing me into fatigue early in my sessions. Regardless the numbers are showing my work rate is increasing as I push rep records while my session durations have dropped back to an even hour.

I have been working on my squat mobility and during this period have focused heavily on the front squat to mix up the stress. Having not  trained the front squat before it took a few sessions to get the cues right. However 3 weeks in it feels like a fantastic adjunct to my training.

A couple of things have surprised me about the front squat. Firstly my form is much much better than normal squatting. Obviously I have some mobility issues that impact my back squat but I feel much stronger front squatting. Though it has to be noted I am squatting holding the bar via straps to compensate for my less than poor writ flexibility. The second benefit appears to be a much more direct quad stimulation that is driving some discernible hypertrophy (at least to my eyes!) While I won't ever pause with a quarter of a tonne like our friend Klokov, it certainly feels like I will have a decent number of wheels on the bar this year. The plan is to switch back to normal squats in a month.

After overhead pressing  I finished the session with paused bent rows. For the these I have tweaked the row slightly, using a foam wrapped around the bar to limit my ROM to the sweet spot right where I need to pause and contract.

I fact I did  several sets of cable pull throughs to work the glutes and hip hinge for reps and to assist with recovery for my next session of deads.

Overall it was a great session particularly given I exceeded my planned rep target for the AMRAP final set of front squats.

Now its about focusing on the big three food, sleep and relaxation to get ready for the next session. It's starting to feel good again!

Stay Strong

Thomo