Tuesday 19.2: Squats

Tuesday. Back squats 7x5 (120kg), tempo squats 3 sets, overhead squats 3 sets.

Back in business! I took it light today with squats. Several 5-rep sets but I didn't go near maxes. After strength training I wanted to try out something I saw from another cf blog, regular light weight back squats with pre-determined tempo. In the end I took some overhead sets. Toni also continued to work after flu and took old school push presses.

Push press, 70kg, Toni

Strength. Back squats 5-5-5-5-5-5-5 (100, 110, 120, 120, 120, 120, 120kg). Even though I'm not in 100% shape those squats felt very good. My goal today was to concentrate purely on form and technique, and complete the deepest squats I'm able to. I was not aiming to the heaviest weights possible. Beforehand I thought about doing 5 sets but it felt so good in my hips and hamstrings that I wanted to do a couple of extra sets =) I believe my form was good, my heels were pushing the ground and thus I found a stable stance. The depth was also good and I'm proud of today's squats.

Tempo squats. 60kg back squats with a tempo 2201. This is something new to practice about. I made the barbell light, only 60kg on it. Tempo in this one means that ideally it would comprise of a slow lowering of 2 seconds, 2 seconds halt in the deepest possible position, explosive rise back up of theoretical 0 seconds, and finally 1 sec rest before completing the same set again.  I did 3 or 4 sets with 10 reps each. I was surprised how deep I was able to go when I was concentrating in it. It was way over 90 degrees, which is astounding. Along with that main focus was in the quick return to standing position. This was a good variation and supportive training.

Overhead squats. Three sets of 5 reps each, max 40kg. Some time ago my form was pretty horrific but I'm finding this one! I don't have similar troubles with this one anymore. After doing that one snatch/overhead squat workout with Toni, some issues revealed to me and now I'm able to correct my stance to find a good overall form.

Toni's workouts.
Push press 3-3-3-3-3-3-3 (60, 70, 75, 70, 70, 70 failed only 2 reps, 70kg).
Toni did push presses after a looooong break. After doing the sets of 60, 70 and 75kg he decided to stick with 70kg until the end. At the second last set he made one failed rep, other than that he nailed that bar upwards each time. At some attempts it was more like a shoulder press but once he concentrated well he took advantage of a proper "dip and drive" method and was able to utilize his legs more than normally.