Does anyone have a good program to increase squat strength? I've stalled out and it's getting quite frustrating.

Thanks for any advice / tips

What have you been doing up to this point?

Also, at what weight did you stall? Could have very different answers depending on how much weight you're talking about.

squats, leg press, other auxillary lifts. currently stalled at 350. im trying to get up to 405 by the end of the year

Not sure of your exact situation but Stronglifts has been effective for me (and others on TA)

http://texags.com/forums/48/topics/2254214

Box squats.

Box squats with chains.

Box squats with bands.

Yah, box squats.

When you are done with those, do some box squats.

thanks for the tips. I got to where i wanted with bench this year so going to focus on leg strength the remainder of the year

Smolov or Hatch. Hurts soooooo good.

Look at Mark Rippetoe's Texas Method.

Ripp will tell you, the squat works the posterior chain more than the legs...but I digress. Your squat is higher than mine so can't help. Have you tried increasing your volume where you are at currently on your work sets? Maybe give that a go and after a few weeks try to go back to lower volume and see if you can heavy it up

I guarantee you will go from 350 to 405 using smolov. Just be ready to eat and stretch like it's nobody's business. It is very taxing on the body... you will be squatting 3-4 times a week.

shano0603 said:

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I guarantee you will go from 350 to 405 using smolov. Just be ready to eat and stretch like it's nobody's business. It is very taxing on the body... you will be squatting 3-4 times a week.

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This.

I've done one Smolov cycle and 2 or 3 Hatch cycles. Hatch is the better option if you don't want to squat 4x/week. Smolov is the better option for pure gainnnzzzzzz. If you're at 350 now, I can almost guarantee that you'll be over 4 hundy by the end of your first Smolov cycle. Hatch will probably net you around a 10% gain based on where you're at right now. That being said, everybody's body reacts differently. You could net more or less than what I posted. I based those numbers merely on what I gained after Hatch/Smolov when my numbers were similar to yours.

during this cycle are you focusing on other muscle groups too or just legs?

I always followed whatever cycle I was on in conjunction with an otherwise normal workout routine that included both other strength work and cardio/conditioning.

Angry Panda said:

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I always followed whatever cycle I was on in conjunction with an otherwise normal workout routine that included both other strength work and cardio/conditioning.

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what i figured, makes sense. for stretching did you go with dynamic, static, mixture of the two, foam role?


i'm really bad about stretching

Everybody always says dynamic stretching before and static stretching after is best. That being said, I'm pretty bad about dynamic stretching and only do a little. A typical warm-up for me looks like this:

• Foam roll any/all of the following, depending on what's sore and the level of soreness: quads/hamstrings/glutes/IT band/lower back/upper back.
• Various static lower body stretches intended to open up hips and stretch hamstrings - lizard pose, half front split pose, frog pose, pigeon pose, etc.
• Shoulder/upper body stretches - twisted cross pose, using resistance bands to open up shoulders/chest, etc.
• Kang Squats - a guilty pleasure of mine. Super light weight on the bar, really just enough to force you A2G. I like to hang out in the bottom for 5 - 10 seconds each rep and shift my weight around to continue the hip stretch/warm-up.

This is just what I've found works for me. My hip and shoulder mobility have greatly improved once I started being more regimented about my stretching, although they still have a ways to go. I'd encourage you to experiment and find what works best for you. ROMWod is a great online reference, although I believe you have to pay to have access to all their full videos. Additionally, "Becoming A Supple Leopard" is a fantastic text reference for any sort of stretch you can imagine, categorized by body part. Best of luck!

While doing it I would stretch before and after I lifted. My preworkout routine would look something like this.
-foam roll my back to pop it. Then glutes, quads and hammys as needed.
-3 minutes on exercise bike to loosen the hips up
-rotator cuff/shoulder warmup
-mixture of leg extentions, leg curls until I felt good
- 50-100 feet of lunges(another program I did recommened lunges before every squat day)

Sounds like a lot, but it only takse about 10 minutes.

After my workout I usually foamrolled a lot, and did static stretches in between. This really helps with the recovery process since you will be squatting again in 2 days.


I still worked out everything else once a week, but I didn't go crazy on it. Maybe 10-12 sets a day. You can play it by how you feel. I got to where I was taking a lot more days off because I needed the rest.

Squat everyday