My Road to a Lean(er) Mean(er) Aurik

[Aurik]

DE Squat/DL

Started with 5mins on the bike, followed by some front/back and side/side leg swings to open up the hips. Next came:
Front Squats (warmup): 45/5 95/5
Deadlifts: 135/3(conventional) 135/3(narrow sumo) 135/3(wide sumo) 225/3c/3ns/3ws 315/2c/2ns/2ws
Leg Press: 765/12 855/10 945/8
Standing Cable Crunches: 115/10 115/10 115/10
Leg Curls: 215/4* - broke the machine
Hammer strength leg curl (per leg): 100/10 100/10 100/10

And that's it. Of the 3 deadlifts, I felt strongest in wide sumo -- once the bar got past the knees or so, my hips would shoot forward and lock it out - BAM! The leg press was fun -- haven't really worked quads much in awhile. Leg curls were funny -- started cranking out my first set of 10, then after 4 reps, BAM! the selector pin slipped and something broke. Oops. Well the HS leg curl was fun, and worked the glutes nicely as well. So Monday I'm going to work up to heavy singles on halting deads to try to get the weight to where I can get my hips under it. Once my hips get under it, it's as good as lockrd out.

[LtL]

Looking forward to seeing some crazy DL numbers soon Ken. Good work!

LtL

[Carl1174]

Nice work Ken thats some heavy weight to be doing DE with buddy....

Sounds like the sumo is a natural for you. I think you are gonna be SF(even)HW soon mate

Carl.

[BendtheBar]

Great work Aurik. Keep charging!

[Aurik]

Thanks guys for the encouragement. One other thing I did differently was I tried pulling and squatting barefoot (well, in socks). I found it much harder to reach depth on the front squats barefoot, but the deadlifts seemed to work better an inch or so closer to the ground. Definitely felt much stronger DL'ing with wide sumo barefoot. So barefoot DL'ing it is

[5kgLifter]

Originally Posted by Aurik

Thanks guys for the encouragement. One other thing I did differently was I tried pulling and squatting barefoot (well, in socks). I found it much harder to reach depth on the front squats barefoot, but the deadlifts seemed to work better an inch or so closer to the ground. Definitely felt much stronger DL'ing with wide sumo barefoot. So barefoot DL'ing it is

I deadlift in socks but find that squats are better with shoes on, I think it's that small amount of heel raise that helps.

[Carl1174]

I feel better in shoes with a solid base, so no running shoes. I think that slight lift definitelt helps. I lift squat shoes actually have a bit of a heel built in tothem, I could be wrong but I am sure they have, you could look into getting some of those Ken. I know LtL swears by them and onve your feet are planted with them, you aint going anywhere.

Carl.

[Aurik]

Originally Posted by Carl1174

I feel better in shoes with a solid base, so no running shoes. I think that slight lift definitelt helps. I lift squat shoes actually have a bit of a heel built in tothem, I could be wrong but I am sure they have, you could look into getting some of those Ken. I know LtL swears by them and onve your feet are planted with them, you aint going anywhere.

Carl.

Carl, I do squat with olympic-style squatting shoes. However, I found that for deadlifting, apparently pulling barefoot works better for me.

[bigtim27]

Bare foot deadlifting sounds interesting.

[Aurik]

Tim, basically deadlifting barefoot puts you a little closer to the floor, which reduces the distance you have to pull and (for me at least) helps improve leverages slightly. Try it sometime and see how it works for you.