Squat vs. RDL and SDL - Important

Mikeh, good point about the shorter races. I forgot you swimmers are crazy crazy people, who swim ridiculously far in some of your races. I would imagine the start/turn would become less important for these races. You could however turn it around and look at it this way; if you have an advantage off the wall in your turn, you can exploit that advantage many more times over a longer race. Something to think about anyway.

And remember, as you begin to squat more, and your DL numbers increase, you’ll have to manage volume to combat overtraining if you’re performing both lifts within the same training cycle.

I do the squat and RDL or SLDL in the same training cycle (in fact the same workout.) I assumed that this would be okay, as I assumed that RDL’s/SLDL’s were not as taxing on the CNS as classic deadlifts are. Is this incorrect? Are RDL’s/SLDL’s about as taxing as classic deadlifts? If not SLDL’s and RDL’s, what would you do for hamstrings? Thanks!

mikeh

How about squats and power cleans? Power cleans seem to tax my hamstrings fairly well. Other thoughts on power cleans?

At first blush I’d say that powercleans and squats don’t belong on the same day. PC’s are an Olympic movement and therefore very taxing on the CNS, and squats are always rough ont he system.

Maybe in the same training cycle, I don’t know.

Are you sure it makes all of this difference?
Would it be truly that different if a swimmer used back instead of front squat (or viceversa)in his/her weight program?
My experience: NOT REALLY! You can use all your knowledge regarding muscles involvements,movement specificity,balanced development,etc,but at the end of the day what you are truly training and developing in the gym is a general quality and should be treated only as such.I find the latest recent post of David W’s (“A change in mentality”) enlightening and most precious in this regard.
I always had good results with swimmers when sticking to the basics in program design:general plan,height of the general stimulus consideration (intensity),breadth of the general stimulus consideration (MU involvement).

Thank you pakewi.