QUICK QUESTION Is their anyway to predict how much you can squat by knowing how much you can leg press.
No. There is no correlation. Start squatting, and you will find out. Leg presses are worthless.
delete please
Leg Presses arent worthless but most definately should not even be close to a focus exercise for an athlete, so I agree with the above post, stop leg pressing start squatting.
Well, I suppose no exercise is entirely “worthless,” but it is a matter of training economy. What gives you the best bang for the buck? As you stated, athletes should clearly be squatting and NOT leg pressing. But, then who should be leg pressing? Bodybuilders? Why? I contend that squats would yield far better leg development than leg presses. Why use an exercise if there is a better option?
Because when you get to a certain level having several options of how to stimulate muscles proves well as a variance in stimulus causes muscular growth and throws off the nervous system, for the more you perform a movement the more efficient you nervous system becomes at it so im not saying it becomes less effective but it is good to throw in something different, so this is just yet another option of working the leg muscles, a different stimulus that could be used every so often to rekindle growth and nervous system excitement because it is a different move. This has been a proven thing by westside, they dont just always squat, although it may be the best exercise, they choose several different exercises that train the same muscle and this also gives the nervous system a kick in the ass, and can you really argue with their success? As well when you perform a move at a high intensity for more than three weeks it wreaks havoc on your CNS, stagnating progress, so change is good, and the leg press is just another tool in the box, not that its one id use, but it could be used.
Who says one has to perform a lift at high intensity for more than 3 weeks? Rather than performing a different movement, you could lower intensity for one week. Oh, and I do not see any Westsiders performing leg presses :D.
The only time for an athlete to do leg presses is if there is some injury that keeps them from doing squats - and even then it is a poor substitute!
Thank you xlr8!
Ok but wouldnt you rather not take an unloading week or risk it and change because its a proven method to fight off stagnation and overtraining? And no im not advocating the leg press, you were saying only full squats should be used, and im saying you need other options so you dont stagnate and if you ask any one exercise rotation is the way to go. You can do as you wish though, im just here to share info…
Nowhere did I say that only full back squats should be performed. But, it should be a mainstay. Other options are front squats, snatch-grip deadlifts, conventional deadlifts, etc.
deadlifts are in a different category by themselves, things like good mornings are beneficial in helping squats. and they are a mainstay but im saying that the exercise variation will allow them to be a mainstay(ie 2 weeks squatting, one doing good mornings, repeat).
They are not necessarily in a different category when referring to training athletes; specifically sprinters.
Just wanted to say that’s there are other things in life that squat. I know a girl who ran 10.73 and never squatted of her life (for the reason xlr8 mentions), but she leg presses. And she can’t even bench press her body weight (not because she’s injured, but because we think it’s irrelevant to bench 200 lbs like girls in US do). This lead coaches to work their minds to find other exercises. So there’s no fatality if you can’t squat.
By the way, talking about leg press, do you have data for how much top male or female sprinters can leg press?
pierrejean
I havent seen any stats about the leg press and I understand what your saying about squatting, which is what I am trying to say to Matt Haugen.
Matt Haugen
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Im saying is that exercise rotation disallows stagnation and when included with an unloading week, no CNS overtraining and will allow greater progress on lifts.
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You can believe me or not, but the repeated stress of a specific movement at a maximum, whether you give an unloading week with that specific movement or not.
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And yes deadlifts are in another category, they are much more stressful on the CNS and much more stressfull and reliant on posterior chain strength because
a)A lot less quad involvement that in full squats
b)A lot more involvment of the lower back
c)There is no cheater or stopping short, its either you get it or not.
Squats are a very useful exercise but they are not an end in and of themselves for track athletes. I know athletes who only legpress because sprinting thrashes their lower backs and squatting would only increase the soreness. I know athletes who legpress because they simply dislike squatting - and still make progress on the track.
I love deep squatting, but I often get my butt soundly kicked on the track by sprinters whom I can easily outlift in any exercise of choice. If squatting or benching big numbers were all there was to sprinting, the throwers would be the fastest runners on the planet. I’ve heard the meme started by Dr. Hatfield now making the rounds on Internet: Olympic weightlifters have faster 30m times than sprinters, and higher vertical jumps than highjumpers, yadda yadda. Undoubtedly true, but there are also non-weightlifting sprinters who would wipe the floor clean with any weightlifter over 100m. I know a couple of 10.50 juniors who almost never weight-train, and we’ve all seen Kim Collins and Carl Lewis in action.
I’m not downplaying the importance of exercises such as squats, bench and cleans - indeed I think they provide the most utility for most athletes. For me personally, they work: I lift weights, I get faster; I don’t lift weights, I get slower. But, to mix a metaphor or two, you got to keep your eye on the ball, 'cos there are many roads that lead to Rome, so do whatever floats your boat.
Oly lifters have those 30m times for certain reasons, and they are the same reasons that lifting is important to sprinting
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They have high relative max strength and RFD, huge in acceleration and sprinting
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They have high neural efficiency, another huge factor
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Their posterior chain muscles are extrememly strong and explosive, which results in those sprint time and VL numbers.
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The thresh hold for activation of their muscle, neural drive, inter and intra muscular coordination are extremely high with oly lifters(except their threshhold for activation of their muscles is lower, a large factor in RFD)
Their faults in sprinting come for a couple of reasons
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They do not train to sprint(plus the extra body mass), thus they have no special endurance, and while reasonable, not very good form
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Because of those factors they cannot run a 100m sprint effectively
What does this prove?
- That RFD exercise and max strength are important factors in sprinting and both can be increased with weight training.
Hmm. I used to think so too, but I’m becoming steadily more convinced that neural efficiency is by far the most important factor in sprinting, and that weight training contributes more via general (not specific) stimulation of the neuromuscular system than via increases in max strength or RDF.
Yes, thats right. Weight training for sprinting should has two purposes.
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General neural increases
a)Neural Efficiency
b)Neural Drive/Excitement
c)Lower Threshold of neural activity to fire muscles -
Weight trainings specific purpose to sprinting is only to increase the strength the specific muscles used in sprinting, not mimic the movement(ie strengthen glutes and hamstrings with squats or good mornings).
RFD and max strength are resultants of both, but RFD is mostly a neural improvement. And weight training aids in improving general neural efficiency, thus having a carryover to sprinting.
To elaborate somewhat, look at the shotput event. To throw the shot 20 meters a shotputter needs a benchpress max of at least 200 kg (440 lb). This does not mean that benching 200 kg guarantees a 20m shot, or that the distance increases linearly with the benchpress, but line up the world’s best throwers in a row and you will see that a 200+ kg benchpress is a sort of minimum admission standard into the 20m club.
There is no such standard for the 100m, not even using another lift such as the squat or the power clean. There is no “minimum” number that all sprinters of a particular level possess. Show me a 20m shotputter and I will bet with relatively high confidence that he benches at least 200kg. Show me a 10.30 sprinter, and I cannot say with any degree of certainty what his squat or clean maximum would be. There is at least one Dutch sprinter (I name no names, but local afficionados know who I mean) who ran 10.30 while in the possession of a 35 kg power clean. Some sub-10 sprinters like Ben Johnson were brutally strong, while others like Obadele Thompson or Kim Collins are probably less strong than the average forum reader.
I just don’t see the link. I just can’t see how a certain level of strength or RFD correlates with a certain speed. The disparities are too great. I can see how a lack of sprint-related neural efficiency means a weightlifter with a 300 kg squat can’t run low-10. But if strength is that important, how come there are some low-10 sprinters literally unable to squat bodyweight?
(Edited later)
Sorry, numba56, I just saw you replied while I was typing this and are in agreement.