Squatting Every Day

And then sometimes you have an idea.  You can't be sure if it's good or bad, so eventually you have to try it.

For two or three or four or five years, however long I've been serious enough about lifting to check up on the generally unreliable reports about what the Bulgarians are doing, I've been fascinated with the idea of squatting every day, and I knew eventually I'd try it.

I thought that I would train for the 2014 USAPL Raw Nationals in July in much the same way I've trained the last 18 or so months, after which, what the hell, I'd experiment with squatting everyday.

But then last Saturday I popped my elbow.  While it looks fine on the outside, it's still very angry, and it doesn't like to go to full extension.  I find I can do slow push ups, and I did a pull up today which I won't try to repeat soon since it made my elbow feel worse than it did Saturday.  I'm almost, but not quite, stupid enough to try any pressing.

A lot of guys, I fear, would take a couple months off here.


Earlier this week I saw an article headline which claimed men's self esteem is lowered when doors are held open for them.  I didn't read the article because I don't read articles like that, but I know I don't care about doors.  Sometimes people hold doors for me because they're genuinely great people, and as I have observed, sometimes they do so because they find me intimidating which makes me laugh.

But if I didn't train, I'm certain that my self esteem would take a bigger hit than it did in my latter teens when I happened on porn and what passes for average genitals.

So I decided to squat everyday.  By far the most reputable source I've read on this, James Steel, recommends hitting at least 70% of 1rm everyday, and going over 80% a couple times a week.  I don't know exactly where my 1rm is these days, so I don't know what 70% is, but 315 is close enough and it's easy to load.

I might improve some of my physical attributes doing this, or I might die, but I was going to do that eventually anyway.  Besides, I've been listening to a lot of what I call drug rap in training lately, and if those guys can ball until they fall, I can squat until I rot.

Thus far though, I feel great.  Obviously my lifting density is way up, but my volume and intensity are both down.   If I were to guess what happens eventually, I'd say I'll get a little bit stronger and a little bit leaner while feeling great all the time and having plenty of physical resources left over to train jiu jitsu with regularity.

And so there are some more ideas I have, but I'm not taking a couple months off anytime soon.

Well actually I've never had that idea, and I still slam doors on people who do.