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Barbell Deadlift program

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adam.stozek

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Hi everybody,

I would like to ask you for specific deadlift strength training.
I am 23 male, 173 cm, about 77 kg. I participated in martial arts for 4-5 years, then turned to bodywheight training.
My core training is gymnastics, but I incorporate barbell and kettlebells as well. In recent years I decided to try some lifting and focus on strength conditioning. I started of course with Pavel's PTTP program, later change in favor of 3x3 etc. but I remain faithfull for his teaching. Up until now I've finished 3 cycles including Deadlift and Bench Press with final results 140 kg and 112,5 kg. Not that much, but I appriciate leveling up with some bodybuilders at my gym in all in all - 9 months.

The reason I didn't stick to PTTP program is I tend to overtrain one annoying muscle in my right buttock. Two days of DF in row and I'm done (and it has nothing to do with wheight. I mean 2x5 with let say 75% 1MR can do this to me. I have no idea why it happans though.). That was my big problem, because right after one month since I had begun training I started to have this issue and spend 2 months of my first DL cycle griting my teeth, taking breaks from gym and consulting with physiotherapists. When times come for second cycle I immiedietaly overtrained myself and then I reduce 4 sessions per week to 3 sessions and the problem has been solved. I put on much bigger wheight then before, did more sets, but this pain (fortunately) occured never more. In last cycle I moved to schedule from Beyond Bodybuilding and did heavy 4x2 reps and then 4x3 lighter three times a week.

It looks like happy ending, but still I had one more issue. In one 3-month cycle, I improved Bench Press 12,5kg and Deadlift only 10kg. This disproportion disturb me a little. It just seems deadlift isn't my thing.

Okey, that was long introduction. I would like to ask you for deadlift strength training. I want to do deadlift and get stronger.

I wondered if 3x3 or 5x5 (3 times per week) are good programs for DL. I read in few places that training deadlift more then 5 sets of 5 PER WEEK is too much. In one program (Stronglift I believe) there is ONLY ONE Deadlift set (1x5) PER WEEK - which looks suspisiously low frequency for me. It was stated so many times that training more will sabotage my resuts, that I actually started to believe that. If 3 sessions are better then 4, why 2 wouldn't be better then 3?

What's more I didn't find any serious DL exclusive programs I mean they are always composed with squats within. But usually there is so much squats, that DL are done hardly ever. As mentioned, stronglifts program has 3 times a week 5x5 squat session and only one time 1x5 deadlift. I got very confused with this. I did multiple times 5x5 and felt good. If you can explain it, I would be grateful.

Don't understand me wrong - I have nothing against squats. Actually, I started doing them lately. I feel stronger I squat movements - I can do pistols 3x3 with 32 kg. And because I'm finishing squat cycle, I'm not sure if doing them together with deadlifts in next cycle, for next 3 months is bright idea. If deadlifting and squating can be mixed in plan for beggining lifter then I would appriciete all advices.

Thank you for all your awnsers :)
Adam
 
Hi Adam and welcome to Strongfirst. If you like the PTTP format, but it bothers some part of your body, you could try changing deadlift stance. Conventional many days in a row bothered my back. I recently switched to narrow sumo and am totally pain free. Your max may take a temporary dip, but you will build up to a new one. Conversely, if you lifted sumo, maybe try conventional.

This may be a temporary patch though and you may try to find what it is exactly that is bothering your buttock. It may be a form issue, a mobility issue or something else entirely. You said you train martial arts. Did you suffer an injury to the area that is bothering you? Others on the forum may have suggestions as to how this could be investigated..
 
adam.stozek said:
I read in few places that training deadlift more then 5 sets of 5 PER WEEK is too much. In one program (Stronglift I believe) there is ONLY ONE Deadlift set (1x5) PER WEEK - which looks suspisiously low frequency for me. It was stated so many times that training more will sabotage my resuts, that I actually started to believe that. If 3 sessions are better then 4, why 2 wouldn't be better then 3?

What's more I didn't find any serious DL exclusive programs I mean they are always composed with squats within. But usually there is so much squats, that DL are done hardly ever. As mentioned, stronglifts program has 3 times a week 5x5 squat session and only one time 1x5 deadlift. I got very confused with this. I did multiple times 5x5 and felt good. If you can explain it, I would be grateful.
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The volume for the DLs on Stronglifts and the original routines it is based on (Bill Starr 5x5 -> Starting Strength) is so low because of the squats. Backsquats, especially low-bar (the style used in Stronglifts) work a lot of the same muscles as DLs.
Because of that your DL will improve even with such a low volume. The other way around it's not the case. DLing a lot with minimal squatting will not improve your squat.
You also need to consider that for routines like Stronglifts, which is a linear progression, you are basically maxing out every single time you hit the gym. That's a lot more stressful for the body and it's ability to recover than e.g. using sets of 5 with your 10RM like you do with PTTP.
Additionally DLs, especially max or near max attempts, are considered very fatiguing to the central nervous system (CNS). A lot more than squats or presses. That's also a reason why many people advise to keep the DL volume relatively low.

You can always try the Daily Dose Deadlift Plan | StrongFirst (Daily Dose Thread).
It's low volume, high frequency and so far everyone who did it got good results. You'll only do 3-5 singles per day. Maybe that helps with your "buttock problem".
It's also designed to be done in conjunction with other things, so you are free to add pistols, squats or whatever you like.
 
I too have an annoying muscle in my right buttock that's easily overtrained. In my case, it was dormant for a very long time and became severely de-conditioned. The Daily Dose Deadlift Plan has been fantastic so far and is working well for me. I don't know if your condition is anything like mine but the Daily Dose might be worth trying.
 
I can also vouch for Daily Dose Deadlift.

It was my first deadlift program, great for technique practice. The heavier days (every 7th session, I did it M-F with weekends off) were good practice to get the feel for heavier weight, but not overloading every session like a linear progression would have you doing. After a traditional peaking program for the TSC last fall, I repeated it again (November to January) and added 5% to my 1RM (285-->300).

It's similar to PTTP in that it is high-frequency (5 days a week) and low intensity (5 reps at your 10RM). If less frequent but more intense training protocols cause issues for you, Daily Dose may be the right answer. For me it was the ease - 10 minutes a day with literally no sweat (I did Daily Dose in the evening, with other training in the morning - it's that easy).
 
I think both high frequency and low frequency work very well with the deadlift, I've done both successfully. I think in the beginning higher frequency is better, to learn the form better with lighter weights. Later, when one has to learn to lift heavy in order to chase PRs, it naturally takes more time to recover.

I think squats and deadlifts are something that can wreck havoc on each other. I have to disagree with @Kettlebelephant , as I have found carryover from the deadlifts to my squat. Squats may have a bigger overall carryover to other lifts, though, so they are very worthwhile to do. And squats definitely help the deadlift, especially the start off the floor. But in any case, I think three to four times a week of both combined together is a pretty safe number to aim for, provided the intensity per session isn't too big..

When I started deadlifting I did it about four times a week, with no squats. After experiencing my first plateau I concentrated on squats and did them three times a week with no deadlifts. After that I started a new program with 1 low-rep day of deadlifts, with 8 reps total, and two days of squats. Being somewhat proficient in the deadlift and doing it for only 8 reps a week made it a breeze and I felt it had effect whatsoever on my other lifting, but I did get new nice PRs after the cycle.
 
Kettlebelephant said:
That's a lot more stressful for the body and it's ability to recover than e.g. using sets of 5 with your 10RM like you do with PTTP.

Additionally DLs, especially max or near max attempts, are considered very fatiguing to the central nervous system (CNS). A lot more than squats or presses. That's also a reason why many people advise to keep the DL volume relatively low.

You can always try the Daily Dose Deadlift Plan | StrongFirst (Daily Dose Thread).
It's low volume, high frequency and so far everyone who did it got good results. You'll only do 3-5 singles per day. Maybe that helps with your "buttock problem".
It's also designed to be done in conjunction with other things, so you are free to add pistols, squats or whatever you like.
Click to expand...

Sean M said:
It's similar to PTTP in that it is high-frequency (5 days a week) and low intensity (5 reps at your 10RM). .
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People mention PTTP as being 5 reps of your 10 rep max, but that's only to start. You are putting weight on the bar if not every day, then pretty regularly, depending on if you are doing a step, wave or linear progression. Pretty soon you are trying to lift 5 days a week at close to your 5rm maximum. Or past it, as the book says to go to you miss reps.

My body didn't like PTTP. I was adding 10 lbs every day and the last 3 or 4 days before I had to reset were tough. In hindsight, I should have taken bigger jumps and 'failed' more quickly instead of dragging it out, which really taxed my body.

I've gone back to DDD, which worked well the first time. I decided to do it again since it seems to mesh well with ROP, which I also decided to repeat.


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Having said that, most strong folks don't follow a deadlift program that looks anything like DDD. I'm no expert, but as best I can tell, most programs call for deadlifting once a week, and possibly doing assistance work another day of the week.

If you like singles, but want to train a more typical once or twice a week, Matt Gary of SSPT has a deadlift program that I want to try. It's just singles, either once or twice a week. His argument is there's no stretch reflex in the competition deadlift, so why train with sets of deadlifts. He also likes that you get a chance to practice your setup and pull as you would in a competition deadlift on every rep - so maybe 15 times a session - compared to 1,2 or 3 times if you are doing sets. He says he doesn't exercise. He practices. (Where have I heard that?) Another advantage is possibly less chance of injury, since the idea is that you get hurt not on the first rep of the set but rather after your body has lost tightness and you are out of position.

SSPT Deadlift Training
 
@Manuel Fortin I think I will try changing stances. Maybe do 1/2 cycle with one (weaker) stance and then turn to classic deadlift? Although I'm not sure if in this case it will solve problem, I thought sumo put more stress on buttocks. And no, I have never suffered any injury in this area. It's only deadlift issue.

I will give a chance to Daily Dose then. I prefer to keep reps low in DL, so it looks good for me. I just thought DD was dedicated for individuals suffering a plateau with weights.

Adding squats sounds like a good idea then, maybe 5x5 or 3-8 x 3 three times a week won't collide with DL singles. I've just started doing squats and it certainly takes time to learn at least basics. I also enjoy beginner gains, so maybe exploit them a little more.

@Tirofijo I had common impression, when getting closer to 5RM sessions were getting quite fatiguing. That's still strange for me, I thought that weightfters are doing something similar to Pavel's teaching. I now it's taxing exercise, but I thought that they also must maintain high frequency. I've got to understand it somehow, because it's bothering me... Do you really need to recover whole week from one session? Or is it what @Kettlebelephant said and they are also doing squats? If so, then I think I'm coming to grips... :)
 
From my experience of also having "one annoying muscle" that's easily overtrained - You might want to do just the Daily Dose for the first couple of weeks and make sure that's working out for you before adding anything else. It sounds like you have a weak link and, if my experience is similar, exceeding the capacity of that weak link will just set you back.
 
Thanks, I will do that :)

It's also somehow cheering up, that I'm not the only one with the issue. Aside overtraining I also heard that if in one muscle group one particular muscle is noticeably weaker, other can "squeeze" it (or something like that) causing pain. Nevertheless, probably there is some inbalance in strength there... As you said, I will stick to low weights in Daily Dose for some time and see what happens. I will start these week, so if something goes wrong I still have time to recover and find something else :)
 
I found the Daily Dose to be very sustainable. If I'm having problems I can drop back to just that for a while until things feel better. It took a couple of weeks to get used to deadlifting every day but after that I hardly notice it.

I don't know if you necessarily have to keep the weights lower than the program calls for. At least for me, the low volume and frequent practice seems to be the trick.
 
adam.stozek said:
@Tirofijo I had common impression, when getting closer to 5RM sessions were getting quite fatiguing. That's still strange for me, I thought that weightfters are doing something similar to Pavel's teaching. I now it's taxing exercise, but I thought that they also must maintain high frequency. I've got to understand it somehow, because it's bothering me... Do you really need to recover whole week from one session? Or is it what @Kettlebelephant said and they are also doing squats? If so, then I think I'm coming to grips... :)
Click to expand...

I'm no expert on deadlift programming. I typed out some things but erased most of it since I would have just been repeating what I've read. I can say that conventional wisdom says as you become more advanced, it's harder to recover from deadlift sessions than it would be to recover from similar bench or squat sessions. A lot of intermediate to advanced powerlifting/powerbuilding programs will have 2 to 3 bench and squat days but only one deadlift day.

However, the Stronglifts 1x5 deadlifts is very minimalist, which may explain why a lot of folks stall quickly on it. Other one-day-a-week deadlift programs will have more volume in one day than the DDD has in 5 days while keeping intensity similar or even higher. They aren't relying on the squat to bring up the deadlift numbers. Mag/Ort is one example.

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DDD the first go round was easy. Biggest challenge was having faith that it was working and not hopping to another program. My 75% days were 225lbs. I barely felt like I was working most days, though I would notice accumulated fatigue after 4 or 5 sessions in a row. .

This go around my 75% days are 275lbs and it's noticeably more taxing. Nothing that I can't sustain, but it's harder.
 
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