The Official Smolov Support Thread

[Matt Thomas]

I was looking at that one. It was between that and the Spud deadlift belt, but I feel like the athlete belt will last longer.

I'm glad I got the cheapo though because it gave me a good idea of the right size to get.

[Jordan Derksen]

This thread is officially cool. Cool because my squats also been stuck forever until recently. I'm not doing Smolov, but I'll fight to the death your right to do it. I squat at least 90% of my max every day which works out to being 145kg. Sometimes I do 3 reps, sometimes only 1. My current max is 160 as of Monday. Woohoo for progress!

[Chris Mason]

This could be renamed officially overtrained thread...

[Matt Thomas]

I dunno. We'll see it. It is intimidating though. I just calculated my numbers through the base mesocycle and some of those days....damn.

[Chris Mason]

Originally Posted by Matt Thomas

I dunno. We'll see it. It is intimidating though. I just calculated my numbers through the base mesocycle and some of those days....damn.

I was sort of kidding. For me, it is about returns. Why would I do all of that when I can make as good or better strength progress with a LOT less volume?

[Matt Thomas]

Yeah well you're smarter than me. If it puts 50 pounds on my squat in 13 weeks, that's better gains then I could manage.

[Aaron Gainer]

Don't do anything else lower body on this program if you plan on going through with it. Make it your #1 priority!!

[Matt Thomas]

Yeah for sure. I don't think I'll want to do much of anything else at all.

There's one day where you have to do 10 sets of 3 with like 30 pounds less than your original max. I think that's going to take about an hour and a half...

[Bill M. Hesse]

yeah....i saw that too. not looking forward to it. I am just approaching this as a challenge to complete and survive the smolov experiance.

[Keith Miller]

It's a very challenging program!! I would plug in a max that is about 10-20 lbs under your true max!! That will make it much more doable!! I've done the base meso program twice and the Jr program once (for front squats). Both times on the base meso I could not finish due to putting in my true max and getting my a$$ handed to me on the second week!!

Just a word of caution, and to reiterate what someone else said, only add in some upper body work!! No cleans, and very light snatches if you do them!!