After months of hard and consistent training, my powerlifting meet prep has come to an end. This week, I’m resting up to compete on Saturday.
Overall, I really enjoy this season of training because the weights get heavier and you can see the results of a year’s (or more) worth of training. One thing I do not like about this season of training is the way that my elbows feel. The position I put myself into for squats can cause bicep tendinitis, which in turn makes bench pressing very uncomfortable.
Now, I’m not a doctor or a physical therapist. I’m not qualified to diagnose these problems. I also need to do a better job of improving my mobility and technique so that squats don’t cause this issue for me—Dr. Seth Albersworth has some great content on this.
In the meantime, it’s on me and my coach to plan training in such a way that I squat enough to build the strength and skill without pissing off my elbows to the point that I can’t get any better at bench pressing. Two things that have worked decently well for me are keeping competition squat volume low and utilizing specialty bars.
The sport of powerlifting involves lifting maximum weights for one single rep. Doing singles or doubles tends to bother my elbows a lot less than doing a lot of high-rep sets. Therefore, I avoid high-volume rep schemes (such as 5x5 or greater) when squatting with a straight bar. While doing sets of 5 or more reps is important in the offseason for building strength and muscle mass, there is no sense in training in a way that’s going to cannibalize my bench pressing potential.
Therefore, I squat with different specialty barbells such as the safety squat bar, cambered bar, or utilize a front squat. Specialty bars and special exercises are an important tenet of conjugate strength training, but they can be valuable for all types of athletes and training methodologies. I do long blocks of training using these bars in the offseason and also cycle in single sessions during powerlifting prep to give my elbows a break while still achieving a stimulus in a squat pattern.
If squatting every week pisses off your elbows, give these tweaks to your training a try.
