New Squat Routine - Bad Idea?

[Seattleite]

I'm looking to switch up my current routine, and I was thinking of doing heavy front squats along with box squats on the same day. I figured that my box squats would be 8-10 sets of 2 reps at around 60% of my front squat max. I don't do back squats, so the purpose of the box squats would be to help increase my deadlift total. I just wasn't sure if the total volume of 2 different styles of squats would be too much for a single workout.

Does this seem like a reasonable plan?

 

[SaiBoT]

How many sets for the front squats? You only specified box squats volume.

 

[Seattleite]

How many sets for the front squats? You only specified box squats volume.

I plan to continue using the 5x5 scheme for the front squats...

 

[Big_BK]

Wait for daveTSI to chime in, this is his area.

 

[SaiBoT]

Your planning to do explosive reps right? dynamic effort by Louie Simmons?

 

[SouthernLord]

When I was into PLing I would do my DE squats and then pull. I would do box squats for 8-12 doubles at 50-80%. I would then pull working up to max triples and singles. At this time I pulled sumo quite a bit and the box squats really helped. I have pulled my heaviest sumos after 10 sets of DE squats.

I would do my DE work before the front squats since the whole point of DE is to be explosive imo. I would be really slow off the box after doing front squats.

 

[highlander555]

I think it could be too much volume for one day depending on the amount of sets and reps you use. One idea might be to have a day early in the week where you to a high volume of one, then a day later in the week (at least 3 days later) when you do the other for a low volume. Every three or four weeks you could switch which exercise you do for the high volume day.

 

[Seattleite]

I think it could be too much volume for one day depending on the amount of sets and reps you use. One idea might be to have a day early in the week where you to a high volume of one, then a day later in the week (at least 3 days later) when you do the other for a low volume. Every three or four weeks you could switch which exercise you do for the high volume day.

It would be 13 sets altogether (5 for the front squats and 8 for the box squats). The volume was my concern, but I thought I may be able to suffer through it since the box squats would be 8x2. I would not be able to do the box squats before the front squats as some have suggested. I need every ounce of my energy when I squat heavy, so I can't afford to sacrafice any of it with the DE work beforehand.

 

[SouthernLord]

Your box squats won't be very "dynamic" if you blast your quads with front squats first. I would split them up. Front squats on Tuesday and DE squats and deadlifts on Saturday for example. I made some of my best gains ever pulling after DE squats.

 

[highlander555]

Yeah, I'd deffinately split them up. Though you could probably do it all in one workout, I think whatever came second would suffer too much from the effort of the previous exercise.

I like the High volume/low volume tactic. Monday you could do you fronts (5 sets of whatever), and friday you could do your box squats, but keep it to a lower volume (4x2 instead of 8?). Do that for a month, then switch the two around. Drop the volume of your fronts to (3x3?), and raise the volume of your box squats to 8x2 like you originally intended.

Doesn't have to be quite like that, but hopefully you get the gist. Either way I think splitting them will be the way to go.

Good luck bro.

 

[SaiBoT]

Your box squats won't be very "dynamic" if you blast your quads with front squats first. I would split them up. Front squats on Tuesday and DE squats and deadlifts on Saturday for example. I made some of my best gains ever pulling after DE squats.

+1! after trashing the quads there wouldn't be much room for dynamic training.

If done on the same workout I think 6 sets of doubles box squats would be an acceptable volume and if done before the front squats even better, but that's just my opinion.