magogian12345
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Hello all,
This is part 2 of my "Good, simple advice." For this thread, I'll deal with the subject of a max out (or maxing out).
Simply put, DON'T DO IT. Especially for exercises like squats or bench.
I've learned the hard way.
The reason you shouldn't do it is that eventually you will hurt yourself. I promise you that. The reason why it is called a max out is that you are taxing your body to the limit. When you do this, any number of things can and will go wrong (if not right away then eventually).
First off, you are very likely to injure a significant joint or muscle. In the case of a squat, it is very easy for your knee to get injured from the strain. Such injuries can take months or even years to heal -- if they do. I, fortunately, haven't had this injury but I know many that have.
I'm more familiar with injures from a max bench press. It is very easy to injure your shoulder when doing a proper bench press max out. The reason is that for the vast majority of body types a proper bench press (touching your chest) causes your shoulder to extend beyond its natural range of motion. For a normal workout, your shoulder can generally take the beating. But for a max out, your shoulder can easily be taxed beyond its limit leading to injury. This has happened to me. I got a shoulder strain from a max out and I couldn't bench for the following 6 months. It was miserable.
Second, and perhaps even more dangerous and scary is nerve compression, or sometimes referred to as "weight lifters headache." It isn't entirely understood, but many sports medicine doctors (that I've had) say that when you strain for a bench press or squat it can cause a nerve in your neck to get compressed. When this happens, you are f-ed. It is absolutely miserable, and it has happened to me.
Here is how it manifests itself. Anytime your blood pressure rises from a strain, (includes needing to urinate, sex, or lifting -- yes, it is crazy that is happens for urination or sex), the nerve is pressed and it triggers the most mind blowing painful headache you have ever had. For me, when I would trigger it, the pain would immediately cause me to drop to the ground and curl into a ball. Quite embarressing for a 6'4" muscular guy. The horrendous pain usually lasted about 10-15 minutes, after which it would subside to a merely excrutiating migraine for about 6 hours. And, no, aspirin, etc. did not help nearly enough. It took roughly three months for me to recover from this.
So, take it from me, max outs, especially for bench or squats are simply not worth it.
Instead, just try for a 3-5 rep max. You can use online max rep calculators to figure out what your max rep is. In my experience, they are pretty accurate (within 5 pounds or so).
I hope this helps.
This is part 2 of my "Good, simple advice." For this thread, I'll deal with the subject of a max out (or maxing out).
Simply put, DON'T DO IT. Especially for exercises like squats or bench.
I've learned the hard way.
The reason you shouldn't do it is that eventually you will hurt yourself. I promise you that. The reason why it is called a max out is that you are taxing your body to the limit. When you do this, any number of things can and will go wrong (if not right away then eventually).
First off, you are very likely to injure a significant joint or muscle. In the case of a squat, it is very easy for your knee to get injured from the strain. Such injuries can take months or even years to heal -- if they do. I, fortunately, haven't had this injury but I know many that have.
I'm more familiar with injures from a max bench press. It is very easy to injure your shoulder when doing a proper bench press max out. The reason is that for the vast majority of body types a proper bench press (touching your chest) causes your shoulder to extend beyond its natural range of motion. For a normal workout, your shoulder can generally take the beating. But for a max out, your shoulder can easily be taxed beyond its limit leading to injury. This has happened to me. I got a shoulder strain from a max out and I couldn't bench for the following 6 months. It was miserable.
Second, and perhaps even more dangerous and scary is nerve compression, or sometimes referred to as "weight lifters headache." It isn't entirely understood, but many sports medicine doctors (that I've had) say that when you strain for a bench press or squat it can cause a nerve in your neck to get compressed. When this happens, you are f-ed. It is absolutely miserable, and it has happened to me.
Here is how it manifests itself. Anytime your blood pressure rises from a strain, (includes needing to urinate, sex, or lifting -- yes, it is crazy that is happens for urination or sex), the nerve is pressed and it triggers the most mind blowing painful headache you have ever had. For me, when I would trigger it, the pain would immediately cause me to drop to the ground and curl into a ball. Quite embarressing for a 6'4" muscular guy. The horrendous pain usually lasted about 10-15 minutes, after which it would subside to a merely excrutiating migraine for about 6 hours. And, no, aspirin, etc. did not help nearly enough. It took roughly three months for me to recover from this.
So, take it from me, max outs, especially for bench or squats are simply not worth it.
Instead, just try for a 3-5 rep max. You can use online max rep calculators to figure out what your max rep is. In my experience, they are pretty accurate (within 5 pounds or so).
I hope this helps.