Starting Strength - How does it work?

As we already stated in our first post, we will be doing the "Starting Strenght" program for the next few months. We thought it would be a great idea to try to explain the program a little bit and get a little deeper into what our training will look like from now on.

What's it all about?

In its essence, it is a fairly easy program. Not much of programming and juggling around with percentages is needed to successfully get stronger with this program. The only actual things you need is a barbell, some weights and some basic knowledge about the main lifts.

Rippetoe himself said in an interview with T-Nation: "The Starting Strength program consists of the use of basic barbell exercises. We primarily rely on the squat, bench press, the deadlift, the press, and the power clean. And we combined those exercises into very short, simple workouts."

Now, what do these workouts look like?

The Workout

You basically have two workouts:

Workout A:

• Squat               3x5
• Benchpress     3x5
• Deadlift            1x5

Workout B:

• Squat              3x5
• Press              3x5
• Power Cleans 5x3*

*You can substitute the cleans for pull-ups or back extensions.

Those two workouts will be alternated every two days, three times a week.

So let's say you go to the gym on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, your days will look like this:

Week 1:

Monday - Workout A

Wednesday - Workout B

Friday - Workout A

Week 2:

Monday - Workout B

Wednesday - Workout A

Friday - Workout B

Weights

Now that we have a basic understanding of the program, we will take a look at the weights, and it is as simple as the workout itself:

Just put a little weight on, every training day. 

You did squats with 50 kg (110 lbs)? Next time do it with 55kg (121 lbs).

Although this is quite a big jump from 50 kg to 55 kg, a beginner will be able to achieve this with ease. The more you progress, the harder it will get for you to do big jumps of 5kg (11 lbs). This is why we bought ourselves some 0,75 kg plates (~1,5 lbs) so we can actually still progress when we get higher in our numbers.

In Mark Rippetoe's own words: "The way we can add 60 pounds to a kid's frame in a year is the same way we can take his squat from 95 pounds to 365 pounds – systematic, consistent loading, as fast as their recovery will allow. Say on day one I teach a kid to squat. We'll likely get to 95 pounds for three sets of five. Then I send him home. Two days later he comes back in and does three sets of five with 105. Two days after that, we get to 115, and so on, and so on. We continue this progression until it slows down to maybe five pounds per workout, then as he gets even stronger, maybe five pounds per week."

Assistance work

Of course, you are welcome to bring in some additional work. Biceps-curls for example. Everyone wants a bigger biceps, no doubt about that. Simply use the barbell to do some curls. We actually implemented curls into the "basic program" by also doing 3x5 with the same weight progression.

We also do face pulls and leg raises for shoulder and core strength, but this is up to you.

You have to find out where your weakness is and put in some effort to eliminate those flaws. In our example, it is our core and rear shoulder, in some other cases there might be some grip issues or weak quads. If you have determined your problem, address it, never ignore it.


We hope we could give you a basic insight into this program and invite you all to criticise or optimize this post by commenting your experiences and giving us your opinion on "Starting Strength".

If you are missing the dietary aspect of this training program, don't panic, we got you covered in our next post, where we will give you an example of a typical day of our diet.

CHEERS
Amin & Jacob