# John Meadows Leg Press Workout



## NbleSavage (Nov 24, 2013)

I ran this yesterday for grins. Love it, may work into my "off" leg day (eg. when not squatting).
Summary:

Warm up

Set 1 – Pick a weight that's a hard 20 reps using continuous tension. Go up and down and get them burning and drive the blood in there.

Set 2 – Go up in weight a bit. Now I want you to do 15 reps with continuous tension, THEN do 5 more reps, but employ the deadstop technique. Do as the name implies. Let the weight go all the way down in the hole and stop. Relax your legs for a split second, and then BAM! Drive up hard.

Set 3 – Go up in weight again. Now do 10 reps with continuous tension, and 10 deadstop reps.

Set 4 – Okay, this is it. This is the set where most people fall out of the machine nearly unconscious. Go up in weight again, and do 5 continuous tension reps, and 15 dead stops.

Let me re-iterate, on the "dead stop" reps, let the weight literally stop and rest. Take a deep breath and fire out of the hole; explode on these, too. Do not lock these out.


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## Azog (Nov 24, 2013)

Interesting. I may give this a try if I can manage to not squat on a leg day. Doesn't feel like a proper leg day without squats!


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## Seeker (Nov 24, 2013)

Looks like fun! The continuous tension is of course important whether you're doing slow or fast reps. The criticism I have is allowing yourself to go all the way down in the hole. By doing this you are allowing your lower back to role off the pad and put it at risk for injury. 

Still looks like a leg burner for sure.


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## NbleSavage (Nov 24, 2013)

Seeker said:


> Looks like fun! The continuous tension is of course important whether you're doing slow or fast reps. The criticism I have is allowing yourself to go all the way down in the hole. By doing this you are allowing your lower back to role off the pad and put it at risk for injury.
> 
> Still looks like a leg burner for sure.



I found this to be the case at first, had to adjust the ROM on the dead stops. They burned like hell.


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## NbleSavage (Nov 24, 2013)

Azog said:


> Interesting. I may give this a try if I can manage to not squat on a leg day. Doesn't feel like a proper leg day without squats!



Same. I'd been alternating box squats, front squats and back squats over my two leg days. Might have to stick with this approach for a few weeks (eg. just squatting once a week) and consolidate front & box squats into one day.


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## DJ21 (Nov 25, 2013)

I'll give it a try, always like trying new techniques.


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## coltmc4545 (Nov 25, 2013)

I do a 6 sec negative all the way down, pause for 1, then drive up but don't lock out. I do 4 warmup sets of 5 starting with a weight that's 15lbs less then my working weight. Then do 5 sets of 8 with 45 seconds rest in between sets (including warm up sets) I do those after ham curls and squats. I'm pretty much crippled after that. Then I go do leg extensions. 2 warmup sets of 15 starting at a weight that's 5 lbs less then working weight. Then I bang out a set of 25. Rest 30 seconds. Set of 20. Rest 30 seconds. Then a set of 15. Needless to say by the time I do extensions the weight is pretty light. First couple of workouts after doing that you won't walk right for the next few days but measure your thighs before you start and then measure them 6 weeks later and let me know how much the tape has grown.


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## AlphaD (Nov 25, 2013)

coltmc4545 said:


> I do a 6 sec negative all the way down, pause for 1, then drive up but don't lock out. I do 4 warmup sets of 5 starting with a weight that's 15lbs less then my working weight. Then do 5 sets of 8 with 45 seconds rest in between sets (including warm up sets) I do those after ham curls and squats. I'm pretty much crippled after that. Then I go do leg extensions. 2 warmup sets of 15 starting at a weight that's 5 lbs less then working weight. Then I bang out a set of 25. Rest 30 seconds. Set of 20. Rest 30 seconds. Then a set of 15. Needless to say by the time I do extensions the weight is pretty light. First couple of workouts after doing that you won't walk right for the next few days but measure your thighs before you start and then measure them 6 weeks later and let me know how much the tape has grown.


  Damn, Colt here I geared up to try Nbls leg workout then you put yours on....hmmm either way I gonna try one or the other for somethng different!


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## shenky (Dec 3, 2013)

NbleSavage said:


> I ran this yesterday for grins. Love it, may work into my "off" leg day (eg. when not squatting).
> 
> LINK to the entire article
> 
> ...



might give this a try this afternoon! My shoulder's giving me issues, so I'm limited


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## PillarofBalance (Dec 3, 2013)

After watching a lot of the vids of meadows at elite fts and seeing him train with Dave Tate you really come to understand what taking a set to failure really means. 

What else you must take note of is that although they are bodybuilding, they are using compound movements and going exceedingly heavy on them.  Their base foundation of strength is what brings them growth and success. This is why every beginner to weightlifting whether there goal is size or strength I push them into a program like 5x5 or 531. Something where they focus on compound movements and understand the relation between their 1RM and it's percentages first.


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## DocDePanda187123 (Dec 3, 2013)

PillarofBalance said:


> After watching a lot of the vids of meadows at elite fts and seeing him train with Dave Tate you really come to understand what taking a set to failure really means.
> 
> What else you must take note of is that although they are bodybuilding, they are using compound movements and going exceedingly heavy on them.  Their base foundation of strength is what brings them growth and success. This is why every beginner to weightlifting whether there goal is size or strength I push them into a program like 5x5 or 531. Something where they focus on compound movements and understand the relation between their 1RM and it's percentages first.



Quoted for emphasis. IMO, regardless of future goals, a newbie to the gym should be trained like every other beginner and that's with a good strength program. Strength is the foundation from which size is built and there's a huge difference between squatting 250lbs and squatting 400+lbs


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