Starting Strength

trainees.
     
    Notice that these options do not include a half-squat, which would be done from approximately the hip and knee angles seen at the start of the deadlift. The half-squat is an arbitrary position to start or stop in since there is no anatomical reason to do so. The full squat works because the hamstrings and adductors achieve full stretch at this depth, but nothing good occurs at half-squat depth. The positions from which the squat can be trained with useful assistance exercises are all very close to the positions of the full range of motion. Training from the bottom up to the middle and then going back down is useful, as are all the variations that work up from the bottom with a pause to kill the rebound. (The top half of the squat is very easy if the bottom is strong, since the top half is the mechanically easy part; conversely, training the top will not strengthen the bottom.) But unlike splitting up the deadlift, it is not very productive to divide the squat into an upper and a lower component and then train each one separately. The top does not need the work, half-squats are hard on the knees, and the bottom is the hard part of the squat, anyway; in contrast, there is no easy part of a deadlift, and both halves of it can successfully be worked separately.
     
    Partial presses and bench presses. The press, like the deadlift, starts from a dead stop, at least for the first rep of a set and for a 1RM. Partial presses from different pin heights in the rack can be very useful assistance exercises. Dead-stop explosion can be worked from every position the rack permits to be set and loaded – from eyeball level, to lockout, to overhead support work starting from locked-out elbows. The bench press can be worked the same way as the squat inside the rack, with the dead-stop assistance versions adding to the effectiveness of the rebound when the regular bench movement is resumed.
    For presses, set the pins at the desired position, from chin level (just off the shoulders) on up, even as high as slightly below lockout, and press the bar off the pins with your standard press grip, keeping the bar close to your face with good elbow position and your chest up. Before it leaves the pins, tighten up against the bar, taking all the slack out of your elbows and shoulders before you try to make the bar move up. Make sure you preserve the critical movement of the torso under the bar. The higher the pins, the heavier the weight can be. The heavier the weight, the greater the instability at the top, the harder it becomes to prevent excessive layback, and the more stress the shoulders and abs will receive. A belt is a very good idea here.

    Figure 7-6. Pressing from different positions within the range of motion inside the rack.

    Resist the temptation to do lots of sets with weights heavier than you can press, especially the first time you try this. Pin positions in the middle of the movement – where most people get stuck, the point at about the top of the forehead where the transition from delts to triceps is trying to occur – are good places to apply this kind of work. And as a general rule, any partial exercise is quite useful when applied to the sticking points in its parent movement, and most of the partial exercises were developed specifically for this purpose. Reps can vary from sets of 3 to 10, but don’t get carried away with the volume. Sets across from a dead stop will beat your shoulders up, so pick a weight, do it for the number of reps you want to use, and then adjust the weight in your next workout if you picked it wrong.
     
    The bench press can be used the same way, with the bar loaded on pins set at the desired height above the chest. Carefully center the flat bench so that it accommodates the correct position under the bar, with your head on the bench and your chest and elbows in the same place under the bar and in the same position they would be in had you pressed the bar off your chest to this level. As with the press, take all the slack out of your elbows and shoulders before you push the bar up off the pins; this is important for correct mechanical execution and to prevent excessive dynamic shock to the tendon insertions on your humerus. Sets of five work well for both presses and bench presses, but again, just use one heavy set. These are very stressful, and you will develop pec insertion tendinitis if you do too much work on partial exercises that allow the use of heavy weights. Shoulders are