Squat Everyday Program: Is It Worth It?
Most people who squat in their training squat one to three times per week, however, there are some who squat every day.
So, what exactly is squatting every day? Squatting every day is a program in which squats are done every day of the week. Some people squat with maximum effort every day, while others incorporate milder exercises for long-term sustainability. The Bulgarian method is another name for the “squat every day” strategy.
If you’re wondering whether you can squat every day in your training, the short answer is yes. If you’re wondering whether you should, the answer is that it depends. The devil is in the particulars.
In this article, I’ll go over everything you need to know about squatting on a daily basis, including:
- Where did the “squatting everyday” method come from?
- How you could incorporate squats into your daily routine
- The advantages and disadvantages of squatting every day
What You Should Know About Squatting Every Day
Let’s go over some of the most often-asked questions about squatting on a daily basis.
So, what exactly do squats every day imply?
Squatting every day is defined as performing some sort of squatting on a daily basis. It is largely a practice of powerlifters and weightlifters.
Back squats and front squats are the only exercises performed in this plan.
There is no time limit for this practice, and it usually involves heavy singles as a prescription.
Why do individuals squat on a daily basis?
Weightlifters and powerlifters squat every day to improve their squat strength, which is an important component of their performance in both sports.
The notion is that specialized adaptations to the imposed demand occur. The more specific your training, the better you will get at it.
Where did the habit of squatting every day arise from?
The “squat every day” approach first appeared in Bulgaria in the second half of the twentieth century.
The country was able to put Bulgaria on the map through the sport of Olympic weightlifting under the watchful leadership of Ivan Abadjiev. More medalists have been produced per population in the country than in practically any other country in the globe. From 1968 to 2000, he produced 12 Olympic champions, 57 world champions, and 64 European champions through his athlete development method.
The notable success of producing several champions resulted from athletes being treated mercilessly, as well as drug use and demanding infamous training philosophy is known today as the Bulgarian technique.
Abadjiev preferred squatting every day all year and only doing a few workouts, particularly the snatch, clean and jerk, and front squat. All of these were done to the best of my ability and with only one repetition set. The Bulgarian approach refers to this pattern of squatting maximum. The curriculum does not have multiple concentration phases throughout the year.
Realistically, the Bulgarian approach to creating medalists had to incorporate not only training programming but also all drug use and dictatorial supervision of the athletes’ lifestyles. Because it was their full-time job, athletes would train up to 8 hours a day. Not everyone made it out of the system alive, but those who did were crowned champions.
What was the point of sitting every day?
The workout was designed to make your squat as strong as possible and was based on the following concepts:
- More work was better.
- In training, do what you do in competition.
- What you felt during training is a lie.
Suffice it to say, this approach was not without criticism for how harshly the athletes were handled and how frequently individuals were wounded in training.
How did powerlifting get the habit of squatting every day?
Throughout the second decade of the twenty-first century, Abadjiev’s reputation grew not only to weightlifting circles but also to powerlifting communities. Many notable names in powerlifting have detailed their approach and ideas on a Bulgarian training regimen online.
Most powerlifters cannot complete the “real” Bulgarian style of training 8 hours a day, but many have tried to improve their squat by doing squats every day.
Squatting every day has progressed from squatting maximally every day to squatting every day with lighter training on days off.
What does science say about high-frequency training and daily squatting?
Squatting every day is simply a sort of high-frequency squat strength training.
There has been a lot of studies done on the frequency of strength training, and the results have been varied. According to the findings, when training volume is equalized, there is no association between training frequency and strength improvements.
Having said that, increasing exercise frequency allows you to increase overall training volume.
Training a muscle area twice a week appears to be superior to once a week in terms of training frequency and muscle gain/hypertrophy, while it is unclear whether training more than twice a week is superior.
Certain factors must be considered when conducting scientific research on training. Relevant research is frequently conducted in the short term, making it difficult to determine the long-term influence. Because research findings are also averages, it is crucial to remember that certain regiments may work differently for different people.
Squatting on a daily basis vs. daily maximum squatting
One thing we should clarify is what we mean when we say “squatting every day.” Do we mean daily maximum squats or squatting every day with some easier exercises in between?
Squatting every day used to imply that the squats were performed to a daily max single.
This is unlikely to be sustainable for the vast majority of recreational lifters, which is why the practice of squatting every day has evolved to include submaximal sessions.
This allows for a more sustainable practice of squatting on a daily basis. Every day, many different coaches and major figures in powerlifting have come out with their own take on squatting.
Another ignored aspect of daily squatting is the back-off volume completed after the big top set. At the end of the day, repetitions will be a big driver of growth – as long as you can recover from them.
5 Advantages of Squatting Every Day
Here are five advantages to incorporate squats into your daily workout routine:
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Allows you to distribute your workload across more training sessions.
The most obvious advantage of squatting every day is that you can distribute your work more equally throughout the day. That means you won’t have to put up with protracted training sessions.
This may be useful because as you work out more and more sets, you become more and more fatigued, causing your rest times to become longer and longer.
In theory, there is an unknown optimal quantity of labor that you can accomplish in a session to maximize the stimulation. Spreading out your training across the week may help you avoid wasting time on meaningless sets.
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Allows you to accommodate short training session availability.
If you have a hectic lifestyle or other circumstances that prevent you from spending long periods of time in the gym, squatting every day may be highly beneficial to you.
If you want to focus on your squat while also working on your upper body or bench press, squatting every day allows you to have shorter sessions where you can squat and do a few other exercises because you’ll be training seven days a week.
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Reduces session weariness, allowing you to practice technique.
Squatting every day means you have seven days to work on your squatting technique. Depending on your goal, you can stick with one or several squat variations.
“Practice makes perfect,” as the saying goes. More specifically, “practice makes permanent.” That is to say, you ingrain the technique that you use. When you squat a certain method, you make that way of squatting more permanent and more difficult to modify if you need to.
This is significant because if you squat for extended periods of time, you will become fatigued later in the session. Your technique is likely to break down when you weary later in the workout. Allowing your technique to break down will ingrain poor technique.
So squatting every day implies you don’t let yourself practice technique when you’re fatigued.
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If squats are a weakness, this helps.
Squatting every day may imply that you have the opportunity to devote a significant amount of time to the squat.
If it’s closer to a powerlifting competition, you might want to stick with the back squat as the only variant.
If you are not training for a competition, you may want to integrate different squat variations to enhance your squatting technique, such as stopped squats, tempo squats, pin squats, box squats, and so on.
Again, doing it every day allows you to focus on technique without becoming fatigued or breaking down technique during the session.
If you are seeking to incorporate squats every day for the purpose of developing technique, the majority of the workouts should be kept submaximal.
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This may help you gradually overload from your former regime.
For long-term progress, progressive overload is the name of the game.
A training program contains numerous aspects that can be manipulated to ensure long-term growth. At the end of the day, the overall training quantity must increase over time in order to maintain the stimulus for muscle size and strength.
If an athlete has a limited capacity to train in a session, adjusting the training frequency may be a good method to allow for progressive overload. The inclusion of more sessions throughout the week will provide you with a window for training input.
4 Cons of Squatting Every Day
- It is possible that this will not be mentally sustainable.
- Does not provide for flexibility in terms of life events and lifestyle variables.
- Overuse harm is possible.
- Other areas of weakness may be overlooked (deadlift, bench, or other muscle groups)