I had bruised arms the last time I did them

Off the top of my head elbow sleeves might do the job.

Long sleeves or wrap a towel around the bar a couple of times.

Either way expect some redness or bruising.

hmm would putting a mini band around your upper back or neck then onto the bar help as a makeshift zercher harness?

Man up Rilla boy, I did 110kg for two a few weeks ago

Anyway, a towel is good. Or simply long-sleeves

Found this...the vids are great (and I was impressed with the lass doing them! )

http://www.bodybuildingsecrets.com/articles/zercher_squats_a_very_evil_exercise.php

They don't make sense to me for a strength exercise. It is easier to do mobility wise than a back squat but it is unlikely you are going to use a load that stimulates the legs sufficiently before your arms give out. I would never be able to use more weight on a zercher than a front squat without the use of some heavy duty equipment so why do it?

Plus if the exercise is hurting somewhere else than the muscle groups you are targeting it is a really easy way to negatively effect your mental attitude while performing it.

The point that is that they work more than just the legs. They are not a legs only exercise. Nor is a deadlift, as you're arms, grip, back etc is used.

Zerchers are great at getting your stronger for improving standard squats & deadlifts.

Sure they work more than the legs but what else are they actually going to build- your bicep tendon!? They are always going to sit in legs day and aren't going to work anything else to the same degree. The legs won't get the same overload as in a stronger exercise like a front squat or safety bar squat because you are more likely to give way elsewhere.

I understand what you are saying.

Have you tried them? For more than one set/session?

Give them a go for a few sessions. Keep the reps to a max of 5 (so you're going heavy) and do maybe 10 sets (increase the weight each set' first 5 sets are like warmups if you like). Then see how you feel after doing them.

I think they're a great variation to use. I for one like working other parts of my body with such a movement.

Besides, Westside Barbell use it and they're strong as hell

If you drop right down so your elbows are between your thighs, so forcing you to go wide, i can see them having decent carry over to sumo deadlifting and equipped/wide stance squatting.

Westside use em, but they use Lou's patented zercher harness no doubt.. and i always wonder how much of their use of zerchers and things like the reverse hyper machine is more about marketing than it is training

For sure there's a factor in the marketing. But Reverse Hypers (his machine or other good ones) are very good indeed. I really rate them. Unfortunately there rare in gyms.

I couldn't support a weight that was heavy enough for my legs, even for endurance work. A couple of guys said Zerchers were used massively at Westside when they visited and they had harnesses to do so. I have seen some use planks of wood but either way it doesn't apply to the point I was making.

A lot of the Westside guys do things differently to get strong. It is fair to say a lot of their rules won't apply to the mass majority of anyone reading this board...

I've found them to be a great addition to training my clients. People that have not developed enough leg strength to find the zerchers pointless; thus the variation is useful for me to give to them.

I also think from a sports perspective, like rugby, zerchers are quite useful.

For bodybuilding then no.

Tried these in anger for the first time yesterday as my dodgy left knee is now un-dodgy enough to get by on some proper squats- wow. Was expecting them to be hard on legs and core, but wasn't prepared for the DOMS in my mid-hack this morning! I feel as though Happy Gilmore has been beating me between the shoulderblades with his 9-iron.

I can only assume this is from the isometric contraction needed to keep your arms tight; hopefully it'll have some good carryover to deadlifts in that respect. My plaster cast comes off this afternoon so the Zerchers are less opportune than they were but I think I'll stick with them for a while anyway, they seem to cause pain in all the right places.

They're good for strongman training! Atlas stones assistance training in particular.

Spit wrote:I can only assume this is from the isometric contraction needed to keep your arms tight; hopefully it'll have some good carryover to deadlifts in that respect. My plaster cast comes off this afternoon so the Zerchers are less opportune than they were but I think I'll stick with them for a while anyway, they seem to cause pain in all the right places.

I think that's the point with them; that they're a good addition to helping traditional squat & deadlift exercises. I think there is a very good carryover. And I really don't think it matters that you're never be able to lift as much with a Zercher as you can with a deadlift/squat.

btw Glenn Ross told me last week he got 5 reps at 200kg! The world-record is 265kg for 1 rep. I reckon he'll not be far off soon lol

health4ni wrote:

Spit wrote:I can only assume this is from the isometric contraction needed to keep your arms tight; hopefully it'll have some good carryover to deadlifts in that respect. My plaster cast comes off this afternoon so the Zerchers are less opportune than they were but I think I'll stick with them for a while anyway, they seem to cause pain in all the right places.

I think that's the point with them; that they're a good addition to helping traditional squat & deadlift exercises. I think there is a very good carryover. And I really don't think it matters that you're never be able to lift as much with a Zercher as you can with a deadlift/squat.

btw Glenn Ross told me last week he got 5 reps at 200kg! The world-record is 265kg for 1 rep. I reckon he'll not be far off soon lol

We have a squat rack rather than a proper power rack in our gym, with fixed-height safety bars; if I Zercher squat to parallel then the barbell will touch the safety bars. At the moment going much lower isn't really an option due to gammy knee (weak left adductor means it'll cave inwards), but as that side of things improve I'd need to walk the bar backwards out of the rack altogether - a bit of a risky move bearing in mind passing traffic.

Should one be looking to go much lower than parallel with Zerchers anyway? I can't work out of your knees are going to start getting in the way beyond that depth, or going deeper will throw your C-of-G too far forwards, any thoughts?

^^ Yeah, same here. No lower than that imo. Although, make sure you keep the back straight. So, if you feel it rounding then stop just before it rounds.

what do you think are the benefits over say back squat and front squat scott?

Back Squats & Front Squats rank higher than Zerchers in a pecking order.

But they add:
- variation
- a combination of squats (front & back) and deadlifts; like a hybrid variety
- work the arms hard
- a good starting point for people to (re)learn how to deadlift properly; it makes you stay very upright (weight dependent of course).
- as Spit said there's some mid-back isometric work going on that you only feel in Front Squats; but again it's slightly different.
I'm sure there's more but that's off the top of my head

health4ni wrote:^^ Yeah, same here. No lower than that imo. Although, make sure you keep the back straight. So, if you feel it rounding then stop just before it rounds.

Cool, I might try doing them from a step tomorrow then to increase the ROM, this seems to work OK for rack pulls.

Got the cast off yesterday so headed straight to the gym to try some chin-ups, and sucked: I think the combo of knackered back from Zerchers and a frail scabby hand were to blame. The only way is up!

I quite fancy having a go at zerchers. Want to vary my leg exercise selection a bit and am thinking of (cover your eyes all hardcore trainers) doing a six-eight week run at leg training without doing any regular squats at all. Will probably do Zerchers, Front Squats and Split Squats for quads...