5 Squatting Programs That Work

So after the deadlift article someone asked about squats.

Well I thought later that although all I have ever done to increase the squat is the squat itself, I've used some pretty different methods to boost it.

Here are some I had good success with.

1.  10 sets of 10 method
This is NOT GVT.  This is one I used for about 6 months and it worked really well to help my groove.  It's brutal volume but it works great for size, and after you transition off of it to some singles work you should see a big bump in strength.
Basically you do 10 sets of 10 until you are at a place where you want to stop or that feels maximal.  However the jumps have to be smallish.  If you're not at 10 sets, do back down sets until you are at 10.  Here is how mine would usually go.
135x10
185x10
225x10
275x10
315x10
335x10
365x10
405x10
425x10
365x10

Plan on being sore as shit for the next 5 days or so.  Then get ready to do it again a few days later.

2.  The Elevator Method
This is with a fixed weight.  I recommend being conservative at first.  You're going to work up to a set of 10, then back down.  Staring at 1 rep.  I would usually pick 365,385, or 405.
1 rep
2 reps
3 reps
4 reps
5 reps
6 reps
7 reps
8 reps
9 reps
10 reps
9 reps
8 reps
etc
.....all the way back down to 1.  Again, do not go heavy here.  The point is to hammer volume on these.  Expect more major soreness.

3.  3x1-5-10-15
This one has been my bread and butter for a while.  Three progressively heavier singles followed by a back off set.  You then have weight goals you want to hit for 5 reps, 10 reps, and 15 reps.  So it might look like so...
week1
warm up sets,
3 progressively heavier singles
back off set shooting for 5 (let's pretend 500)

week2
same as previous week but shooting for 10 on back off set with a lighter weight (say 475)

week 3
same as previous week but shooting for 15 (say 425)

I would pick weights that I wanted to hit and never waiver from them until I hit them.  Just bump the singles slightly so that the back offs become a smaller % of my 1 rep max, thus hopefully I am getting stronger and able to hit the rep goals more easily.

4.  5/4/3/2/1 - 1x8
Similar to the last one, but slightly different (duh).  After your warm ups, just go 5/4/3/2/1 progressively heavier, then the back off of 1x8.  I usually would use whatever I did for the set of 3 or 4 for the back off.  Just something to keep in mind.  This one is nice because it makes you think about every jump.

5.  20 rep squats
This is NOT breathing squats.  This is just good ol high rep squatting.  This shit works.  Period.  It will make your legs bigger and stronger, but I really only advise this for guys who have a decent level of squatting already.  Kind of a baseline I have in mind is that you should be able to hit 250x20 before you get serious about high reps carrying over.  I just don't see 150x20 being worth a shit to worry about.  You'd be better off using any of the programs above to get to a good foundation of squatting strength.

These are actual programs I have ran with success.  Not shit I made up and wrote on the net.  If you want to be fair to one, use it for 10-12 weeks and go hard after it.