Knee Wraps Are A Really, Really Good Idea For A Lot Of Lifters

There is just so much bad training advice on the Internet in general. But the piece of training advice I personally hate the most is the one that says that using wraps in squat training is a bad idea for everybody. 

There's just a point where not wearing any knee protection at all gets me hurt when I squat. That point is actually rather low for me, around the low 200's. I have to start putting on knee sleeves when I'm strong enough to work with 250. Under 200, I can squat safely with nothing on. 200-300 requires the minimalist protection of knee sleeves to help guarantee pain-free lifting. Over 300 requires some light wrapping; not powerlifiting competition thick or tight, but something more than knee sleeves.

Not everyone is equally endowed. I've seen time and time again that when I get up to around 300 lbs or so on the squat, it's time to bust out the wraps if I want to train with any meaningful volume. There there are lifters who will never need knee protection even if they squat several hundred pounds. There are those who can do without wraps till much higher weights than I can...but who will still eventually have to wrap at some point to remains pain-free.

The best deep squatters in the world pound-for-pound are the top Olympic weightlifters. And I see a lot them wrapping up for big squats and cleans. Sure, they warm up wrap-free with more than I can max. But some of them wrap when things get heavy for them. My "wrap point" is in the low 300's; theirs may be in the 600's. But wrapping at around 300 for training will allow me to progress to 400 and beyond because I won't keep getting hurt. 

"Do you even raw, brah?"

(And I know that Olympic weightlifters use Ace bandages which don't give as much support as thicker powerlifting wraps, but that's because they need more flexibility and depth. The takeaway point is they still go a little further than mere knee sleeves.)

As impressive as top Olympic weightlifters are, top single-ply powerlifters are just as if not even more impressive squatters. These lifters do their heaviest work in wraps and more and still manage to get almost unbelievably strong. Again, they are the genetic cream and the point at which they need to wraps is higher than someone like me whose frame is more suited to running across the plains of Africa south of the Saharan. 

Do you really think this guy should ever squat heavy without wraps?

I know for a fact that using wraps spares my knees, keeps them from getting banged up by heavy squatting so I can keep my squat progressing. It's also nice to be able to use my legs normally between squat sessions for activities like getting into and out of my car. 

Back around 2010 I trained Smolov base phase twice a few months apart. The first time without wraps and the second time with wraps. The first time I was virtually crippled and it took my knees months to recover. The second time my knees were just fine both during and after the cycle.

More recently I've been trying to stick with the much less supportive knee sleeves because of understandable desire to be able to make evaluate progress. I try to keep style (bar placement, stance width) and equipment used (shoes, knee protection, belt) consistent. But with the squat there just comes a  point where I need to start putting on the wraps and accept that they give me as much as 20 lbs over what I can get with nothing at all on my knees.

My knees have been hurting quite a bit lately because I've been using the less supportive sleeves even as my work weights have climbed over 315. But last night I did my first squat session with the old school red line wraps and my knees felt so good. The wraps secured my little knee ligaments in place and provided a cushion at the very bottom of the movement that took some of the worst of the stress off the connective tissue at the bottom of the squat. 

There are people who argue that such support is precisely why wraps prevent the knees from getting "stronger". This is such outrageous bullshit. There are those whose joints are naturally robust enough to squat several hundred pounds without wraps...just as there are those with thick enough skulls to go really far as professional fighters. But my knees can only get "stronger" enough to handle about 300 lbs or so on their own. So why should I limit the progress of my squat musculature and the poundages I can handle in the movement because my unprotected knees keep breaking down at certain loads? 

Are you going to tell Klokov his knees would be "stronger"
if he ditched the sleeves and wraps?

I have fairly long fingers and can comfortably hook grip maximal deadlift loads. There is no point at which I have to resort to mixing my grip or relying on straps. I think hook grip is more bad ass looking than mixed grip or straps. But I understand that some people just don't have the long fingers I do that make hook grip comfortable at max loads. So I don't look down on them for using mixed grip or straps in training so that their grip doesn't limit their deadlift progression. I wish the people who look down on knee wraps would apply this same courtesy and logic to the use of knee wraps by people who didn't win the genetic lottery with knee joints. 

Maybe this isn't even a debate anymore. It seems that over time a lot of bad advice is slowly drifting into the detritus of old forum posts (Lord knows I added my share...  low bar and belts ). I just like to post things that may help some other lifters not suffer like I have. I took advice that really wasn't suited to me on a lot of things, but not using wraps earlier has probably been the most destructive to my health and hindering to my progress. 

Yesterday's Training (Friday, August 21, 2015)

(Power cleaned and squatted 135 x 6 and 185 x 5 while waiting to share the squat rack. )

Back Squat, high bar, weightlifting shoes, sleeves, light wraps @ 315, no belt

225 x 4

275 x 3

315 x 2

335 x 2

355 x 2

Deadlift, conventional, no shoes, no belt, hook grip

365 x 3

405 x 2

435 x 1

450 x 1

455 x 2, 1

I'd actually started using wraps in the session before this one, but those were the slightly thinner Harbinger solid blacks. Those are essentially Ace bandages. I felt I needed something a little bit more supportive so yesterday I upped the ante to the classic Red Line white wraps. These were just right. They kept my knees in a nice groove and kept everything just tight enough. At the bottom of the squat they bunched up thickly enough to keep undue stress off my knees. It was almost like sitting on a box! 

It's hard to say how much these wraps add to my squat because there is more at play here than rebound from the wraps. Part of it is comfort and confidence. So I can squat 10 lbs more with these wraps than I could in my Rehband blues, but maybe five of those pounds are rebound while the other five is just the fact that I'm more efficient because my ligaments aren't sliding around at all. 

I felt free to experiment yesterday because these squats were just warm ups for my deadlift. That's why I didn't attempt to get a couple more singles with 355 (No way I was getting another double!). I was supposed to use 450 on the deadlift which was already a 15-lb jump from last week. But 450 felt so easy and I wanted to replace those 2.5 plates so bad! So I jumped to 455. A 10-lb jump next time would be sensible, but I'm probably going to go for a 15-lb jump. 

My best ever conventional pull was 495 with a belt when I was a few years younger when I also could use 405 for reps in the low bar squat with a a belt. I'm probably good for a beltless conventional pull of 475 right now and maybe 490 with a belt. I very desperately want to get a 500-lb conventional beltless pull. Then maybe I'll start exploring various powerlifting cheats like a belt and sumo.