In "Introduction to Weight Lifting I," I highly recommended Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe and briefly touched on general recommendations and the concept of compound lifts forming the backbone of your workout. In this installment of "Introduction to Weight Lifting," we'll seek to make a basic recommended workout for all baseball players - pitchers and position players alike.

Eric Cressey is notoriously against "cookie-cutter" workout plans, and I agree with him - for the most part. When you work with mostly unskilled youth athletes like I do, a basic template is never a bad thing to have as a starting point. This is why I heavily recommend Starting Strength to all my clients and integrate the program into their workout as well. There are other programs out there that produce results; Westside is one of the more popular ones, where athletes generally use 50-70% of their one-rep max (1RM) as working sets, focusing on high speeds and safe acceleration of the weight to build strength - and it works. Westside lifters routinely set new records in all types of Olympic lifts! However, I view Westside as an intermediate to advanced program that's not terribly applicable to the beginner athlete - especially the beginning baseball player. Starting Strength is simply one of the best programs for motor skill acquisition of the major compound lifts and for building general, full-body strength.

The original novice Starting Strength program is:

Workout A
3x5 Squat
3x5 Bench Press
1x5 Deadlift

Workout B
3x5 Squat
3x5 Press
5x3 Power cleans

(The Starting Strength Wiki is an outstanding resource for this type of material, and I highly recommend you check it out. You can even download a great Excel-based logbook for SS-type programs here.)

Squat refers to the back squat while Press refers to the overhead standing press. All exercises are done with barbells. This is the only change I make to the main program for my athletes - instead of the overhead press, we substitute the Pendlay Row:

Why do we substitute the Pendlay Row for the Press?

Basically, the overhead press (like most overhead lifts) are contraindicated in the overhand throwing motion. This means that any lift where the elbows go above parallel with the shoulder blades should be avoided and something should be substituted for them. The Pendlay Row is a perfect exercise to build scapular strength for throwers of all kinds, so it's a natural substitution!

So, the basic program that I recommend to youth baseball athletes will look like this:

Workout A
3x5 Squat
3x5 Bench Press
1x5 Deadlift

Workout B
3x5 Squat
3x5 Pendlay Row
5x3 Power cleans

These workouts should be alternated and performed three times per week with one day of rest between them. Typically this means working out MWF while taking TThSatSun off. The first week will be ABA while the next will be BAB, then back to ABA, and so forth.

How do I get started?

Mark Rippetoe advises you to perform the lifts at low weights and increment them slowly on your first day, finding out where your working sets start to slow down. When they do, that will be your starting point. After that, you'll increment them every workout until you fail - at which point you'll reset various lifts and start over again.

An excellent primer on beginning your Starting Strength-inspired routine can be found here. Here's a synopsis of what you'll do on your first day:

The First Workout
During the very first workout a general warm-up performed walking on a treadmill is all that is necessary. The first set of squats begins at 45 lbs (an empty barbell) and a set of five is performed. If this is completed easily with the trainee's best form, ten pounds are added to the bar for the next set. If bar speed does not slow and form does not break down, ten more pounds are added to the bar and another set is performed. This process continues until either form begins to falter or the bar speed slows more than the preceding sets, whichever comes first. This is the trainee's starting weight. Once this occurs the trainee rests and performs two more sets at this weight, for a total of three sets of five reps (3x5) at the starting weight. For the squat, a typical starting weight is in the neighborhood of 85 lbs.

The bench press is the next lift to be performed and the process of adding weight until form breaks down or bar speed slows is repeated. Again, once this weight has been found two additional sets are performed for three sets at the starting weight.

Starting weight for the deadlift is similar but because it is done for one set, once the starting weight is determined no further deadlift sets are performed. Also, the deadlift must start from a standardized height. If bumper plates are not available to the trainee and a deadlift of 135 lbs is too heavy, other plates may be stacked under the bar to elevate it to the proper height. After the deadlift weight is established the first workout is done and the trainee takes the next day for rest and recovery.

What about Thrower's Ten or accessory lifting? Should I do those?

Accessory exercises that work the rotator cuff, increase flexibility/mobility, or increase cardiovascular endurance all have their place in a comprehensive workout regimen - and that's what we'll start to cover in the next installment of "Introduction to Weight Lifting." For now, go buy Starting Strength, read it cover to cover, and get started in the gym! Be sure to get your form nailed down - take videos and upload them to YouTube for analysis (you can even ask Coach Rip himself over at Strengthmill.net), or find a reputable coach in your area to help you in real-time.