Bigger & Stronger
The squat is one of the most effective exercises to recruit a lot of muscle fibers, improve mobility, eliminate fat and build strength in the whole body. And you build great legs and butt as well. This allrounder should be at the core of many people’s training program.
This article shows you how to squat and what you can do to improve your squat.
No one size fits all
There are more ways to perform a squat. People feel comfortable and squat best with different positions of the bar, different stance widths, different grip widths. There is no best squat. But there are different approaches that are more or less effective for different people.
Each version has his own benefits. For example, the bar high or low on your back, heels elevated, or with feet flat on the floor.
Technique
The correct way for any squat is to take the three working joints: hip, knee and ankle through their full range of motion.
Low bar versus High bar squat
1. Low bar Squat
- Place the bar on your back so it sits on the mid traps and the rear delts
- Take a wider grip on the bar
- Let elbows move behind the bar
- Squat down by moving hips back
- Keep your knee over your ankle at all times
- Squat down till your upper leg is parallel tot the floor or slightly below
- When going up back up, first extend your hip
- Then extend your hip and knees as you lift the weight back up
The advantages are:
- Preferred by powerlifters
- You can carry more weigh
- Easier to learn
2. High bar Squat
- Place the bar high on your back, so it sits on the upper straps.
- Take a closer grip on the bar
- Keep elbows the whole exercise under the bar
- Squat down by moving the knees forward
- Move the knees past your toes
- Squat down till your hamstrings cover your calves
- Extending your hip and knees when you lift the weight back up.
The advantages are:
- More recruitment of the knee stabilizers (Vastus Medialis, VMO) because the knee goes past the toes
- More mobility and greater gains because all major joints (shoulder, hip, knee ankle) need mobility to be in the lowest position.
- Better muscular balance. All major muscles need to be in balance. Otherwise the knees will buckle.
Pushing your knee over your toes.
During squatting down bring the knee forward, past the toes. The goal is to have the hamstrings in full contact with the calves.
The knee joint is made to flex and extend, it is a very natural movement. It keeps the knee joint healthy and lubricated, improves knee stability, mobilizes the soft tissue and activates the involved muscles completely.
Why not to do half squats?
Half squats are not preferred because they destabilize the knee. When you do half squats ,you only work one part of the range of motion and therefor one part of the muscle.
The part that is worked will get stronger and the part that is not worked will remain weak, resulting in an imbalance.
How to get the best out of your squat
1. Warm-up
Strength training is based around specific movement patterns. That’s why the best warm up for strength training is the movement itself. No other exercise will prepare your body and central nervous system (CNS) better for doing the squat than the squat it self.
The CNS is responsible for telling the muscle what it needs to do. The CNS is activated wit reps below six over a course of 1-6 sets, depending on the target weight of the first work set.
2. Perform
- Elbows under the barbell
Your upper body stays more upright when you keep your elbows under the bar. To keep your body upright is important because you put strain on the lower back when you lean forward That is not good in the long run.
- Go deep
The deeper you squat, the more you use the full range of motion. Training in full range of motion is the way to go for muscle balance and stability.
Squatting below 90° strengthens the muscle responsible for the balance and stability of the knee (Vastus Medialis, VMO). With a full squat you stretch all the major joints (hip, knee, ankle). This improves mobility and prevents injury.
- Go slowly
The tempo in which you perform an exercise, the tempo, is important for the effect of the training. For example; performing a set of 10 reps at 3 seconds per rep (total; 30 seconds) has less effect than performing a squat set at 5 seconds per rep (in total 50 seconds).
Besides tempo, emphasizing on squatting down (eccentric) contributes more to muscle growth and strength than emphasizing on squatting up.
Combining these two techniques gives this recommendation for tempo.. Use for example a 4020 tempo:
- Squat down in 4 seconds to the bottom position
- Pause 0 seconds when the hamstrings make full contact with the calves
- Squat back up in 2 seconds
- Pause 0 seconds when you’re back up before starting the next rep
The tempo can differ, depending on the goal of your training.
Struggling to go deep?
Are you struggling to go deep? Use the squat challenge, technique inspired by the Israel movement Ido portal.
Squat challenge
- Squat for 30 days, maximum 30 minutes per day in the sitting position of a bodyweight squat.
Remember; progress over perfection. - Usually people can start with 3 minutes and work up to 30 minutes during the 30 days.
In the squat position you can:
- vary in the position of the toe
- move the centre mass in all directions: front, back, left and right, up and down.
This exposes all joints of thee lower body in full flexion and has multiple effects:
- Improves your mobility
- Improves your squat technique
- Improves your posture in the sitting position
After the squat challenge you will be able to squat significantly better, will be able to put more weight and therefor build stronger legs and butt.
Go for it and tell us your experienced after this challenge
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