Yes i agree hips are weak. Squat i did the other day is 341lbs. Squat is weak point. I plan to squat a lot more as part of this training and hopefully it will help improve my dead lift too.
But I am very upper body dominant like I said I bench 450. And I can one arm row 150 pound dumbbells for 10 reps for three sets with no problem. I have overhead push pressed 225 for 17 reps at a strongman competition too. I think my whole rear chain is pretty weak. Quads are weak too. That’s why I’m trying to work on this. After i deadlift the main thing that is sore is my lats the next day. I feel i could row about as much as deadlift sometimes lol. Here is my 341lb squat. I feel both squat and deadlift have so much room for improvement if i train those exercises.
Yes. Your squat needs a lot of work on the most efficient bar path.
- You are squatting down. You should be squatting back more.
- It looks like you are relaxing your hips to get down to parallel. You cannot not relax your hips or spine. They must be tight and braced.
- In the final 10% of the descent gets squirrelly. The bar path moves forward, so much that it is in front of your toes. Your knees get too far over you toes, IMO.
IMO, if you perfected the bar path, you could put an additional 100lbs on your max squat within a month.
What does your lower body training look like? All squats/deads? Is there any accessory work for individual parts of your legs?
For the last few years i really slacked on squats and deads. I didnt deadlift or squat and only did leg extensions, leg curls, leg press for leg day basically.
So the last 2 months i started squats and deadlifts again. I still do leg press also after. I used to use my ghd but got too weak to do it unassisted after skipping for so long.
I need some videos to show me how to go back and not down. And i am keeping my brace. And ya the bottom is hard. My body feels like it has to do weird stuff just to get that low. And how should bar path go?
IMO, this is a hip flexibility issue. You need to master greater flexibility where you can control glute contraction through the full range of motion.
IMO, the simplest initial remedy can be attacked through the leg press. Position your feet on the plate where you can allow your thighs to pass outside of your torso. This will feel odd at first. What you want to feel is your thighs dropping deep while you keep your hips against the back of the seat. Your lack of “hip flexibility” will have your hips rising off the seat. Master this flexibility and then you can translate this feel to the squat.
But you could use a personal on-site coach to perfect your squat form in a quick amount of time.
In a squat you want the bar path to be a vertical line over the middle of your foot.. I still think a SSB or even front and goblet squats would help you learn the movement well.
I also think you might benefit from high rep Romanian Deadlifts with an emphasis on keeping your back flat.
Here is my first meet results.
320lb squat. Felt easy but my right knee felt very weird after so i didnt do anymore squats. I was the only raw squatter aka no sleeves or wraps. Bench i hoped for 407 and got 413! Deadlift i was not confident to go over 501. So i did 451 opener 473 then a PR 501lb. But it moved pretty easy. Probably had a little more in the tank but i wanted at least 400 bench and 500 deadlift on paper.
Good work!
Now you have your meet PR’s. Good start that you made your two goals.
Can you describe the weird feeling. I know that you squat with your toes way over your knees. Was it related to that?
BTW, what weight class and what did you weigh in?
How many in your class?
Its a sharp pain when knee is bent. Like i tried to go down in a squat position after just with body weight and it kept reproducing the same pain. When knee was straight or walking i could barely feel it but bent it felt sharp but not too painful. Felt like a tendon or ligament got strained and probably wasnt ready for that much bending of knee with that weight. Its definitely not the main patellar tendon. It felt deeper and more medial. Towards center of body inside of knee cap. Maybe mcl? Its not like a tear or injury and by time i deadlifted i didnt feel it at all deadlifting. But i didnt test it again by going into the squat position. There was at least 3 hours between my squat and deadlift. But the 10 mins between squat attempts was not long enough and i didnt wanna go heavier and risk actually injuring it and not be able to donthe other 2. I felt the pull of it at the bottom of the body weight squat with knee fully bent. Like a pulling that cause the kinda sharp pain. Just a weird pain where not injured or ripped but you know something aint right and got stressed and telling your body not to stress it out anymore. Haha.
I was attempting to get to 220(100kg class). I was 225 a week before and i could have cut probably or even just for weigh ins lost the water thru lasix or sauna. But i really wanted to be fully fed and hit my goals. So i actually tried to load up on carbs the last week and weighed in with short and tshirt and socks and hat and underwear ect and weighed in 106kg (233lb). I am 6ft tall. The gym i was at is APF federation. There all time record for raw bench for that gym was 420lb bench for 220lb class and 424lb bench. I was gonna try. Might have got it. But i was happy with the 413. No other guys in 242 or lower beat my bench. Second best was 402lbs. So i was very happy with that. I was the only one out of 35 people to be in the new RAW category which is naked knees. Most were in the classic raw/wraps with knee sleeves or knee wraps. And others in single ply or multiply squat/bench/deadlift suits. So i was 1/1 since only raw lifter. But there was a classic raw knees wrapped so tight that squatted 650 and deadlifted 722 opener and benched 402. So obviously i wasnt anywhere close to him since he was 242 class. If i was 220 class i would have probably got first since it wasnt competitive.
Also. If anyone if counting. The squat bar is the texas monster squat bar 66lb (30kg). The bench was the texas bench bar 55lb (25kg). Deadlift was texas deadlift bar 44lb (20kg). And had competition collars on that are 5kg (2.5kg each). Because i am used to at home only using a 20kg rogue power bar with 5kg comp collars and used to different colors on and had to verify they weren’t messing up the weights since i have used kg comp plates, comp collars, and 20kg comp power bar for last 4 years in my garage where i do my majority of lifting and i know the weights and colors by heart lol.
I’d get that knee figured out before worrying about pushing the gas pedal on your squat. Does it hurt at all if you do air squats without squatting heavy before?
Is there a particular weight were it begins to hurt?
What I’m getting at is if you can do squats that don’t hurt at all with a particular loading, do them. Front and goblet squats in particular helped me with my back squat by making me more comfortable in a deep squat. Kettlebell front squats are what I do most of the time these days, with double 70’s being my heaviest.
Paused squats are also good for becoming more comfortable in the hole and for confidence. If you can pause it in the hole and still finish the squat, you now OWN that weight. The only time I nearly had a mishap with them was when I was pausing with 405 and a gym-goer assumed I was stuck.
It’s hard to say “GTF away from me” when you’re bracing with 405 on your back.
But yeah, from what you’re describing I’d shut it down until you figure that knee out. Sharp pain is no good. If going to the Orthopedist is not in the cards, you could try squatting multiple times per week with weight that causes no pain. A month or two of goblet squats or some other alternative won’t make you weaker, and you might find the pain is gone next time you load up your spine with a barbell.
Sounds like something i used to have an issue with. I suggest moving to low bar and focusing on not letting knees cave. I also bought the little patellar tendonitis wrap from eddie hall just to feel supported. After I stopped letting the knees cave in though, it completely went away
Well i squatted a week from the meet. I warmed up and even did some leg extensions/leg curls to warm up. Knees felt fine. They felt fine up to 335. But 365, felt like i bent the knees first and i felt a twinge in the lateral side of knee so i stopped and did heavy leg press 700+ lbs to try and still get some leg workout in.
I have been trying to sit back. Bend at hips first and keep knees back from toes. But when i hit depth, knees seem to go out in front of toes. And i just feel my proportions of femur or tibia or something hurts my squat form. Along with poor mobility.
So i think the weird ligament twinge pain is due to too much stress on knees on heavier weight due to form and trying to get great depth. I tried knee sleeves but they dont help and more than naked knees. Its super tight on my quad and loose on knee itself. I dont know if i wanna try wraps like every single person at the meet i did. Or go wide stance and try to focus on hips/ect instead of knees so much. Bar path seemed to start fine then go forward then come back.
You are getting a little lower than you need to go. You would definitely never get red lighted for depth.
It looks like you are relaxing your hips in order to descend the final few inches. This hurts the amount of weight you can squat.
Have you tried a wider stance? That will help keep your knees from going over your toes.