I started overhead squats today. The worst part was balance, but putting something under my heels helped a little. I felt it in my shoulders and traps, but not at all in my legs. Is this exercise supposed to hit the legs at all? Will I feel it more in my legs when I get used to the movement?
You will start to feel it in the legs as soon as your shoulder girdle is strong and flexible enough to balance substantial weight over your head and when you have enough flexibility to drop into a full squat position. Read up on everhead squats at Dan John’s site. He believes that OHS are the single best exercise there is (at least for throwers). It is one of those “work the body as one piece” type exercises.
Welcome to the club. I bet you got some strange looks. O/H squats are great for your shoulders, back all abs including your TVA but not really a hard core quad excercise. If I’m doing these I’ll combine shoulders and quads. I wouldn’t use O/H squats as a replacement for back or front squats on quad dominate day.
Its a weightlifting sport specific exercise intended to reinforse the up phase of the snatch. Why do you need this?
ive got an awesome website for you. its called www.bodyforpussies.com. go eat your carbs and do your leg extensions and shit there. if youve ever done HEAVY OHS you know that they are a great total body exercise.
I just had a thought, maybe a stupid one. What if I did them with a staggered stance? A little wider than shoulder width, the toe of the back foot in line with the heel of the front foot. The front foot would remain flat on the ground and the heel of the back foot would rise up at the bottom of the squat. Get up and try it to see what I mean. This might be more stable and might allow me to push more weight. I could switch legs each set or each rep. What do you think?
I personally like to do them with a snatch grip feet very narrow (almost touching), and squat till your back begins to round. But like Polo said they won’t really blast your legs like squats. I think that they are a great medial delt exercise and would recommend that you try and do them without a block under the heels (takes some shoulder stimulation out of it) it may take you a while to work up the flexibility. A great combo lift that will hit your legs more and get you into the olypic lifting spirit is the snatch-overhead squat combo. (Look up Coach Davies to see how it’s pwerformed.)
For all the reasons listed so far, balance, shoulders, back & abs. Dan John said there was a thrower who said his coach wouldn’t let him start throwing until he could do bwt for 15.
Like the other guys said, your shoulders and your core need to streghten before you reach the real results of O/H. You’ll notice better results in your overall power if you incorporate olympic stlye lifts in your workout.
Why do you need them was simply asking him to consider his training goals. Was i wrong about the weightlifting origins? Is it absolutely necessary for a bodybuilder for instance. Got the wrong impression i think Goldberg. None of the replys were listed when i read. Yes i agree they are a great whole body exercise. And for the record I dont do leg extensions as i have no need for isolation exercises in that area, and they apparently cause unnatural tracking of the knee due to the abcence of antagonist stabilisation of the hamstring. And I hate soy and am aware of its downside.
Patman. Get those blocks out from under you and don’t even think about staggering your feet.
DO IT LIGHT until you can DO IT RIGHT! It is a complex movement that takes years to really master. You will notice improvement quickly if you concentrate on form and stay light. However, you will get hurt quickly if you try to force it.
Ps. Rik- Overhead squats are considered essential to achieving athletic potential by most of the worlds’ top athletes.
Thanks for all of the tips, guys. Anyone else?
I’ll only be doing them once a week, but I think for now I will practice them on some off days with just the bar (I need to increase my flexibility).
When learning a new movement that requires substabtial balance and flexibility which you are unable to use substantial weight, I beleive can be performed everyday. You will not really be taxing either the CNS or the muscles to a great degree. Maybe you should use OHS as a pre-workout warmup exercise for now and make them an actual “workout exercise” once per week. However, I would make sure that form is the primary consideration to begin with and not weight. BTW, I don’t think there is anything wrong with the “elevated heals” in performing this exercise. Certainly you do not want to use elevated heals with every squat exercise, but it is certainly okay, particularly here were flexibility is a major issue. As long as you perform other squat-type exercises without elevated heals from time to time, you should have no problems. Eventually you may want to ween yourself off of the elevated heal-style, but only after you are able to full OHS with elevated heals. JMHO.