Squat Problem, Fatigue

Training
41

[quote]Jarvan wrote:

[quote]LoRez wrote:
I’d bring your elbows more directly underneath the bar; you seem to be rounding forward at your upper back in this video, unlike the last one. Focus on keep your chest up.

I also think you’re going a bit too heavy for you. I’d drop back about 20% from where you are right now and work back up. It’ll feel light, and that’s fine. Just use it as an opportunity to keep everything tight and crisp and drill that in. Try to explode out of the hole, and keep your back a single solid unit.

Likewise, if you’re not doing a few lighter sets to warm up, I’d start doing that and make sure each of those are crisp and fast.

It looks to me that your back is just a little weak right now. Since you’re doing StrongLifts, you should be getting some decent upper back work with the Pendlay Rows. How heavy have you been able to go on those?

Another final tip. Before you start into your work sets, put an extra 20-50lbs on the bar, walk out with it, and just hold it for 5-10 seconds. Repeat a few times if you want. This should make your work sets feel much lighter, as well as just getting your back (and mind) used to holding heavier weights.

Best of luck.[/quote]

OP is performing a low bar squat. If his elbows were to be beneath the bar, his shoulders would collapse. His elbows are great. His scapulae is pinched and elbows in tight and flared behind him, the way it should be. His chest can’t get any higher than it is. As a matter of fact, if his chest went any higher, he’d fall backwards. What you haven’t taken into consideration is that OP is a tall motherfucker, if you can’t tell from how he squats. So unless he switches to a high bar squat, it’s gonna look like he’s flirting with a good morning.
NOTE* OP’s hips do come up a fraction of a second earlier than it should.

What the OP should do is tuck his chin in. Meaning force a double chin on yourself. For the knock knees, add accessory work to give focus to the abductors. The weight distribution should lie on the outer skirts of his foot, with the heel firmly planted. Whereas OP is currently laying the weight more towards the medial part of the foot, and the balls of his feet. Drop the weight and focus on pushing the knees outward as you descend AND ascend until you reach the pinnacle. If you can find a resistance band, wrap it right outside your knees and work on firing your abductors as you squat.

If you’re getting too tired to finish the sets, it’s perhaps because it is simply a new program. Or you can try using Thib’s neuro charge warmups to adequately set off the CNS before your first working set. And double checking your nutrition wouldn’t hurt either.
Potentation to charge your CNS is great, but it is unnecessary to fix your squat ATM. Save it for when your squat form is in check and you’re warming up for that new PR.
[/quote]

Do me a favor and tell Sam Byrd this because apparently his Squat style is completely wrong. Low bar or not you should try to bring your elbows under the bar as far as possible. This not only flares the chest out keeping it high but locks it in place by forcefully contracting the upper back and statically supporting the chest to stay up.

Raising the elbows high like your suggesting allows the chest to cave in especially when weights get near 90% and make the lifter much more prone to dumping the bar forward. Now if you are following Rippitoe or how ever you spell his names advice then sure I guess your doing fine but, considering Sam warms up with his max so uhh… Yeah.

42

Not even close to the chicken winging your advocating to the op.

43

You might want to invest in a mirror so you can see how even you are.

44

[quote]SevenDragons wrote:

You aren’t setting the bar evenly on your back to start.

The reason it is more pronounced at the bottom is that you are tightening up as you get to the bottom and ready to come up.

If you were getting tight when you took the bar off the rack, like you are supposed to, then you’d see the unevenness of the bar right away. You seem to be too loose. It was worse in the first vid, but it’s still there. When the weight actually gets heavy, you are not going to be able to get away with being loose and then tightening it up as you start your ascent.

Get tight before you lift the bar off. Set the bar evenly. And stay tight all the way until you have the bar racked and are done.[/quote]

I don’t feel loose when I unrack the bar. Is there something else I can do besides pulling the shoulder blades back together?

Also there have been no feedback as to whether my form has improved in any way since I started the thread. I’m posting a video from yesterday in this post, it would be really great if someone could look at it and check if I’ve at least done something right.

What I have done so far to improve my squat is:
*Slightly wider stance

*Doing planks to strengthen my abs, hips still rise to quickly sometimes but I believe this will be fixed over time.

*Trying to stay tighter during the movement by “gripping the floor” and “Trying to spread the floor”

*Tucking my chin

*Increasing bar speed, now that I’m getting back to where I was before the deload I believe it is a little faster.

*Tried to get the elbows more under the bar, in the top position It’s hard to get them closer under, but during the descent there is no problems. It kinda comes naturally.

Would it be easier to stay tight at the top if I don’t stand as upright?

I don’t know if I should keep on progressing on the squat or deload again. I really don’t feel like doing a second deload, nor do I like squatting with a bad form.

45

Switch to Paused Front Squats for a while. Give your lower back a rest. Also jump on the Bret Contreras train and start building your glutes and hips more with assistant exercises. Id also chuck in some weighted back extensions with static holds to build up the lower back without putting a heavy load on your back.

Also are you doing your abdominal exercises standing or on the ground?

46

Well, it does look too heavy. The butt coming up too fast is usually a sign that it’s too much weight, even though you look like you have it under control. The upper back looks fine, from what I can see. You may want to bring your hands in a bit, but do what ever’s comfortable. One thing gentilcore says is to squeeze oranges under your armpits to tighten the lats and stabilize the back. For myself, I tend the physically push up on the bar when I go real heavy, which seems to have a similar effect.

It also looks like you may be leaning a bit too far forward, I can’t tell. Where do you feel yourself pushing off the floor? The balls of your feet?

I can’t quite figure out what’s going on w/ the hips in the hole. It looks like you get down and favor one side over the other and sort of lunge it up. You could try filming yourself at a lighter weight to compare… that would be a good sign if you’re heavy or not.

Other things to try:

-shoes: it will help you grip the floor and just give you more confidence.
-food: My squat will not go up at this point unless I eat more… you may be at a similar point
-just keep going: this can be dangerous… but I find with squats, I need enough weight (around 215-245 lbs) on it to “hold me down,” otherwise I tend to lean forward to balance… you might be in that weird in between zone where it’s too light to lean forward and too heavy to lean back.

47

[quote]1 Man Island wrote:
I can’t quite figure out what’s going on w/ the hips in the hole. It looks like you get down and favor one side over the other and sort of lunge it up. You could try filming yourself at a lighter weight to compare… that would be a good sign if you’re heavy or not.
[/quote]

This is basically what I meant.

You essentially want both left and right side of your lower body doing the same thing. Yours does not do this.

Having one side act differently means that there’s some sort of imbalance. It might be because one side is more tighter than the other or weaker for the most part. These things can cripple your progress.

This is why I advocated paused squats. If you pause, then you can actually spend time feeling where the weight is distributed. You actually develop a feeling over what’s being worked, and this is valuable. Plus, they do a great job of revealing weaknesses. If your left side is weaker than the right, then it will probably be obvious when you try to come out of the hole.

Plus, paused squats do a great job of developing core strength. Ever since I spent a month or so doing nothing but paused squats, I haven’t had an issue with my core on the squat thus far. I think this is because I know how my core should be feeling when I’m doing things correctly, and I keep at it even when the weight is heavier than I’ve ever squatted.

Really spend some time developing how the weight feels and how your muscles should be feeling under load. Weightlifting isn’t merely about lifting heavier weights each time. That can come later with time, but spending a couple of months just knowing how the load feels when it’s properly distributed and how your body feels when it’s working properly is invaluable imo.

48

1 Man Island

I will definitely try out your orange squeezing tip!
I try to push of my heels, sometimes however I lean to far forward which in turn makes me push more with the middle of my feet.

As for the hips, my guess is that I push more with one side to compensate for the uneven bar.

magick

I’ll follow your advice and just do paused squats instead of just doing them on the warm-ups. Would dropping down to 130-150 pounds and work my way up with paused squats be a good approach?

If I find out that I have a weakness or that one side is tighter, should I just keep doing paused squats and let it even out?

49

Your bars become uneven as you descend and then come out of the hole. I have no idea why.

I’d recommend that you drop down to 135lb or less and rebuild your squat from scratch. Take some time to read up on how to squat properly and spend time just finding what works for you.

Post a video of a 135lb paused squat if you can.

As for the shoulders- my left shoulder is much tighter/just plainly more fucked up than compared to my right. At its worst, I couldn’t even bench properly.

Doing a shit-ton of shoulder dislocates (do them with something that doesn’t stretch, I use my judo belt) and doing some exercises from the Diesel Crew shoulder rehab video helped tremendously. I can now bench (sort of). But I still notice a difference in elbow positioning during squats. It’s not much of a problem though. Try doing shoulder dislocates, they are generally the go-to for loosening your shoulders up so that you can rotate them better.

50

It’s very likely you are just not activating your hamstrings at the bottom of the lift.

51

Magick, here is your requested video. The bar is still uneven, and I think my upper back is as tight as it can be. When I tried the “orange squeeze” trick mentioned above I could get my elbows more under the bar and keep my chest up easier.

I have had some shoulder issues before and I used to do shoulder dislocations with a plastic mop handle that we had at the gym, but it is broken now. It could be as simple as just a shoulder inflexibility making the bar uneven.

dt97

Is it possible to squat without activating the hamstrings?

52

[quote]Jointe1992 wrote:
Magick, here is your requested video. The bar is still uneven, and I think my upper back is as tight as it can be. When I tried the “orange squeeze” trick mentioned above I could get my elbows more under the bar and keep my chest up easier.

I have had some shoulder issues before and I used to do shoulder dislocations with a plastic mop handle that we had at the gym, but it is broken now. It could be as simple as just a shoulder inflexibility making the bar uneven.

dt97

Is it possible to squat without activating the hamstrings?[/quote]

Try this:

Go to your couch or a low chair. Assume your squat stance and sit back onto it. Relax for a sec and then try to stand up like how you squat. Most likely, your ass will come up first.

Next, do the same but try to “leg curl” yourself up by flexing your hamstrings and kicking your heels back and see if your torso angle changes.

53

[quote]Jointe1992 wrote:
Magick, here is your requested video. The bar is still uneven, and I think my upper back is as tight as it can be. When I tried the “orange squeeze” trick mentioned above I could get my elbows more under the bar and keep my chest up easier.

I have had some shoulder issues before and I used to do shoulder dislocations with a plastic mop handle that we had at the gym, but it is broken now. It could be as simple as just a shoulder inflexibility making the bar uneven. [/quote]

Could be the angle of the video, but it looks to me like your feet and knees are pointed out at different angles, and that the unevenness is a result of that. I could be completely wrong.

Your left knee also seems to move around a bit when you hit/go below parallel.

Just observations.

54

[quote]Jointe1992 wrote:
Magick, here is your requested video. The bar is still uneven, and I think my upper back is as tight as it can be. When I tried the “orange squeeze” trick mentioned above I could get my elbows more under the bar and keep my chest up easier.

I have had some shoulder issues before and I used to do shoulder dislocations with a plastic mop handle that we had at the gym, but it is broken now. It could be as simple as just a shoulder inflexibility making the bar uneven.

[/quote]
Right off the bat, the bar is not sitting on top of your right side posterior delt.

I suggest that you take a look at Mark Rippetoe video on squat- bar placement(google this).