Squat Technique Help

Bigger Stronger Leaner
1

Hey guys,

I recently started squatting and would like some feedback on my technique. What should I improve and work on.

If I lean a little bit more forward and push the butt more back, I get buttwinked.

I think I’ve long femurs and it took me few weeks to fix the buttwink I usually have when I squat. It looks okay now without it, but there is job to be done technique-wise. It still does not look like a squat to me, more like legpress with barbell, but I might be overly critical here.

NOTE - Keep your comments about the “weight” to yourself, this is not why I posted the video.

Thank you.

2

I’m no expert, but you form looks pretty damn good to me.

3

[quote]Sharp4850 wrote:
I’m no expert, but you form looks pretty damn good to me. [/quote]

x2, back looks like it isn’t rounding, and you’re hitting good depth

4

That weight looks kinda weight-y.

Forms textbook perfect brah.

5

Yes, 225 pounds is a killer weight :wink: The magic number. Hah. But I’ll get that sucker up now. Don’t want to go berzerk on the technique, want to get it down.

To Mat "Looks good mate. Do they let you deadlift on that floor? "

According to the owner, people WERE allowed to do it before - but they were going so heavy that the entire building vibrated and those who worked nightshift couldn’t sleep, so now they have rubber-insertions there. Black stuff on the floor to eliminate the sound. You have to start with the bar 0.5" lower though, but it’s okay. Pain in the ass to take the weight off though.

6

Hey man, Your form looks good to me. I could be wrong, but i just noticed on the last rep, you were starting to lean in a bit. try lifting your head up and looking toward the ceiling also.

Otherwise, Great Form

7

Good form man, it’s good to be concerned about these things though, you’re not being unnecessarily paranoid, it’s a healthy fear.

Only thing I can offer really is that you might want to try spreading your stance a little bit, I could see you having a tendency to turn squats into half goodmornings as you start to add significant weight to the bar. But nothing “wrong” with how you’re doing them now.

8

[quote]Sarev0k wrote:
Hey man, Your form looks good to me. I could be wrong, but i just noticed on the last rep, you were starting to lean in a bit. try lifting your head up and looking toward the ceiling also.

Otherwise, Great Form[/quote]

I would echo what Sarev0k is saying here.

You want your chin up and eyes on a point above your head at all times. Don’t look at the ground or let your neck sag. Remember: Your body will follow whatever your head is doing, so get your head going up and back on the concentric part of the movement.

Also, on the way up you don’t want to think about extending your legs, you want to think about extending your hips, or rather - pushing your hips straight forward and pulling your shoulders straight back - in order to lock it out. This while help you to use stronger muscle groups like the glutes rather than a weak link like the lower back.

9

impeccable

10

We don’t determine the Form for anything you are doing as BB’er.

Your progress does that.

That being said you shouldn’t hurt yourself doing that kind of squat.

Checking to see if you’ll fuck yourself up. Yeah we can help with that…some…

The form begins to change, as you keep hitting reps. This is normal, just like the ‘slow down.’

The form on later reps in a set, on your later sets, and all that, can and should be reigned in. However, that is a kind of micro-progress, if you will.

When I am on my final set of Inc. DBP, I am slower than a sloth on heroin, and my form is not as ‘perfect’.

However I am always, TRYING to move fast, and FOCUSING on my chest.

Bad form as a BB’er is that which will hurt you, and or take focus off of the muscle you are trying to bring up.

If you loose Quad focus, but are still getting reps, you failed your tech, as a BB’er.

The above is okay, for a LITTLE while, but again, ‘micro-progress’.

Get the point?

11

“It still does not look like a squat to me, more like legpress with barbell, but I might be overly critical here.” I don’t get how you see it like a legpress with a barbell. Klockren Squat i mina ögon.

12

[quote]Antares wrote:
We don’t determine the Form for anything you are doing as BB’er.

Your progress does that.

The above is okay, for a LITTLE while, but again, ‘micro-progress’.

[/quote]

Antares, I don’t quite understand what you’re saying here. Are you saying that your form is determined by your progress?

13

[quote]Mr. Mister wrote:

[quote]Antares wrote:
We don’t determine the Form for anything you are doing as BB’er.

Your progress does that.

The above is okay, for a LITTLE while, but again, ‘micro-progress’.

[/quote]

Antares, I don’t quite understand what you’re saying here. Are you saying that your form is determined by your progress?

[/quote]

It seems you do not understand what I meant by progress.

On the highest level ( to a BB’er ) that is larger/aesthetic muscle.

Whatever form gets you to the above, without hurting you is the ‘correct’ form in BB’ing, for every movement in a trainees rota.

We can not tell the OP this, only HIS muscles can.

You might get this on a macro level, as in movement selection can and should be personal.

However, 8 guys doing ‘Back Squats’, may be better off using 4 different techs between the 8 of them, but there are only 2 different techs between these 8 trainees.

We can say ‘that shouldn’t injure you, OP’, sure, we can say that…But he could still fuck up what LOOKED like safe tech, tomorrow, somehow.

14

[quote]Antares wrote:

[quote]Mr. Mister wrote:

[quote]Antares wrote:
We don’t determine the Form for anything you are doing as BB’er.

Your progress does that.

The above is okay, for a LITTLE while, but again, ‘micro-progress’.

[/quote]

Antares, I don’t quite understand what you’re saying here. Are you saying that your form is determined by your progress?

[/quote]

It seems you do not understand what I meant by progress.

On the highest level ( to a BB’er ) that is larger/aesthetic muscle.

Whatever form gets you to the above, without hurting you is the ‘correct’ form in BB’ing, for every movement in a trainees rota.

We can not tell the OP this, only HIS muscles can.

You might get this on a macro level, as in movement selection can and should be personal.

However, 8 guys doing ‘Back Squats’, may be better off using 4 different techs between the 8 of them, but there are only 2 different techs between these 8 trainees.

We can say ‘that shouldn’t injure you, OP’, sure, we can say that…But he could still fuck up what LOOKED like safe tech, tomorrow, somehow.

[/quote]

He’s saying that all we can do is give, at best, an educated guess on form that’ll keep your relatively safe. But there’s a difference between form and execution. If doing an exercise a certain way isn’t hypertrophing the right muscles, then you need to change your execution, or use a different exercise. Like, for instance, if you use the Flat Bench Press as your main chest movement, yet you feel it all in your shoulders and triceps, and your chest is lacking, then you need to adjust how you perform the exercise or get a different one. Went off on a bit of a tangent.

15

third rep was shallow. Other than that, the weight was not travelling east-west much at all. Good form.

16

Oh i think i understand now. Thanks guys

17

Aren’t his knees going too far over his toes?

18

General pointers for the high bar form that you have:

Your knees are coming forward quite a bit. Think about forceing them out during the lift. Don’t actually look at them when doing this, but try to push your knees out all the same. You may want to experiment with foot placement, usually widening your stance will help prevent the knees from comming so far forward. Your head should be looking up at an angle at all times. Not straite up at the ceiling mind you, but something like 45 degrees maybe. If you look down, the bar may slide down your back midset. This has happened to me a couple of times. Try to dig the bar into your traps/back so that it sets there securely(chalking up also helps). On the way up, try to force your elbows underneath the bar. This will help keep your torso in the right position and help prevent you from leaning forward. Another general point is that taking a deep breath and holding it deep down in your gut during the lift can help you maintain tightness. I generally do this and only start to exhale when I am out of the hole on the way up.

Nice lifting. Just work on pushing your knees out, digging the bar into your traps/upper back, and keeping your head/chest up an out.

Hope this was helpfull.

19

Everyone, big thanks for the input! Much appreciated.

I agree about the knees and that has been bothering me - the execution. I’ve my feets pointing out around 45 degrees and that should allow for a more proper knee-tracking. But I guess it does not. To widen the stance might be a solution though, but that might bring back the butt-wink, but I’ll have to play around with that one.

Thanks for the reminder on elbows, when I read about the head I remembered what David Tate said - drive it into the bar.

And just a little bit about “micro-managing”. I do get your point bro and it is a relevant one. But to quote Mr.Tate again, guys gain up to 50 pounds on their squat just by fixing the technique. I want to start with good technique and adjust it as it goes, everything changes and there are a lot of variables in it, but the fundamentals are the same and I want to engrave it into my motor program :slight_smile:

@silkyhorse - because of the knee-tracking. High Bar + big knee tracking = legpress with barbell :slight_smile:

20

That form looked perfect to me! Holy crap.

I agree that your muscles should dictate and not injury… Holy crap.

I don’t understand what is meant by pulling your knees out. I thought knees going over the toes wasn’t bad at all unless you felt improper pressure in the joint, or if your heels were not absorbing the load(?).