Heavy Squats can be a scary exercise. The weight on your back. The impending doom in the bottom of the squat. It will Test you physically and mentally.
There are many keys to feeling strong under a heavy squat. I will outline some of the keys that I find useful below.
Core - When you Squat you really need to brace your core. The Core is the transverse abdominus, obliques, abdominals and the pelvic floor muscles. I find it helpful to Squeeze the pelvic floor muscles like you are holding from going to the toilet. Then bracing the obliques hard as you pull into the squat. you normally don’t breath from 1/3 to halfway down until 1/3 the way up. The breathing is not full release breaths but more shallow breaths whilst still keeping some tension In the core.
Upper Back - The upper back is a big key to preventing the whole upper body from collapsing. It prevents the bar from moving away from the centre of gravity. You will need to squeeze the shoulder blades together and squeeze through the lower lats. That means that you need to grip the bar slightly wider than shoulder width but not too wide that you can’t engage the lats.
Bar placement is a preference based on your height and leg length proportionate to upper body. The longer your legs the more likely you are to have to lean forward. in this case the bar placement is will need to be lower below the upper traps and on the rear rear delts. This is the low bar position. If you have a longer torso the bar can sit higher.
Foot position - This will depend on leg length and height. The longer your legs the wider your foot position. The wider your feet the more you need to angle your Feet out.
The descent - to help create a stable spine you need to feel like your pulling yourself into the squat by tensing the hip flexors to flex the hip joint. This will help you to activate the Glutes and core. As you descend into the squat place more weight onto the heels and feel like your pushing your feet out laterally. As you sit into the squat allow your knees to ascend inline with the toes and all your butt to go backwards over your heels. as you go down you will need to breath into as brace your core tight. Once in the bottom of the squat you need to push hard through the heels to start the ascent.
The Ascent - Tighten up hard through the core and the upper back and drive through the heels. From about halfway up you will need to drive the hips forward as you extend the knees and hips. Avoid straightening the knees and hips at the top of the moment as this will then put load through the lower back.
The key to a good squat is to engage the upper back and core for a strong position and then engaging the larger muscles of the Glutes and Quads to do the majority of the work.
You need to be in full control especially in the bottom of the squat and feel like you could hold the bottom of the squat under full control.
I hope this article helps you to improve your squats Especially under a heavy load.
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