Everything and anything about squatting part 1

Squatting is a basic human body movement that we have done since we were a baby. Yet over the years of development, people lose the ability to do a proper squat. I am just talking a body weight squat, forget when they decide to throw some weight on the bar.

Don't get me wrong, squatting is a foundational movement and should be a part of most everyones program. However, not everyone is made to do traditional back squats. For example, a person like myself. Being 6'6" tall I have many disadvantages when it comes to lifting. The two main lifts that are difficult are benching and squatting, simply because my extremities are so long. So, I tend to do more box squats and front squats.

People sit way to much. They sit at work, sit in the car, sit when they get home, and so on. As a result, sitting caused extremely tight hamstrings. On top of that, they think there doing good by going to the gym, and they go do 60 minutes on the elliptical. Well guess what? That also shortens and tightens your hamstrings. Because so many people have tight hamstrings, they tend to compensate when their lifting with there lower back. That is when you see a lot of forward trunk flexion and kyphotic movements, which then causes pain and injury.

As you look around at college strength and conditioning programs and the leaders in the field like Mike Boyle and Eric Cressey, you will notice that they are doing more and more non-traditional squatting. These include things like front squats, box squats, and lung variations.

The box squat is one of my favorite exercises to do. It really emphasis the hips and glutes while working on your form on every rep.

Here are some great lines from Dave Tate, one of the strongest and most intelligent men in the field.

1) Training on a box will allow you to sit back onto the box to a point where your shins are past perpendicular to the floor. This places all the stress on the squatting muscles (hips, glutes, lower back and hamstrings.) When you can increase the stress on these muscles and lower the stress on the quads, then you'll be ready to see your squat poundages start moving.

2) Restoration is another major advantage of box squatting. You can train more often on a box when compared to free squatting. According to Louie Simmons, the original members of Westside Barbell in Culver City, California, used to perform box squats three times a week. Currently at Westside we train the box squat every Friday for our dynamic workout and occasionally on Monday's maximal effort workouts. If you're new to box squats, I suggest you do them once per week.

3) When performing box squats you never have to guess how low you're squatting. It'll always be the same. Think about it: when most people start adding weight to the bar, their squats get higher and higher. You see this all the time in any gym you go to. They look good with the light weights, then begin doing quarter squats when the weight gets heavy. With box squats, you'll always go low enough.

4) The last reason to box squat is to reinforce good squat technique. Many times for the intermediate or beginning squatter, the hamstrings aren't yet developed and "sitting back" into a squat is impossible without falling over backward. To teach these athletes how to free squat properly would take months. The squat wouldn't look right until the hamstrings and glute strength increases. Why wait two or three months? Put them on the box and you'll have them squatting properly within five minutes. Within one month the hamstrings will begin to kick in because of the added stress of sitting back on the box.

So, today I focused a lot on box squats. My next blog I want to focus on front squats. A squatting technique that puts more focus on the anterior part of the leg, but a very humbling exercise.

If you have any questions please let me know.

Best,

Doug Spurling, CSCS, NSCA-CPT