GM squats, balance and quad strength

[Murelli]

The general consensus seems to be to work harder on staying tight

I would add: completely unlearn Rippetoean mechanics.

I see vastly too many examples of knee-extension-absent-hip-extension in the early part of the concentric.

Inb4: "but Austin's squat is pretty". Yeah, it is. In the ~7 years I've been reviewing Rippetoean squats, I can count on two hands examples that I think are mechanically awesome. @KOTJ is another case. People with really short femurs do okay, but they would do okay with pretty much any squat model.

I'll try to translate this using my N=1:

My first time doing squats was solely with the Layne Norton video for instruction. Then I've read Starting Strength. My proprioception allowed me to do well enough, with the only issue being dive bombing and losing tightness near/at the bottom when I was a novice. When I tried to "bend over more" without anyone telling me to, I began having issues with thoracic extension, knee slide and something being pinched in my hips. So don't think about tits to the pavement, or any other dumb cue. Sometimes you have to be more upright than you currently are to stay in your hips and do a proper low bar squat. That's where video comes so handy.

Most current StSt Rippetoan cues are overcorrecting cues for vices that come from other coaching currents, like trying to be vertical as possible (nipples to the floor, look down, etc.), lifting your chest before your hips, etc. So don't take them at face value. Most people who have not been coached or who have "form creep" (haven't checked their form in a long while) will tend to use an incorrect stance (includes toe angle) for their anthropometry, incorrect back angle/gaze and/or tightness problems. Most common symptoms are not hitting depth, knee slide/cave and/or GMing squats.

As KOTJ would say, cues are individual.

[Hanley]

When I tried to "bend over more" without anyone telling me to, I began having issues with thoracic extension, knee slide and something being pinched in my hips.

All very common.

[OverheadDeadlifts]

I have tendency toward good morning squats. As I go out of the hole, my hips will rise faster than my chest, the bar will go forward of midfoot, knees and hips will go back a bit.

This was me for like the first 4 years of squatting. I tried deloads, quad work and every recommended cue for the problem. The cue that finally killed it stone dead was 'hips forward', especially out of the hole.

I consider it a really powerful overcorrection cue, since I don't actually want my hips to go forward, and I've found it's the only cue that works for somebody who's got an ingrained habit of having the hips/knees go backwards out of the hole. The cue I most often read about and got offered by in person coaching was 'hips up' which just didn't cut it. I suppose the reason is because, when you're bent over and looking diagonally at the floor, it's hard to know exactly which way is up and which way your hips are moving. There's only a small difference between pushing straight up and pushing slightly backwards, but hips forward is the polar opposite, which feels like it's more actively resisting the hips going backwards.

It also fixed my knee cave.

[PatrickDB]

I can't think of another squat model to recommend, because I don't think coaches do a good job articulating their models.

Be the change you want to see in the world, homie.

[Hanley]

I can't think of another squat model to recommend, because I don't think coaches do a good job articulating their models.

Be the change you want to see in the world, homie.

I suck at articulating mechanics. I also sorta suck at squats in general.

[mgil]

Best way to fix a squat (for me) is to video every set for a while and make it look “efficient”. I have no idea what that means, and it looks different across lifters.

Basically, it shouldn’t look shitty. To Hanley’s point, this is difficult to articulate and a single prescription won’t be nearly general enough.

[Hanley]

Best way to fix a squat (for me) is to video every set for a while and make it look “efficient”. I have no idea what that means, and it looks different across lifters.

Yeah. I don't even know what I'm seeing when I see it, but when someone hits the right/optimal joint angles it's obvious. It looks...fuck, here I go again...beautiful.

[Wilhelm]

It looks...fuck, here I go again...beautiful.

Clearly stalking my instagram feed.


But, yes. Video all your reps.
Till you are sick of doing it. Then keep doing it.

When i got closer to my meet, i wanted to pace my warm ups, and simulate more of how i would be doing things meet day.
So i stopped recording and watching back between sets.

I found that i had learned much better "how correct felt"

It helps to know what you are aiming for though.

[damufunman]

I know this is Rippetoean heresy, but I've found thinking about driving with the shoulders into the bar (I think Nuckols advocates this too) CAN be helpful, as long as it doesn't lead to leading with the chest. An overcorrection of the "lead with the hips/point nipples straight down" overcorrection, if you will.

[Murelli]

I know this is Rippetoean heresy, but I've found thinking about driving with the shoulders into the bar (I think Nuckols advocates this too) CAN be helpful, as long as it doesn't lead to leading with the chest. An overcorrection of the "lead with the hips/point nipples straight down" overcorrection, if you will.

Yeah, focusing on pushing the bar up instead of "standing up" or looking a little further away from your feet will help a lot in unRipping your squat.

[quark]

I have tendency toward good morning squats. As I go out of the hole, my hips will rise faster than my chest, the bar will go forward of midfoot, knees and hips will go back a bit.

This was me for like the first 4 years of squatting. I tried deloads, quad work and every recommended cue for the problem. The cue that finally killed it stone dead was 'hips forward', especially out of the hole.

I consider it a really powerful overcorrection cue, since I don't actually want my hips to go forward, and I've found it's the only cue that works for somebody who's got an ingrained habit of having the hips/knees go backwards out of the hole. The cue I most often read about and got offered by in person coaching was 'hips up' which just didn't cut it. I suppose the reason is because, when you're bent over and looking diagonally at the floor, it's hard to know exactly which way is up and which way your hips are moving. There's only a small difference between pushing straight up and pushing slightly backwards, but hips forward is the polar opposite, which feels like it's more actively resisting the hips going backwards.

It also fixed my knee cave.

It does make sense to correct hips moving back by the overcue, hips forward. This is consistent with the @Hanley note that not extending the hips early enough on the ascent is a problem, as obviously extending the hips brings them forward.

Hips forward is easier to accomplish than hips up, as you explain.

Two cues are probably the outer limit of my ability to focus. Get and stay really tight and move hips forward (extend hips) at the start of the ascent. Alternatively drive shoulders, push bar up, as @damufunman and @Murelli suggest, but I doubt I can focus on all of these at once.

Plus video everything and watch.

[cgeorg]

It does make sense to correct hips moving back by the overcue, hips forward. This is consistent with the @Hanley note that not extending the hips early enough on the ascent is a problem, as obviously extending the hips brings them forward.

Hips forward is easier to accomplish than hips up, as you explain.

Two cues are probably the outer limit of my ability to focus. Get and stay really tight and move hips forward (extend hips) at the start of the ascent. Alternatively drive shoulders, push bar up, as @damufunman and @Murelli suggest, but I doubt I can focus on all of these at once.

Plus video everything and watch.

Keep in mind that you are bent over at the bottom - "up" in the sense of torso moving towards top of the head is actually forward. I actually cue pushing back, not up, against the bar, because back is actually up when you're bent over. I also think it helps lock in your lumbar - it promotes a hinging about the hips that just "up" doesn't.

[damufunman]

I have tendency toward good morning squats. As I go out of the hole, my hips will rise faster than my chest, the bar will go forward of midfoot, knees and hips will go back a bit.

This was me for like the first 4 years of squatting. I tried deloads, quad work and every recommended cue for the problem. The cue that finally killed it stone dead was 'hips forward', especially out of the hole.

I consider it a really powerful overcorrection cue, since I don't actually want my hips to go forward, and I've found it's the only cue that works for somebody who's got an ingrained habit of having the hips/knees go backwards out of the hole. The cue I most often read about and got offered by in person coaching was 'hips up' which just didn't cut it. I suppose the reason is because, when you're bent over and looking diagonally at the floor, it's hard to know exactly which way is up and which way your hips are moving. There's only a small difference between pushing straight up and pushing slightly backwards, but hips forward is the polar opposite, which feels like it's more actively resisting the hips going backwards.

It also fixed my knee cave.

It does make sense to correct hips moving back by the overcue, hips forward. This is consistent with the @Hanley note that not extending the hips early enough on the ascent is a problem, as obviously extending the hips brings them forward.

Hips forward is easier to accomplish than hips up, as you explain.

Two cues are probably the outer limit of my ability to focus. Get and stay really tight and move hips forward (extend hips) at the start of the ascent. Alternatively drive shoulders, push bar up, as @damufunman and @Murelli suggest, but I doubt I can focus on all of these at once.

Plus video everything and watch.

Might need to triage a bit. Probably tightness is going to be the biggest thing to work on first, followed by hips forward, and then maybe hips up if necessary, cuz I'd listen to @Hanley before me.
Do one or two things at a time, as you are able to focus on and really focus on those for a few sessions/weeks/whatever until they are automatic, then move on to the next thing(s). Video is easy and doesn't take any extra attention once it's set up so do that from the get-go.

[Murelli]

N=1, but I've never needed more than one cue per set to fix what I caught wrong watching the video from the previous set.

[PatrickDB]

To start, I would simply look forward with chest more forward on your squats.

So “low bar squat with high bar mechanics”?

[Hanley]

To start, I would simply look forward with chest more forward on your squats.

So “low bar squat with high bar mechanics”?

Eh. Not really. If you're imagining a high-bar model as you squat, shit might get wonky (a "cobra squat" is common...which is chest too forward [basically hypertension]);

I like these very much:



Lakshmi learned from me (Rippetoean), but had her squat rebuilt by Todd Christiansen (you can hear "chest up"):

[quark]

To start, I would simply look forward with chest more forward on your squats.

#wedontlookdown

[Austin]

The general consensus seems to be to work harder on staying tight

I would add: completely unlearn Rippetoean mechanics.

I see vastly too many examples of knee-extension-absent-hip-extension in the early part of the concentric.

Inb4: "but Austin's squat is pretty". Yeah, it is. In the ~7 years I've been reviewing Rippetoean squats, I can count on two hands examples that I think are mechanically awesome. @KOTJ is another case. People with really short femurs do okay, but they would do okay with pretty much any squat model.

Lol'd ... thanks dude.

I see GM squatting as the symptom, with a few different potential causes. 1) Excessively focusing on "hip drive", i.e., throwing the hips up (or worse - back) as hard as possible without regard for anything else. 2) Insufficient quad strength is another (and over time may plausibly result from the first). 3) "Looseness" as a cause is ... a bit nebulous, but ok -- this is along the lines of traditional SS thinking, where the GM squat results when you fail to maintain isometric hamstring contraction out of the bottom (which Nuckols would argue is probably happening because there is insufficient quad strength to overcome the hamstrings' knee flexion force).

I like having people do tempo squats and cue them to keep their knees forward longer as they drive up out of the bottom to teach them how the pattern should go.

[KDW]

@Wilhelm , In the post where I mention a common error in the squat, yes, tightness was part of that but the main thing I was trying to show there was that there are a ton of people trying to squat with their lumbar spines in hyperextension. Instead of "hinging at the hips" while keeping the spine "neutral" or maintaining the intervertebral relationships, they excessively stick their buttocks out as they descend and overextend the spine. The result of this is that on the ascent there is an unraveling of the whole thing. Usually there is some knee slide at the bottom, hips go back, and the back starts to round on the way up.

I suggest that the back be held in a position that there will be no change intervertebral relationships, regardless of back angle, at any point in the squat and focusing on moving the bar straight down and straight up. Finding this position cleans up a ton of issues and allows much better mechanics during the lift. Better mechanics leads to better training. Better training over time will lead to gains.

@Austin does this jive with your experience.

[Wilhelm]

Ah. I can picture that now.
The tightness all the way through is what i picked up on. Specifically in the bottom.
It did help a great deal with me not getting pushed forward in the bottom, but yeah, i can well picture what you are describing.

Thanks.