Perfect Back Squat Form | Men’s Health Muscle
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00:00 There are few exercises more hallowed in the gym than the back squat.
00:03 The back squat is well known as a lift that's going to let you move a whole ton of weight
00:07 over a very large range of motion and in the process we're going to wind up touching every
00:11 single muscle in our body.
00:13 However, the back squat is also one of the most challenging lifts in the gym because
00:17 it is incredibly technical and the truth is I see a lot of guys go into the gym and they
00:21 really have no business back squatting.
00:24 Because of that and because they're not back squatting properly, they're inviting injury
00:28 and even more importantly, even if they are getting their back squats done, they're still
00:32 not getting the maximum benefit from the lift.
00:35 How do we avoid all that?
00:36 We want to make sure we really understand our technique for the back squat and we want
00:39 to make sure we really understand how it fits into our workouts and who it's for.
00:43 And we're going to run through all of that for you right now.
00:47 This is not a squat that everybody needs to do.
00:49 If you're in the gym and you're really trying to focus on your quads or your hamstrings
00:53 or your glutes, the back squat is not an exercise that you need to do because we have some other
00:57 options.
00:58 We can go to squats like the front squat, we can go to a front rack kettlebell squat
01:02 and all of those are going to help you learn how to squat properly and we can do different
01:07 things that way we can attack different muscles with those moves.
01:10 The point where we get where we really want to back squat is when we want to squat a whole
01:14 ton of weight.
01:15 You can't do that if you're doing a goblet squat.
01:17 It gets very challenging with the front squat, it gets very challenging with kettlebells,
01:21 but if we put weight on our back, that's going to let us move our max load.
01:24 So when you want to go heavy, that's when you want to start thinking about the back
01:28 squat and that's when you want to start mastering this technique.
01:31 Now what are we actually training when we do the back squat?
01:33 We're going to attack a couple key muscle groups.
01:36 We're going to really focus in on our quads because we're going to wind up getting a lot
01:39 of knee flexion and we're also training hip extension, the idea of driving our hips through
01:44 the front at the top of a squat and that is a motion that is driven by our glutes.
01:49 We're also going to get a lot of work for our lower back extensors because this is not
01:54 a squat where we're keeping our torso completely upright.
01:57 Instead we've got a little bit of a hinge that's going to one, allow us to capture power
02:01 from our glutes and two, that requires our lower back extensors to really fire.
02:06 They're loaded and they have to really deal with the weight that is on our back the entire
02:11 time.
02:12 So you get three key muscle groups when you're squatting, your lower back extensors, your
02:15 glutes and your quads.
02:17 Let's also clear up a couple of misconceptions about muscle groups that are not really getting
02:21 attacked when we're doing the back squat and there are two main groups.
02:25 One, you have your hamstrings.
02:26 Now a lot of people think of the back squat as a total leg builder and it kind of is,
02:31 but if you think about the way your hamstrings are acting during the squat, yes they are
02:35 stabilizing but they never actually change length.
02:38 We are moving at the knee and at the hip simultaneously.
02:42 Because of that our hamstrings never change length, they're contracting isometrically
02:45 but you're not really going to build a ton of strength or size in your hamstrings when
02:50 you do the back squat.
02:51 The other muscle group that is not really working when you do a back squat is your abs,
02:56 your rectus abdominis.
02:57 A lot of people think yes your core works when you do a back squat and your core does
03:01 have to stabilize the entire time.
03:04 However, your rectus abdominis is responsible for spinal flexion.
03:07 That is the last thing we want to happen on a back squat so our abs are not really effectively
03:12 firing when we're doing a back squat.
03:14 That is not what we're going to attack on your lift.
03:16 So we're going to train a lot of things in the back squat.
03:19 You're not going to hit your abs, you're not going to hit your hamstrings but we're still
03:22 going to get a ton of quad, glute and lower back work and we get that total body stimulus
03:27 because we're lifting a heavy weight.
03:28 So we've got Brett here to help us demo the back squat and before we even get into the
03:32 mechanics of the squat, let's go over how we have to set up.
03:35 And ideally you're going to do this in a power rack as opposed to say doing a power clean
03:40 up off the ground and putting the weight on your back.
03:43 Because by doing it from the rack we're going to be in a much safer position and we're going
03:46 to expend a lot less energy with our setup.
03:50 The only thing we really have to do when we're trying to figure this out is make sure that
03:54 the rack height is optimized for us.
03:56 So what Brett's going to do and you can do this if you go up to a new rack that you're
03:59 not familiar with, we want to make sure that the bar is ever so slightly lower than the
04:05 top of our shoulders.
04:06 As we can see from this when Brett lines up, this is much lower than his shoulders.
04:10 So if he were to set up in here, sure he can get the weight out but he's got to expend
04:14 a lot more energy doing that and when he has to put it back there's a lot more margin for
04:19 error that he might drop it too low or he just might strain his back.
04:23 So he's going to move the rack up a little bit to a more optimal height.
04:29 And again at each step where you're going you can measure this again.
04:33 Just place your shoulder right next to the rack to see to make sure that the height is
04:37 efficient for you.
04:38 You want to basically bend your knees a little bit once you're in the rack and then straighten
04:42 your knees and you should be able to step back with the weight.
04:44 So now that Brett has his optimal height, then we can begin to get ourselves set up
04:49 for this squat.
04:51 And what you really want to do is think more, yes this is primarily a lower body move but
04:55 we still want to be very, very thoughtful with what we do with our upper body.
04:59 Now there are two reasons for this.
05:01 One is because we're going to get some body lean here and we want to make sure to really
05:05 be able to control the bar.
05:07 And two, we want to create a nice shelf and position with our mid-back for the bar to
05:12 sit because that's going to prevent it from moving and rocking all over the place.
05:15 The object of a back squat is not to put the bar on your neck and try to balance it.
05:21 We want it to be nice and stable.
05:23 You want to think about having it on your mid-back when you set it up.
05:26 So how is Brett going to do this?
05:27 He's going to think about pulling himself into the bar.
05:30 So what he's going to do, he's going to walk up to the bar and he's essentially going to
05:33 get low and what he's trying to do, what I want him to try to do as he pulls himself
05:37 into the bar is essentially think about creating the same tension he would during a pull-up
05:43 or a pull-down.
05:44 Pull nice and tight and then he wants to find a nice meaty part for the bar to be on.
05:50 The goal with the back squat, your neck should never be craned forward.
05:54 So if Brett has the bar here, suddenly when he pulls out, his neck is going to be craned
05:59 forward.
06:00 That is not what you want to do.
06:01 Set up again, Brett.
06:04 So he wants to be lower on the meaty part of his traps and that's where we want to keep
06:08 the bar.
06:09 Once we're set up like that, he's got all this good tension in his mid-back, he's going
06:14 to maintain that tension.
06:15 He's going to squeeze tight on the bar with his hands, maintain a nice tight grip and
06:20 then he's going to take one more step.
06:22 He's going to try to roll his elbows forward just a little bit so that they're in line
06:28 with his torso.
06:29 And what we've done now is we've helped place our shoulders in a nice safe position.
06:34 Sometimes if you back squat, if you're not picky with your upper body positioning, you're
06:38 going to get shoulder issues.
06:39 This is how you avoid that, by making sure you have good tension through your entire
06:43 back.
06:44 And by maintaining that, you're going to prevent shoulder trouble and you're also creating
06:47 a nice, strong, stable base from which you can squat.
06:51 So that's the set up for the back squat.
06:53 From here, all Brett has to do and all you really want to do, aim to just think about
06:58 shifting your hips forward and standing up.
07:02 And suddenly Brett is all set to back squat.
07:04 He'll take one small step back because we're in a half rack and now he's ready to perform
07:08 his back squat.
07:10 So now we've got our rack height down, we've got some weight on the bar and Brett is almost
07:14 ready to start squatting.
07:15 The only thing we want to make sure to be thoughtful about is our foot position.
07:19 You want to make sure that this is comfortable for you and the truth is, it's going to be
07:23 a little bit different for every person.
07:25 So what we want to do and the adjustment Brett's going to make, he's going to get his feet
07:29 a little bit wider than shoulder width.
07:31 And again, you'll want to play with this stance and there are some ways that you can find
07:35 your best squat stance, but in general you want to make sure that it's a little bit wider
07:39 than shoulder width.
07:40 And then from there, he's going to make another adjustment.
07:43 You are not going to be able to squat your best and squat your deepest if your toes are
07:47 pointing straight ahead.
07:48 If you look at the way most power lifters and the guys who are squatting heavy, heavy
07:51 weight are doing it, their toes are generally at a 15 to 30 degree angle open from their
07:56 hips.
07:57 Doing that and finding your comfortable position there is going to set you up to squat optimally
08:01 and it's going to let you open your knees as you squat and as you drive up, which is
08:06 going to be critical to the success of your squat.
08:08 And one final note when you set up on the rack is checking in with your guards.
08:12 We want to take advantage of those if we have them because if Brett winds up losing this
08:17 weight or if it winds up being too heavy and he can't handle it, the guard is what's going
08:22 to save you.
08:23 So we want to take advantage of that.
08:24 That does not mean that the guard needs to be exceptionally high.
08:29 In general, we don't want that because then you're not going to feel comfortable squatting
08:33 low.
08:34 You're not going to feel comfortable getting to a good depth and you're not going to wind
08:37 up getting the most out of the motion.
08:39 So in general, I like to think about setting these one or two notches higher than the very
08:44 bottom on the rack.
08:46 That will put you in a position where if you need to, you can drop the weight behind you
08:51 if you need to fail and it will land in the rack without creating any impact on your lower
08:54 body but it's still not too high where it's going to wind up impeding the way you're lifting.
09:00 So our foot position is down.
09:01 We've got the weight out of the rack.
09:03 Now we're going to begin the descent and now the real technical of the squat winds up becoming
09:08 very, very critical.
09:09 So a couple of things.
09:11 What Brett wants to do with his upper body here is he wants to brace very nicely against
09:15 this weight and he wants to create a lot of tension through his upper body so that the
09:18 bar does not shift.
09:20 Our goal when we're doing the back squat, we want the bar to go down in a straight line
09:24 and ascend up in a straight line.
09:26 That's going to be our best way to produce force.
09:28 We can produce force in one direction and it's going to help us control the bar as we
09:31 drive up.
09:32 How is Brett going to do this?
09:34 So a couple of things we want to do.
09:35 He wants to make sure to screw his elbows in and continue to screw those elbows in.
09:39 We're thinking about elbows almost parallel to torso the entire time and maintaining
09:44 that as he lowers into the squat so he always has control of the bar.
09:48 He's going to start off by taking a really deep breath into his belly and he's going
09:53 to hold his breath.
09:55 You want to hold your breath for the duration of your breath because that's going to give
09:59 you really good core stability and it's going to prevent any lower back issues.
10:03 It's going to prevent anything in that area if we maintain that breath.
10:06 Now how is Brett going to lower down?
10:08 One thing with the back squat, and this is the biggest difference between this and your
10:11 other squats, he cannot keep his torso straight up and down perpendicular to the ground.
10:16 If he tries that, try to go down that way Brett.
10:19 It's not going to work because then he can only move at his knees.
10:21 That is an injury waiting to happen or it's just an unproductive waste of time squat that's
10:26 not going to get you what you need.
10:27 So we're going to start, Brett is going to start by pushing his butt back ever so slightly.
10:32 He's thinking about leaning his torso forward just slightly and then he's going to start
10:37 to lower, bend at the knees.
10:38 He's opening his knees as he lowers into that squat.
10:42 Now he's at his max step.
10:44 Let's come up from that Brett, mostly because it's not really fair to make him hold the
10:47 rep at the bottom there.
10:49 And he comes up.
10:50 Let's go into another rep though Brett.
10:52 So it's a deep belly breath, butt goes back.
10:56 As he lowers he's thinking about opening his knees out ever so slightly.
10:59 Give us a couple reps there Brett.
11:01 He's thinking about opening his knees up as he's lowering.
11:05 We don't want our knees to cave in so you want to think about that as you're lowering
11:09 and then we also really want to think about our tempo as we're lowering too.
11:13 You're going to see a lot of people bounce or go really fast.
11:16 Let's give him a really bad fast squat Brett.
11:20 And you're going to think that's better.
11:22 It is less time under tension and also once we start to add weight, yes it seems like
11:27 you're bouncing and you're being explosive and you get to capitalize on all that.
11:31 But what we want is that nice slow controlled descent.
11:35 So deep belly breath, push the butt back, control your way down to the ground and that's
11:40 going to put you in a position where you're going to be able to power up.
11:43 Now how deep do we need to go on our back squat?
11:45 The deeper you are able to take your squat without rounding your lower back, the more
11:50 you're going to be able to get out of the squat in terms of muscle growth because we're
11:54 working over a larger range of motion and we're challenging our muscles with more time
11:58 under tension through that larger range of motion and we're hitting those lengthened
12:02 portions of the motion which you're not going to get if you're not going deep on a squat.
12:06 That said, let's position ourselves one more time Brett.
12:08 It is not bad and not everybody is going to have the depth that Brett does.
12:13 If you can go all the way down, then do it.
12:16 If you can go all the way down without feeling like you're starting to round your back, that's
12:20 great.
12:21 If you can't get that deep, then don't be afraid to think about just getting your thighs
12:25 parallel to the ground.
12:27 If you continue to work on your hip mobility, continue to work on your ankle mobility, over
12:31 time you'll be able to get that squat deeper and deeper as you build strength.
12:35 So start by just making sure to get your thighs parallel, making sure you're not rounding
12:39 your back.
12:40 If you feel like you're rounding your back, then you're going too deep for you and just
12:44 go as deep as you can without rounding your back.
12:47 Continue to push that depth and then we're going to start to really get the benefits
12:50 from the back squat.
12:52 So now we understand how to descend into the squat with control.
12:55 Now we're going to take all that control and power up in the squat and this is where things
13:00 get fun.
13:01 This is also where we're going to really capitalize on a lot of that lower body strength and power.
13:05 In order to do this, what we want to do is avoid the big mistake in the squat that a
13:08 lot of people make, which is basically called a squat morning.
13:11 Essentially what happens is our hips rise before anything else and this winds up putting
13:16 us in a really, really bad position.
13:18 It is not an efficient position for us to drive up from the squat and it is also the
13:22 position where the tension is maxed out on our lower back as opposed to our lower body
13:27 muscles.
13:28 So we're not getting the most out of the squat.
13:29 How do we avoid that?
13:31 The key to this and the reason this mistake happens is because we think only about moving
13:36 our lower body and we're not maintaining tension and we're not driving up through our upper
13:41 body.
13:42 So the way we want to think about this, Brett's going to lower down into this squat and as
13:47 he's driving up, he's going to think about raising his chest and raising his butt at
13:52 the exact same rate.
13:54 If you do one before the other, then you're going to wind up placing your body out of
13:58 position and that's the issue that most people have because the squat is a very complex motion
14:03 and because it gets very, very convenient to continue leaning your torso forward and
14:08 again, that's taking off all the tension when we're in the squat.
14:11 So Brett's going to lower down again and the goal as he drives up, move hips and chest
14:19 at the same rate.
14:20 As long as you think about that, you'll be okay.
14:23 Think about driving up into the bar and driving up in a straight line with the bar and that
14:28 will help you get past that fault.
14:30 The other things we need to think about as we're driving up from that squat, it's very,
14:35 very common for us to let our knees turn in but as soon as we do that, we're losing a
14:40 lot of power from our adductors and we're losing a lot of power from our glutes.
14:45 So Brett's going to think about turning his knees out as he stands up from every single
14:49 rep and then as he gets to the top of the rep, now he's finished with the rep, then
14:54 he can let out a big exhale.
14:55 If we're going to do another rep, we're going to take another rep, he's going to take another
14:59 deep inhale, lower back down again, hit his max depth and then he's going to drive up
15:05 from that squat.
15:06 That winds up being your basic execution for a back squat.
15:10 It's going to set you up to be very, very successful with the squat as long as you follow
15:13 and think about all of those cues, you will avoid injury and we're going to get plenty
15:17 of muscle building benefit out of this too.
15:19 So now we understand how to execute the back squat, let's wrap things up by understanding
15:23 how to program the back squat.
15:25 And remember this is not a squat that everybody needs to do.
15:29 If you're chasing glute size, if you're chasing quad size, there are other options in your
15:33 gym that are going to be a lot less challenging for you to learn and let you get a lot more
15:38 hypertrophy benefit with the lighter learning curve.
15:41 But if we really want to start to lift heavy, that's when we're going to start to integrate
15:44 the back squat.
15:45 And because of that, we want to think of it as one of those heavy lifts that we're going
15:48 to place early in our workout.
15:50 You want to think about doing this once or twice a week tops and we want to keep the
15:54 reps nice and low.
15:56 Think about doing three or four sets of anywhere from three to ten reps.
16:00 I wouldn't go above ten because then we start getting into lighter weights.
16:03 If you're doing 12s and 15s and 20s, you're going to be working with lighter weights and
16:07 you're not really going to fatigue your legs.
16:10 Your cardio is going to fatigue before your legs so you're not going to get the most out
16:13 of this from a strength building standpoint.
16:16 When we are building that back squat in, we're going to make it one of our early lifts.
16:19 We're going to think about moving with power, make it your first lift in your workout and
16:23 attack it then.
16:24 You don't need to back squat but if you do choose to back squat, you're going to get
16:27 to move a lot of weight, you're going to get to build a ton of strength and if you follow
16:31 all the tips that we gave you today, you're going to feel nice and safe doing it which
16:35 is going to help you go even heavier in the long term.