GBP, it looks as though you are trying to high bar back squat, and in general it seems ok. you want to straighten your wrists out to prevent them from bearing too much weight. you need to work on getting better depth. From the front view, you need to shove your knees out hard to prevent the small amount of knee cave out of the hole. Your shoes are not helping, bare feet or something with a solid sole (eg chuck taylor) would be better.

also, is that a pussy pad?

thanks for the advice. I actually think I have some all stars lying around somewhere so I'll use those next time.

re: the pad. never thought twice about it. didn't even know there was a stigma on it lol

GBP: If you want to quit using the pussy pad, you'll have to put your elbows back further to flex your lats so the bar won't bump into your spine.

No additional form comments, though looks pretty good.

Yeah I used to be strict about that but I think after taking a short break and trying to hit more depth I've been leaning forward a bit too much at the bottom.

I'll work on that, thanks for the feedback!

@kozor
The neck craning and the lumbar rounding in the hole are related. Try to lock the whole spine in a neutral position. The neck craning indicates you are simply trying to extend as much as possible, not lock in a stable neutral position. Overextension at the top can lead to the buttwink fault according to Starrett. Keep the weight under control on the way down while you concentrate on locking your back in neutral position. Make sure you're able to exert some downward torque during the lift (i.e. screw your feet into the ground) to be stable. If you cannot, point your toes more forward.

^ will sacrifice some depth and maximum capacity for the health of your lumbar.

Squat 3x5x275:



Knee/chest cave gets pretty bad toward the end of the sets, and some reps are shallow. I've been doing some heavy isometric holds in the front rack to try to strengthen my upper back and fix the chest cave. Any other comments/advice?

That's very helpful- thanks!

I don't see any reason not to go deeper. What do your warmup sets look like? (Sets, reps)

xukxuk: Looks like you're descending under control and cutting your depth off when the buttwink is about to happen. Nice. Film yourself if you try to go lower, because the buttwink is likely to come back then.

Your arms are all over the place. Does the bar bang into your neck/spine sometimes when your elbows go forward? Get the elbows back and locked into place to stabilize the bar and keep it off your bones.

trying to learn pistols, cross posting this from my log, any help appreciated....

have you read this? http://www.beastskills.com/one-legged-squat-the-pistol/

I haven't learnt these but this site is pretty great

I do not like your hands/bar holding position. I would really try to tighten your hold on the bar and squeeze your shoulder blades together as much as possible. There isn't enough tension in your starting position to keep stability throughout the movement.

Looking for some feedback, didn't try out my max on those to focus on form. Unfortunately not great videos, as I had some problems with my phone.

Deadlift (100 kg) - not enough glutes involvement first thing I can spot

http://youtu.be/mkd8zq_E024

Front Squat (30 kg) - Here I am especially looking at posture advice as I keep having the feeling the weight is pressing too much on my wrists, even at such low weight and that makes me already struggle at 40-50 kg...

http://youtu.be/uLQzzzYD5ls

Incline bench press (40 kg) - Trying still to figure out best hand position. Is this correct or too narrow?

http://youtu.be/k47nKN5La8I

Chin-ups - Not sure why I didn't cross my legs from the beginning. Should I have a larger width between my two hands?

http://youtu.be/qBVxsIh8E9s

Thanks

[QUOTE=dj_mercury;41160353]Looking for some feedback, didn't try out my max on those to focus on form. Unfortunately not great videos, as I had some problems with my phone.

Deadlift (100 kg) - not enough glutes involvement first thing I can spot[quote]You pulled that pretty quick. But I can also spot you raise your hips mighty fast which is why you have little glute/ham involvement - your strong enough to pull the weight with mostly your back.

BTW I noted you used a mixed grip - make sure you flip that around occasionally to avoid developing a grip imbalance as well as avoiding a bicep tear. Personally I never go mixed until I start hitting the heavier side and then I flip between sets.

I'd say too narrow. You've got a close grip bench grip going on. Close grip shifts more of the focus to the triceps, while an incline bench is supposed to be more about your chest first.

Don't cross your legs. While you do that to maintain stability, you actually challenge your core far more keeping them apart. I think your grip width was fine until you "get stronger" and can do more, then you can widen and really target your back.

Also, you should allow yourself to drop further, you're keeping a lot of contraction in your arms. You shouldn't go slack at the bottom, but drop further.

Thanks nuclear500, very appreciated.

DEADLIFT

Ok, will have to flip around as I always do it this way with my right hand underneath. My grip sucks with heavier weight, that is why I do it this way, I just do not want to have to stop doing a series just because I am having my grip letting me down while the rest of my body can keep going, however I will try to go heavier with normal grip and switch to mixed when I can't do more than 5.
Will try to do the movement more slowly next time and get my legs involved, I guess if I am able to do 100 kg this way, there is no reason why my max is currently only 3x120 kg, just fixing the form should allow me to go beyond this.

BENCH PRESS

Yeah, that is what I thought, the problem is that when I go for a wider grip I struggle to mantain balance of the bar, here instead I really managed to go up and down equally on each side. I have a video shot I did before with a wider grip pressing just the bar, I will post that tomorrow so I can get feedback on that.

CHIN-UPS

Clear, no leg crossed, more ROM.

Agree with KC. Couple other things I noticed. Pull the slack out of the bar before you start your pull. If you listen to that first rep, you can hear that you don't do this. You can also see your head/shoulders jerk when the slack is finally out which causes the movement to be a bit jerky at the beginning. Pulling the slack out of the bar will help (won't jerk on your grip and shoulders, will allow you to maintain a tighter upper back). Either get your hips higher in your setup or maintain your initial back angle. Your hips move up without the bar moving, which is inefficient. It also looks like you pull with your lower back and not your a$$ and hammies.

Here is on of my DL sets from last week. Look at the difference between your set and this WRT the start of hip movement to the start of bar movement. My DL form isn't perfect, but it will at least give you an idea of what I am talking about.

DL - Put your weight back on your heels more and pull the bar in to you with your lats - you are too far forward. The bar should be scraping your shins the whole way up. Should be easier to utlilize glutes/hammies when your weight isn't so far forward. Agree that it's easy enough weight for you that you pull mostly with your back while still able to keep it from rounding - fix technique before you pull heavier.

FS - Push those elbows up through the entire ROM, it's easy to forget about them and then you are trying to "hold" the bar rather than have it supported in the shelf of your front delts. You can fiddle with hand placement/amounts of fingers under bar as well. I personally prefer to put my hands pretty wide outside my actual shoulder width (almost to the rings), and 3 fingers under bar. Helps make my funky shoulders and wrists happy, but YMMV. It usually takes a few sessions before you get comfortable with the rack position and don't feel like you will black out (or break a clavicle) when you have heavy weight on there.

Incline - Would make your grip a bit wider, but in general you want to have incline grip be a hair narrower than flat bench to reduce stress on shoulders. I also notice you are really letting your wrists bend back - keep them straight! Bar should be nestled deep in your palm, not near the knuckles.

Pullups (chins are palms facing you, and yes would generally be narrower) - A little on the narrow side, a wider grip would target lats better. I wouldn't worry about crossing legs, just don't kip . Varying hand placement for pullups/chins can be a good thing over the long run (wide/hammer/chins/etc). Agree start from full dead-hang.

I'd like to get a critique on my DL. How's the camera angle?




I think my 2nd rep is worse (not surprising). On that rep it looks like I may have a slightly rounded back and my hips rise a tad before the pull. Thoughts?

I took vid of my deadlifts today. They look worse than I expected. Or at least I think they do look pretty bad. Any opinions?



Some things I expect to be wrong/bad:
- Lower back slightly rounded?
- I don't keep my neck straight (this one I already knew, it's ****ing impossible to not look at a mirror in front of you)
- Bar is too far off my legs at at least in some reps
- It seems like I get my legs straight first and only then start extending my hips. That's also wrong, right?


Should I just keep on with the progression and go heavier, or is there something so fundamentally wrong that I should just try to fix form before going heavier?

Set up tighter - you're set up rounded at the start.

Check out Skeletor's posted up above, or Cha's log for some examples.

2nd looked a little rounded, but not terrible. Angle's tough. I like straight from the side.

The girl taking the video kept moving around and didn't really get a good angle but here's a squat video if anyone could help out. tryin to do SS again.

BGP,
pretty good.

I'd sit back a bit more
head down
fix your wrists- so that they aren't extended
knees out a bit more.

lol chinese gym lighting

Yeah straighten wrists and try pretending you're going to press the bar so that your elbows come underneath it

also squeeze your glutes & core more at the lockout, your squat could use some intensity

Consider buying lifting shoes with a hard sole or squat barefoot

Thanks a lot guys

I'll try to get some Chinese pop music in the background for you next time Syndr0m :P