going to work on some Mobility to try and fix the butt wink in my squat.

Here's my DL. the view is a bit far used different phone to make vid. Now realize i need to use zoom on it. will re vid on Monday.

Evil Empire: DL Looks OK overall. Neck looks cranked though. Cha will freak at that for legit reasons. I would strive for a more neutral position....ie look down a bit. Weird thing, you rock back just before you pull. Don;t do that. Also, pull slack out of bar prior to pulling off floor. DL is turning a dial up not flipping a switch.

Newfie: Squat Like HL said, little bit of butt wink, but I thought mostly when you were deep. Just hit slightly below parallel and probably fine imo.

DL: looked pretty good imo. Hips through at end. shoulders a little more over the bar

HL: Love the boots. You have to drive your heels into the floor though. Speed on 5 set was fine. on double, too slow imo. unless you were doing that on purpose. Great push off chest. Nice work imo.

Elbows flared out more than I think healthy. Also, you should breathe during the set.....Big breath in at top, down, off chest, exhale at top. THis is my opinion abou the way to breathe. You can do what you want, hold all the way thru repetc. But, definitely breathe during set. You will be stronger for doing so and when heavier, you will not black out and drop it on your face. imo.

I like the speed of my 5x, just thought slower was better for some reason. Guess I'll stick with what I like.

In #7 of the Tate series on benching he mentions the feet out in front with heels on the floor:
http://articles.elitefts.com/feature...e-series-here/

Seems like he's saying that that is a stronger method, but bad for the shoulders over time. I just tried setting up like that, and it didn't feel solid at all. I have horrible ankle ROM, as I'm currently recovering from about my 10th grade II sprain.

There's no way anyone can get their heels on the floor with the legs tucked under the bench, right?

Also tried switching to basketball shoes and getting a good grip with the surface of pad + toes of the sneaker on the ground. Unfortunately the foot of my flat bench is where my feet need to be for this.

I'll try to get those elbows back in. Had worked on that before with my narrower grip, but must have let it back in when I went wide.

I was just reading in a McGill book that he thinks it's better to breathe more during lifting, cuz you can't hold your breath when you brace for athletic maneuvers. I'll try your breathing scheme tomorrow.

Thanks.

My squat basically hasn't improved in quite a while (maybe a month) including lowering the weight back down and working up again. I'm having trouble preventing myself from shifting my weight forward when it gets tough.

As contrary as it may seem, "falling forward" can actually be a sign of weak abs - or at least the weaker of the muscles involved in keeping your torso upright.

Also try to keep your elbows more under the bar.

Thank you very much BPA234. I'm not sure when I started moving around before lift off but I'm working on it and will add head/neck position into my checks.

I don't feel like I'm falling forward so much as it's easier to push the weight up when it's over my toes. It feels like I get more use of my quads that way or something like that.

I thought the SS technique for low bar squats was elbows up and back:

"The elbows should be cranked up to trap the bar between the hands and the back." (p.24 of SS 3rd ed).

I also have some shoulder flexibility issues so my grip is wider than it ideally should be.

Fix your shoulder flexibility issues.

Check out Cressey and mobilitywod.com

You're not coming up and down in a straight path. Your squats look a lot like mine used to, then I started falling forward coming out of the hole and failing.

I would:

1) Look up, not down.
2) Stay back on your heels, you want the weight to be over your heels.
3) Cut off a little, you're below parallel it looks like, and at the end, you seem to be coming down/forward on your chest for depth, and you just won't be able to support the weight like that long.

It's ok to abandon Rip's method. If you balance better and get better quality squats, go with more of a HBBS. Check out some logs - Cha, Fredd-bird, KhalynYork have really good squats, off the top of my head.

Echoing this.

But not this. It's ok to abandon Rip's method, but for a beginning lifter I don't think it's a good idea. Drop down until you can do it correctly, and increase weight while doing it right.

I've been working on it and it's been improving. When I started I actually had to quit for a while because of shoulder pain from trying to hold the bar.

Thanks both responders for the tips. I'll keep working on my form.

Still a work in progress I think. Maybe a little better? Chest up better now?

I can't figure out how to keep my butt from being the first thing to move up. I'm really trying to stomp feet/push butt in but when I watch it just doesn't seem to happen.

biggerboat,



Look at your mechanics when the bar is at knee height. You're basically doing RDL's. There is no hip drive whatsoever in that lift. Probably weak hamgstrings, glutes and core. I don't think there's a real "quick fix" in terms of adjusting technique. You want to be thrusting your hips forward when the bar reaches knee height, so that you finish the lift with your legs as well, by squeezing your glutes forward really hard, so that it becomes a full body lift. Right now it's all lower back. Also your shoulders seem to be coming way in front of the bar.

Im having major troubles with my squat. Ive seen and read countless articles and movies from rippetoe and posters on 2p2. I try to focus on gazing downwards, squeezing what should be squeezed and shoving my butt up before my chest. Ive been focusing on form for the last month, but without anybody to guide me im not really making any progress and feel pretty tempted to just ditch the squat all together out of frustration. Im pretty embarrased about the clip so bear with a noob please.
Worth mentioning is that i had been squatting different weights for half an hour so i was dead tired and my form suffered even worse as this was mY last set done purely to film.

Hope for some help, thank you very much.

Cant embed it for some reason
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Kxvj3E98oWw

Yeah, my hamstrings have always been a problem. They are disproportionately weak and always have been.

I really wish I had a form coach with me for a couple of sessions. I'm just not getting it. My brain is telling me I'm doing this right but obviously it isn't. My thought process is "chest up, tighten core, stomp" but somehow this isn't happening.

Is there something I can work on sort of incrementally? Do I need to just lower the weight?

Looks like a low bar squat but with high bar placement? Place the bar correctly and stop balancing on your heels, and move your knees forward earlier in the descent.

gis,

re-read SS. You're not doing it right. Sit back, not down. At least a little. Your hips are hardly involved. It's all quads. Standing leg press.

Its supposed to be a high bar squat, im having troubles keeping my chest up. Do you have any tips as to wwht i can do to fix it, i spend 15 mins doing goblet squats and stretching before starting, but as soon as im in going down my chest is falling forward - and its not a weight issue as im the same thing happens if im holding a broom or weights. And could anybody comment on what i need to improve going up out of the hole or if the movement is alright ?

Nicoolo13:
I'm a beginner myself so take what I say with a grain of salt but it seems to me that you're leaning way way too back at the start of the squat. If you're high bar squatting just drop more directly down, you don't need to get your ass as far back and back as horizontal as in LBBS. It seems like you're almost falling backwards at the start of each rep.

Thanks for the tip! Ill keep that in mind tomorrow and see if i can make it work

Tried power cleans for first time today, would appreciate some feedback on them. They are obviously quite light so it's likely I'm going to look a lot worse when I start upping the weight but any pointers on what I need to look for are going to help. It felt like the natural place to catch was just above parallel but I experimented with other heights as you can see (it's deliberate not just me being ******ed).

First video is the second set I did but it cuts off my shoulders:


This is third set but you can see a little better:

for the first time, these are quite good imo. your setup looks OK overall, one small thing to do is look up before you go; pick something high up on the wall in front of you; maybe where the wall meets the ceiling and stare at it for the whole rep.

Another thing, on some of the reps you start with your shoulders behind the bar, when you really should be out over the bar. if your shoulders are behind the bar, its going to be impossible to keep the bar close to you because theres nowhere for it to go but out once you reach the hip if your shoulders are behind it from the getgo.

Also on alot of the reps, especially 2nd rep on the 3rd set vid, you pull with your arms before standing all the way up basically pulling with your arms from right above the knee,

as you stand all the way up, pull the bar into you once you get above the knee while keeping your heels down. related to this, on some of the reps your feet leave the ground before you finish the pull. concentrate on standing all the way up and really finishing the pull before your feet leave the ground. IMO, Its not bad to overemphasize the jump when learning, but with this weight, there is no reason for your toes to leave the ground at all really and number one focus should be finishing the pull before jumping, but at the same time don't pull with arms until you've stood all the way up.

One other thing you can try is going a tad slower from the ground to the knee, and then really emphasize speed from the knee to standing up while pulling the bar into you. It really makes no difference how fast you get from the ground to the knee, you really just want to maintain the back angle/good position you start with.

sorry for wall for text and like I said these are pretty good for first time. keep it up

cool, thanks for the pointers will have a go at them next time and will try a little heavier too.