konrad,

Your knees are going forward the whole time, you lack hip drive, and you're not jamming your knees out. Take like 50 lbs. off the bar and get your form down. Have you read SS?

edit: It also appears you don't keep your back in extension near the hole.

Thanks for your reply. I have read SS, but I will reread the squat section. I just kept adding weight every workout, but I should have gotten the form down better first. This weight feels too heavy and I will drop it next time.

Read the part on knees and the terribly useful block of wood. Everything you're doing is a common newbie mistake and is easily fixed with a little bit of concentration. Focus on knees out, chest up, and sitting back into the hole.

I look forward to using the block of wood, focusing on those cues, and recording the squat again tomorrow.

I'm a bit ill, so lowered weight a lot to 56kg and focused on knees not going forward at the bottom. Not sure how successfully. 3rd set.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0JqGs09ok4

Also, shoulder presses, 3rd set, 33.5kg:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKiiVu3KN6I

I will appreciate a Squat form check.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dz9HMG0V18U

My other lifts are right where the standards spec a 148lb novice.

Press 95
Bench 135
Dead 235

But Squat is 155 vs 185 standard, don't know what I am doing wrong.

case3, I think the standards are for 1RM. If you do 3x5 with 155 it means you have 174 1RM (closer to 188 novice standard). Maybe you already account for that though.

Also, I think you lack hip drive, but I'm not expert on this.

4th rep looks best imo.

Watch all your reps frame by frame. In the 2nd, 3rd and 5th, you can see that right at the bottom you are losing tension in your hamstrings and letting your hips and knees travel forward a little and your lower back curve a little.

On the 4th rep you cut your depth of a little higher (probably tired), but you keep better tension in your hamstrings I think and your knees don't slide forward.

Over all they are decent, but these are things worth thinking about as the weight gets heavier.

Also, can't really see much of your upper back in that camera angle.

can any PC experts give a bit of feedback? thanks...

cant imagine that setup (or lack thereof) is remotely proper.

I'll take a stab Dan.

If you pause your clean vid right as you start the "jump" you can see that your elbows are already bent. So basically you're using the momentum of the pull from the floor along with muscling it up with your arms to rack it, when it should come from you standing up and jumping explosively.

Go to :13 in this vid : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TlbDQUWs0s

See how her arms stay straight until after she explodes up. You can pause yours at the top and see the arms bent far too early.

I would guess you should maybe slow down the first pull just a tad and focus on that explosive jump more, or do hang cleans to learn that 2nd move.

I'm still a noob at these, but have done a lot of reading trying to learn about it. Hope that helps.

I think your problem on the squat may be that you are not jamming your knees out more. Nice music though.

On the OHP, get under the bar earlier, like right after the bar passes your head. You also have a lot of movement in your torso. Squeeze your glutes, get your chest up and try not to move around so much. I also use a slightly wider grip.

thirddan's PC looks like he gets plenty of power but also a lot of early arm bend. I tend not to offer advice on the cleans because everyone has a stronger clean than me. When I achieve a 100kg clean or something I'll start offering advise cuz I'll have to fix 1000 issues to get there.

these look pretty good. Some reps better than others. Depth iffy on a couple towards the end. The 1st rep you really get your knees set early and they don't drift too much. Def speed it up as you get more comfortable. You'll get a better stretch reflex that way.

get under the bar faster. tighten everything. blow out your abs.

The scores to hamster's vids are pretty awesome.

not an expert but it looks like u have a couple of diff things going on here.

i would try and control the bouncing before your clean (for one, it's hard to watch haha) but i think you are going to be better off getting a clean, smooth pull and be able to do it a lot more consistently if u have a good setup rather than 3 big bounces. i know i move a bit and have a little bounce pre clean as well but that seems excessive so i would try and work on that.

when i did slow it down it looks like u are starting your first pull a little too bent over. i think u need to sit back more, pelvis lower and try and be more straight up and down. the straighter you are the less variation there should be in the bar path (i think) and you should get more of your force working vertically on the bar.

you're not getting full extension on your 2nd pull either. it looks like u break ur elbows almost as soon as the bar passes ur knee. u should basically have full extension in ur legs/hips/ankles before the 3rd pull when you break your elbows and drop to receive the bar. your reception of the bar also isn't as clean as it could be because u are relying on ur arms/3rd pull to get the weight up rather than the explosion from the 2nd that would allow u to get a quick turnover of ur elbows and drop under the weight.

those are my thoughts anyway. maybe try doing some hang clean pulls or clean pulls to try and get a sense of what the weight feels like when u get good extension and also to mentally know how far u can move the bar without having to rely on ur arms.

Bench Form Check: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xggFnRcGGbs

OK, I should widen my knees while keeping feet the same.

Yes, I guess first rep I remembered to bend them (what feels like artificially) early, and I guess that helped.

I feel like I lack coordination to do that and would just punch myself in the face with the bar while trying. Should I slow down or just keep trying?

Sorry, I don't understand what that means. Tighten my abs? Or blow out air from the lower part of my lungs?

Thanks for the reply, I was going loose at the bottom to:

-Let the bar push me below parallel
-Trying to find the 'bounce' spot

I can see now these reasons are wrong, will work on staying tight.

When you breath in, suck the air into your gut, rather than your chest. Make your stomach stick out. That widens your base and makes you more stable when you do stuff like squats or DLs.

I found it sort of hard to really tighten my abs and back blowing air into my gut. Possibly force of habit. Also note that Rip and others don't advocate this approach.

pretty sure he does, given his thoughts on belts.

There's a difference between focusing on sticking your stomach out as far as possible and taking a big breath of air into your belly (which forces the abs out) then contracting everything.

yeah. obv i mean the latter. though i suspect i have a tendency to "blow out" too much. prob how i got the hernia.

Tate and Rip on breathing: http://startingstrength.com/resource...ht=breath+tate

Can't remember Rip saying anything other than "great big breath" in his vids either.

good stuff, thanks...

thanks to the rest that commented as well...

thirddan, do you "take the slack out of the bar" before you execute?

i shoulda mentioned before it looks like you get a plenty of power.