Nick's Ugly Lifts

[reygunz]

Squat 160x5 - YouTube First time wearing a belt. Tried to keep my back in extension. I was told to "arch my back like a stripper". Seems no matter how hard I braced my core, I couldn't keep from going into lumbar flexion. Maybe I don't understand the cue.

Press 90x6 - YouTube Miscounted the reps. Starting to feel a little heavy. Its a struggle to keep my wrists straight. I'm not sure if I got enough hips into these.

Deadlift 240x5 - YouTube My lower back was pretty taxed by the last 3 reps, but even so, I'm pretty happy with how I did. Still room for improvement, however.

Help me with my squat, please!

[David Geiger]

SQ: Why did you make a 10 lbs jump on squats? You are still holding your knees back, and now you are starting with a leaned over torso, with an arch in your back. Don't do that. Instead, stand up as straight as possible (while having the bar over mid-foot) to start, with your spine in neutral extension. Break your knees and hips at the same time and push your knees out over your toes (both forward and laterally). You are still jerking into the start; take your breath, set your tightness, and then smoothly break your knees and hips. Fixing your knees might fix your back issues, as holding your knees back puts you out of balance.

DL: Do not drop your hips to set your back. Instead, leave your hips where they are after step 3, and rotate your chest up between your shoulders to set your back.

[reygunz]

So this is what Scott Hambrick, SSC, said on reddit about my squats at 150.
"Knees out earlier. You have short shanks and a long torso. Throw the knees out. hard and quick. You are going to be a little more vertical than most people, which is fine. Wear your belt and try to point your butthole at the wall behind you the entire time. you have a bit of lumbar flexion. We want that to go away. Arch your lower back, think like a stripper. (He is very unlikely to hyperextend.)"

I'll stick with 160 lbs tomorrow. Am I misunderstanding what he is saying about lumbar extension? The answer is yes, but if you look at my squats at 150 lbs, you'll note that I do as you instruct and I still come under flexion.
Do you think you could help me make sense of this? I think my squats at 150 look much better, but maybe I'm going into flexion because my knees are not set as you are saying. I've been working on leaning back. Maybe this time I'll keep my mind focused on knees. What do you think?

DL: I watched the video again and it looks like I am just rocking the weight back off my toes. My back was already set. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Thanks for your help Dave!

[David Geiger]

Squat: I do not disagree with anything Scott says, per your quote above, and I don't think what he said about your 150 lbs set and what I said about the 160 lbs set contradict each other (except I think you have too much low back arch in the 160 set, which is not visible in 150 set). I think (based on your videos), you are confusing (or perhaps combining) arching your low back with leaning over. It is physically possible to be standing straight up vertically, while also arching your low back; and you can lean your torso over with or without arching your low back. There is still lumbar flexion in your 160lbs video. There are articles and videos and threads on this site about the superman exercise (and others) to make sure you can voluntarily contract your lumbar erectors, and if you cant, to teach you how to do so. It would be appropriate for you to go through the exercise to make sure you can do so. In the 150 set, your depth is deeper than the 160 set, and that extra depth might be contributing to your lumbar flexion in that set. In the 160 set, I think you start overextended, and due to a combination of holding your knees back and dropping in to the descent too fast and already overextended, you lose tightness at the bottom and go into flexion. So my advice is to stand up taller at the start, get very tight (squeeze shoulders together, brace abs and lumbar erectors), smoothly break your knees and hips, push your knees out faster and further forward than you have been, descend more slowly than you have been, and concentrate on staying tight. This is a lot to think about so you have to think about it serially. everything you can think about before starting the descent, think about to get set, then stop thinking about those items. Then, think knees forward smoothly, then immediately shift your though to stay tight. As soon as you get each part right, you can stop thinking about that piece and focus on what's left to fix. But your low back staying in neutral extension is priority number 1, then your knee position. This is a little jumbled so ask me questions if I am unclear (or ask Scott to look at the 160 set and see if he has the same thoughts I do about the differences between 150 and 160).

DL: You are dropping your hips without needing to. Some reps you have set your back before dropping your hips, on rep 3 you drop your hips before finishing setting your back. In any event, leave your hips up and set your back by rotating your chest up through your shoulders. It looks like you are trying to initiate the pull with your back, and by sitting back and using your body weight as leverage to get the bar moving; this is wrong (for SS technique). Leave your hips up, set your back, then push the floor away from you with the middle of your foot.

[reygunz]

Thanks Dave. Life got in the way yesterday, but I'll be at the gym today to give your explanation a shot. Definitely helps me understand all the cues everyone has been giving.

[reygunz]

Squat 45x5 Squat 45x3 - YouTube
Accidentally cut the video too short. Missed the first two reps.
Did some back extensions and did too many to count sets of these trying to get it right. Would have added weight after this last set, but I was already into an hour of training. These ended up evolving into tempo squats. I went too low on the fourth rep (second rep in video) and went into spinal flexion. My other concern is I'm not sure if I'm too vertical or not. Scott Hambrick has told me that I have a long torso and short legs so I'm going to be more upright, but after the last two weeks, I just felt like I was using my knees too much.

Bench 140x5 Bench 140x5 - YouTube

[reygunz]

Ignore my last post. I tried to edit it, but somethings up with the site.

Squat 45x5 - YouTube Did some back extensions and did too many to count sets of these trying to get it right. Would have added weight after this last set, but I was already into an hour of training. These ended up evolving into tempo squats. Watching this set on my computer, I still see a lot of mistakes. I think I'll try TUBOW on Monday. If I can't get this down by the end of this coming week, I might have to look for a more expensive fix.

Bench 140x5 - YouTube

[David Geiger]

These look better, but still work to do; you set your knees, but then punch them forward just as you get to the bottom, try to keep them set and have that last movement down come from your hips going down and back. I am generally against lots of reps with an empty bar because there's not enough weight to get good form, so you run a high risk of grooving the wrong movement pattern.

Bench looks fine. You might consider moving your feet towards your shoulders a bit more, if it's not painful, to establish a more solid base/better angles for leg drive.

[reygunz]

Thanks Dave!

I started a new thread for my squats because this thread was getting skipped over. I've done two training sessions since my last post using TUBOW. Here is todays final set: Squat 125x5 TUBOW - YouTube What do you think?