Every time somebody invents a new toy to play with while they Exercise with, we have to see it here, for some reason.
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Posted this down in E&P but i guess it belongs here as well. Secretly hoping for a rant from rip.
TMPHBITEU
Every time somebody invents a new toy to play with while they Exercise with, we have to see it here, for some reason.
Member
Originally Posted by veryhrm
That's a very good point and I have another question/aspect to this because recently I'm really struggling with my squat form even on weights that earlier in my progress weren't a problem (even on the last few warmup sets). To explain my issues first (and getting to the possible bent bar connection later) I feel that I have a hard time controlling my knees not shifting forward at the bottom, which makes me really slow on the descend. Also as I approach parallel I suddenly feel like I'm losing control/tightness and then having to REALLY struggle out of the hole just to find that once I get out of there the bar suddenly moves explosively (as it should on the weight that I once had no trouble with).
Getting to the bent bar part now out of lack of options currently I have to train in a crappy commercial gym with crappy bars that I don't even know if are made of steel (where the chrome chips off a brass/bronze like metal shines through). There are 5 or 6 bars in that place and each one of them is badly bent, which is why I really have to check that the bow faces upward before each set I do to avoid rolling of the bar.
Recently though in a little town not far from the city I live in said gym chain opened another gym. In pictures I saw they had at least a different kind of barbell (noticed the center knurling) so just this Monday I drove to this place to do my TM volume day there just for the simple reason that I wanted to see if they had "real" barbells.
Turns out their bars are decent and even from a short first glance I could notice the difference of how it not only looked like real steel but also felt completely different to the touch compared to the ones I was used to. To cut things a little shorter I did my squat sets with a decent amount of weight and it felt so easy. I didn't struggle with my form on the descend at all. The speed wasn't as extremely slow but "controlled" without feeling that I'm losing tightness, my knees stayed where they were supposed to and oddly enough it felt like the bar was riding in a straight line on the top of the mid-foot without feeling forced. I was really surprised by that workout as every single rep felt just right and it made me thinking a little: could that really be because of these new bars not being bent as sh*t?
Well I didn't think all too much of it then but right now I'm back from my intensity day from my old gym with the crappy bent bars. To put it bluntly my sets today sucked. Even the warmup sets with less weight than on volume day felt way off. I got kinda mad but it also made me think back to the new barbells I had used on volume day and tried to analyze what a bent barbell could do to my form on the squat and if that can really be the reason.
OK so lots of story telling until now but here's what came to mind when analyzing this:
First off I'm a little OCD when it comes to these kind of things and as I already said I check for the bent bar to have its bow towards the ceiling each and every set. I also play around for quite a while until I find the perfect placement on my back and for my hands which means that I don't unrack the bar until I feel that it sits as tight and secure as I can get it. Now as veryhrm said due to the changing back angles the bar SHOULD rotate down a little on the back so that it stays in balance. Well I'm not sure if I just can't feel it or if it's even impossible to be that way but the bar feels so secure on my back I don't feel the bar moving at all. That means that neither can I feel a change on my back nor in my hands. And just to mention it as well: I always grip the bar as hard as I can and my wrists don't bend back. Ever. Yes, I already told you I'm OCD about this stuff.
So if the bent bar is not rotating on the descend when the back angle changes, this means that the bow has to change its angle from facing directly the ceiling to whatever angle the back gets into. This I guess would shift the lower ends of the bow (so where the weight plates reside) towards your butt thus shifting the whole center of mass of the lifter/barbell system back the more the back leans forward. In order to keep the center of mass above the mid-foot it only makes sense that the knees try to shift forward, therefore slacking the hamstrings and me losing a sense of control and strength on the descend or am I coming to a false conclusion here? At least it's obvious that it has to fuck with the balance if you keep the bar from rotating on your back.
Please note again that the barbell I'm talking about is quite bent and therefore probably magnifying things that maybe wouldn't be that noticeable with just a slightly bent bar. Also this is just a theory I thought about while roaming around the gym in frustration but it might be worth thinking about it some more and how much this might affect the balance and therefore the form of the squat. I'll definitely go to the new gym (despite it being a longer drive) the next days and check whether this was just a coincidence that suddenly my form felt right on Monday for every single rep while it got back to shit today even on the warmup sets.
TMPHBITEU
A bent bar can only rotate about 1/4 of its circumference.
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