"Forget about squat depth"

[exter]

Hey Rip,
I'm a T-nation reader and I know you've written quite a few articles for them.
I came across this article today : Forget About Squat Depth | T Nation
Which was quite shocking, especially coming from a world-class powerlifter.
Care to comment about it ?

[Mark Rippetoe]

T-Nation will print anything. That's probably why they ran my stuff, but that's also one of the reasons I stopped writing for them several years ago. You don't need me to poke holes in this article for you, because the errors are quite obvious to anyone who has thought about this. My thoughts on squat depth have been detailed elsewhere. So go ahead and click, and enjoy your weekend.

[AndrewLewis]

Which was quite shocking, especially coming from a world-class powerlifter.

Why is that shocking? If anything, it makes more sense.

"Both have the knee joints moving through the same ROM (as demonstrated by the lines – which weren't changed, only rotated), but one has a different ankle ROM than the other. By depth standards, this means one squat is "high" and the other is "good," but yet the ROM is the same."

Oh man. If only another joint were a part of that equation. Like a joint with a lot of really big muscles like 4 inches below your belly button. But sadly, such a joint doesn't exist, and therefore, knee angle is the only consideration when addressing squat gains.

[Harcourt]

Oh man. If only another joint were a part of that equation. Like a joint with a lot of really big muscles like 4 inches below your belly button. But sadly, such a joint doesn't exist, and therefore, knee angle is the only consideration when addressing squat gains.

Now you done gone and wrecked an elegant theory. Facts have a way of doing that.

hip angle.jpg