Extreme back flexibility and squatting

[Raskolnikov]

I've recently gotten my girlfriend into the gym a couple times and I've been working on getting her squat form down. The first day was mostly bodyweight squats (no convincing her that the bar wasn't too heavy) and things looked pretty good. After I got her to get her knees out, she easily hit depth with a tight arch in her back. But yesterday, when I put a bar on her back, I realized that she has a problem of a different sort: she has a crazy range of motion in both her lumber and thoracic spine. She can hyperextend her spine to the point of basically folding herself in half. She's been a dancer from childhood, so she's definitely a very flexible person, but this is just a bit extreme. When her hips break parallel, her lumbar spine is almost perfectly horizontal, while her thoracic spine is almost completely vertical -- imagine a "U" cut in half. It's pretty freaky looking, to be honest, and I'm afraid she's really going to hurt herself. But I'm not at all sure how to "fix" the problem, or if it's even fixable. Is this just one of the rare cases where back squats aren't an appropriate lift for someone? Any advice would be appreciated.

[misspelledgeoff]

lucky bastard.

[Raskolnikov]

I knew that was coming :-)

[misspelledgeoff]

post pic's so we can better assess situation?


shit man I don't know. you may wanna ask Rip, KSC, JLascek or other coaches on the board. but be prepared!

[pbjorge12]

She needs to push out with those abs.
Rip has a trainee on his DVD with the same problem (Hell. I have the same problem). She'll have to learn how to keep a neutral lumbar spine.

Teach her how to take a deep breath into her stomach and then push out with her abs. If this isn't working it might be wise to stick a belt on her for a bit so she gets the proprioceptive feedback.

If you have a crossfit journal subscription - http://journal.crossfit.com/2009/01/...-the-squat.tpl

But really who the fuck knows what the issue is unless we have pics.

[BryanM]

I like the cue of "setting the chest". Instead of trying to figure out what the fuck my crazy back is doing, I think about the position my sternum is in, how it's positioned relative to my spine, and how it's not wiggling anywhere and everywhere.

Really bad things happen from hyper extending backwards, worse than rounding forward.

If we gave up on things just because we sucked at them from the start, not one of us would have learned how to walk.

But I don't believe any of this jive story is true until I see pics of course.

[Flying Fox]

post pic's so we can better assess situation?

But really who the fuck knows what the issue is unless we have pics.

But I don't believe any of this jive story is true until I see pics of course.

+1
Pics are an absolute necessity to get decent advice. You wouldn't want your girl to get hurt would you? I didn't think so, post the pics.

[BruteForce]

I actually have the same problem. I have to squat with a shoulder width stance and toes straight forward because of it. When I go wider with my toes out it just hurts my lower back.

[zendefone]

Rip told the girl in the dvd with the same problem to tighten her gut more.

[Raskolnikov]

post pic's so we can better assess situation?

But really who the fuck knows what the issue is unless we have pics.

But I don't believe any of this jive story is true until I see pics of course.

+1
Pics are an absolute necessity to get decent advice. You wouldn't want your girl to get hurt would you? I didn't think so, post the pics.

Fuckers . I might outweigh her by nearly 100lbs, but she'd kick my fucking ass

Anyways, I'm going to have her wear a belt so she can at least feel what it means to brace her core (she's having a bit of trouble understanding what I mean). Hopefully that'll help the situation. Thanks for the advice.