Squat - Form Breaking Down?

[Ryan Simpson]

All,

First of all.. 27yo, 118kg BW, eating ~2450kcal (220p), sleep is probably less than optimal but that's the nature of my job and still fitting training in.

I hit 150kg on the squat today an all time 5 rep PR, so I'm pretty please with it. However I've noticed while things don't look terrible I do have some form breakdown. I'm still taking 2.5kg jumps I've maybe got a couple of these left I'd say.

Vid of my 3rd set - YouTube

My knees are starting to cave a little in the initial part of the accent, the speed slows and then get my knees back out and it starts to move again.

So I guess my question is, do I take a small reset to work on form, start micro-loading, or add a lighter squat day?

Based on everything I've read all three are pretty feasible, but I don't know if the breakdown is enough to warrant a reset.

Cheers.

[Eric Schexnayder]

I am in the same boat regarding little sleep, except with kids not work. I squat way less than you and I started a Light day.

My rationale for it was that it took the mental tax of Wednesday’s squats off my shoulders and it gave me a little more recovery time, meaning Friday’s workout started getting better. It also got me excited to workout again.

I waited til I stalled once to add the LS day. To me it seems logical to add it when you’re averaging the progress with it anyway, I.e., when you should be doing 15 lbs a week but with resets and missed reps in reality you’re hitting 10 lbs a week.

Andy Baker once told me that if your form is “trainable”, meaning not so awful that it’s unsafe or ingraining bad movement patterns, you should continue to add weight. You don’t want perfection to become the enemy of progress. Note what’s wrong and work on it during your warm up sets. If you take a Light day, that’s also a good opportunity to practice technique.

I have no experience micro loading the squat. Just not there yet.

[Ryan Simpson]

Hi Eric,

Thanks for the insight.

This made me have a little "huh, I'm over thinking this" moment. I think I'll see how tomorrows squats go and if they are killer I'll maybe add in a light day, I get caught up in chasing the numbers higher and higher sometimes, but 5kg a week is still decent progress.

I should be a little more mindful during my warm ups too.

Thanks!

[coleossus]

Is micro-loading the squat something that's prescribed now?

I've never micro-loaded anything other than press movements, and wouldn't suggest it to anyone. Great way to waste time. The sheer number of muscle groups involved in the squat or deadlift or really any movement performed by any trainee other than an elite competitive athlete shouldn't require microloading.

The idea behind LP is training against regular intensity-overload events. The more you train intensity, the more you're training a specific adaptation that improves the efficiency of your existing muscle. At a certain point that muscle is as efficient as it can get, and you have no choice but to make the muscles bigger to improve their cross-sectional area (aka hypertrophy). LP is a compromise between these two adaptations in the 5 rep/3 set range. HLM sometimes programs 5 rep/5 set, to increase hypertrophy by way of greater volume. Texas Method has volume and intensity days scheduled separately. Other training modalities cycle through different periodization styles featuring more volume and alternating workload stressors.

If you need to microload anything other than presses you should move to intermediate/advanced programming.

[JD Keip]

All,

Vid of my 3rd set - YouTube

My knees are starting to cave a little in the initial part of the accent, the speed slows and then get my knees back out and it starts to move again.

So I guess my question is, do I take a small reset to work on form, start micro-loading, or add a lighter squat day?

Based on everything I've read all three are pretty feasible, but I don't know if the breakdown is enough to warrant a reset.

Cheers.

You're an inch or two high, it looks like, with a slight thoracic bend as you descend. Take a giant breath at the top and tighten everything to turn your spine into a steel rod. For the whole rep. Bounce that rod out of the hole by keeping your knees out harder and descending slightly faster. Yes, take some weight off.

Setup: lots of wrist bend despite the wraps. The meat at the base of your thumb should be keeping the bar in place. Maybe move your grip closer by one or two fingers as well.

Shoes could be more suitable for lifting, too

[Ryan Simpson]

Coleossus, point well made its noted.

JD, I worked on keeping my knees out harder this session and still went up on weight. The 2nd set was probably the gnarliest and the 3rd I tried to only think about getting my knees out felt like I help. Where do consider parallel I've always thought it was the crease of the hip at the hight of the top of the patella?

2nd YouTube
3rd YouTube

Felt heavy as shit but doable and I'm not having to seriously grind...

[JD Keip]

Coleossus, point well made its noted.

JD, I worked on keeping my knees out harder this session and still went up on weight. The 2nd set was probably the gnarliest and the 3rd I tried to only think about getting my knees out felt like I help. Where do consider parallel I've always thought it was the crease of the hip at the hight of the top of the patella?

2nd YouTube
3rd YouTube

Felt heavy as shit but doable and I'm not having to seriously grind...

Yeah, those knees look a lot better, depth much more consistent, elbows are ducking less on descent. Some deterioration at the end of the third set of course.

We agree on the definition of parallel; on your first video it looked like the first rep was to depth, the others a smidge high. With the camera at the level of your safeties (above squat parallel), I'd expect the hip crease to be lower in the frame than your knee. If you want the camera to tell you the truth, put it at kneecap height.

My earlier grip comment referred to a thumbs on top of the bar setup, which I'd failed to notice you're not using.

[Ryan Simpson]

Slow reply, sorry.

Yeah I see what you're saying now and agree with you. In terms of the grip yeah, I was having a lot of elbow pain from thumbs on top of the bar and after a lot of experimenting this is the only painless grip I've found. I'll probably get better wrist wraps at some point, these are were cheap.

So I went up in weight again up to 155kg, there were a few ugly reps with inconsistent depth and on the last set I was concentrating pretty hard on not dying that I ended up doing 6 reps and that rep was horrible. In some ways I took it as a positive that I ended up "getting" 6 reps, but I can't confidently say that those were 3 set filled with good reps. So I may stick with the weight there and if I can't rep with consistent form I'll reset as I haven't reset at all yet.

Heres the vid as it shows my form at I guess pretty near my limit - YouTube