Squats hurt my knees - Squat form check

[Craig]

Hi,

I have posted about this on the Q&A board in the past but I can't seem to fix the damn problem. Long story short, my knees have been a problem for a while, the pain rises as a function of my workset weight and when I have irritated them it stays painful for a little while. It gets to the point where I have trouble getting up and down stairs or running. Last time I checked with a sport doctor I was told that nothing is broken, ruptured or anything.

I was hoping I could get some feedback on my squat form. It's far from being even decent, but I don't see what in particular affects my knees so much.

Front and side view :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snS6wxJ5g3k

45 view from the week before, but the cage is obstructing a lot :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4PKjVdx_wI

I am :
22 yo guy
170 lbs
3x5 135 squat, 194 deadlift, 80 OHP, 105 bench
5x3 119 power clean

[Steve Hill]

"Hi, help me with my knee pain, which I will proceed to not describe to you in any detail whatsoever."

So, after you google knee anatomy and look at all the pretty pictures you can tell us EXACTLY how / where your knees hurt.

In the meantime....

1) move your feet closer together - about 1-2" - they are supposed to be roughly hip-width. Turn your toes out more. More than comfortable.
2) Quit jamming the bar down your back like you have Schwarzenneggarian back muscle you have to fight against. Just put it right below the spine of the scapulae. If you don't know what the spine of the scapula is, or where it is, see SS:BBT and the aforementioned Google, along with the colorful and illuminating pictures that result.
3) Jam your knees out.
4) Tell us more about: Training progression, weight gain, how much you're eating (because you are a skinny little thing and need to eat more than three sandwiches - do you have a girlfriend you can send to the kitchen to make them for you?), what weight you started at (squatting), and what other activities you perform that may affect your knees / recovery / etc.

[Gunnhild Bruno]

Your hips go back first, and your knees don't move until the bottom. This is wrong. Hips and knees should break at the same time. Knees stop moving forward about 1/3 of the way down. And don't be so sluggish at the bottom. Re-read the squat chapter in the book.

And stand up between reps. What's with the rash of people who won't stand up all the way?

[Steve Hill]

Your hips go back first, and your knees don't move until the bottom. This is wrong. Hips and knees should break at the same time. Knees stop moving forward about 1/3 of the way down.

The likely cause of this is the bar being about an inch too far down his back, which makes him do some unusual contortions at the bottom to keep the weight over mid-foot, which he actually does a pretty good job of. Watch his hip drive out of the hole - he's doing it right for where the bar is. I didn't finish editing and re-posting until after you had posted.

Agree with the standing up part. It's starting to give "head down" a run for the money on the most common stupid mistake.

[Craig]

Steve, I didn't give much detail about the pain to keep my post short. I didn't know to what extent you guys like to deal with injuries. I get dull pain in my medial collateral ligament, quadriceps tendon and in the region between the patella and the MCL. The pain sometimes become sharp, mostly at the top and inner side of the patella. The bottom and exterior of my knees are fine. Both knees feel this way, with the left usually hurting noticeably more than the right.

About my progression : I lifted for a little under 3 months in 2009, basically until I first started getting these knees problem. My progression went like this :
BW 154 -> 176, Squat 80 -> 179, Bench press 65 -> 110, Press 45 -> 95, Deadlift 89 -> 200 and no PC (I did chin ups instead).
Then I stopped for almost two years for "treatments" because I was scared about my knees.

This time around I started in mid july (so closing in on 3 months) but had poor progress because my knees quickly started hurting again.
BW 154 (not a typo, I went back to exactly 154) -> 170, squat 105 -> 135 (I reached 135 seven workouts in, went back to 125 because my symptoms were coming back fast, and I haven't been able to get past 135 since), OHP 55 -> 80, bench 70 -> 105, deadlift 129 -> 194, PC 89 -> 119.
Right now I'm not doing any sports beside weight lifting. I was eating 3-4K cal of good stuff when I started but slowed down a little when I started missing workouts because of my knees.

Spar, I will give the squat chapter yet another reading, but about standing all the way up, am I stopping short on every reps ? I'm trying to keep my back arched the whole time.