Have fun with this one!

[Jared Nessland]

Squat lifts likely cause of stress fractures in young athletes, study finds

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/133028228.html

[Mark Rippetoe]

You guys are on your own with this one.

[Valhall]

One of the comments on the article:

I am a PhD candidate in biomechanics, and specialize in weight training biomechanics. I'd trained everyone from pre-adolescents to world class atheltes, boys, girls, men, and women. I have done studies on the squat exercise that have been published in peer reviewed scientific journals. I would like to see the full methods of this study, and the full results, not just a news story. Just from what has been reported here I have some serious reservations about how they are able to conclude what they did based on their methods. These MDs need to read Stuart McGill's work (a professor at the U. of Calgary, who is probably the world's foremost expert on the spine).

There are many different kinds of squats. If a low-bar squat technique is not used, they are not harmful if done correctly. A big part of the problem is very few people know what correct technique is, so when some high school football coach tells some high school kid they are doing it right, they probably are not.

But then unfortuantly you have so called high school coaches reading it:

While squats are a hard to beat for gaining quad strength, I think that we have to take the results of this study seriously. I have been a certified athletic trainer working in high schools for the past 12 years, and unfortunately, I have seen some of these pars injuries as well. I can guarantee you that most kids that are doing squats aren't doing them properly to begin with and now that there is some research to suggest that even if they are doing them properly, it may not make a difference, maybe we need to change our approach to strength training. I am a big believer in weight training, but I have also seen some pretty impressive improvments with body weight workouts and other sport specific movements. There are many different ways to train each body part to get the desired results that you are looking for. I believe that we could basically eliminate the squat and still have a team of strong athletes.

[Alex Willess]

I stopped reading at 95lbs. Then just now went to read one line further and found out how they got their results. "The exercises were done under the guidance of a physical therapist."

[Dan3088]

Well time to give up squats iv already given up smoking, drinking, food and sex on the advice of the medical community and don't even get me started on how dangerous it is to leave my home. Guess we should all be afraid of everything all the time!

[Dilan]

"They used a bar and weights totaling 95 pounds.

The exercises were done under the guidance of a physical therapist."

I stopped reading after this.

[JB1981]

The study was done with 95lbs, man. 95lbs!

[Eric K]

Didn't you know that lifting weights puts stress on the skeleton, Rip? Stress, Rip. Stress is bad. One should try to lift with as little stress to the body as possible, obviously.

[Roy]

They did not control for milk.

[Timothy]

Most of the comments to the 'study' are equally disgusting; Ph.Ds and personal training all have a thorough misunderstanding of proper mechanics and purposes. I think the worst comment was " There are many different ways to train each body part to get the desired results that you are looking for."