Form Check: Squats

[Carlos Daniel]

but i'm not sure where this whole "omg?! where'd you learn to squat?!" sentiment is coming from. (perhaps i'm reading too much into some of the statements).

It's just that this is hardly the kind of squat that results from people that learn how to squat from the book.

[Gunnhild Bruno]

Watch this:
http://startingstrength.com/index.ph...sition_control

Also, narrow your stance and shove the knees out more. This will help you achieve depth.

High bar squats are fine if this is what you want to do or you have a compelling reason to prefer them. But there is a reason why Rip advocates the lower bar position and resulting squat. There are tradeoffs with each form of squatting, but most of us think that the low bar has the edge. To say that one makes legs stronger than the other is not only a vague statement but an oversimplification. At any rate, nothing in your video leads me to believe that the low-bar version is contraindicated for you. You just need to refine your form, as do most people who are starting out.

i have no idea how anyone is judging depth on this video. You're wearing black pants, the hip crease in the bottom position is being obscured both by the vertical piece of the rack and by the weight plates AND the video is shot from a high vantage point which makes it additionally difficult to eyeball. (have the person filming you take a knee, for example)

Because when you’ve seen enough squats, you don’t always have to see the crease to judge depth or see them from an ideal angle. Many of those reps are of questionable depth, and all of them have less than ideal lumbar extension. I personally don’t get freaked out over a little lumbar movement at the bottom, but here it looks to me that it is interfering with hip drive.

[Gunnhild Bruno]

SS certainly does talk a lot about keeping your knees from going too far forward. For example p14 fig 2-9 caption "knees should be just slightly in front of the toes" which shows the front-most part of the knee being about an inch in front of the toes in the plane of the foot[...]

The statement was for people of average proportions. It varies from person to person, depending on their proportions.

[KNA]

I'm going to go in somewhat of a different direction:

Other than the back rounding things look ok, i would say. Room for tweaking yes, but i'm not sure where this whole "omg?! where'd you learn to squat?!" sentiment is coming from. (perhaps i'm reading too much into some of the statements).

i have no idea how anyone is judging depth on this video. You're wearing black pants, the hip crease in the bottom position is being obscured both by the vertical piece of the rack and by the weight plates AND the video is shot from a high vantage point which makes it additionally difficult to eyeball. (have the person filming you take a knee, for example)

SS certainly does talk a lot about keeping your knees from going too far forward. For example p14 fig 2-9 caption "knees should be just slightly in front of the toes" which shows the front-most part of the knee being about an inch in front of the toes in the plane of the foot. He later says more about it but generally one gets the impression that knees too far forward are the bigger problem (due to killing hamstring involvement and all the good stuff having to do with that)

That said, i do think you're keeping your knees too far back by a few inches. And, as several people have mentioned, you're unhinging the hips first and the "very useful block of wood" thing could help you get you timing right.

Now... to keeping the low back in extension ... it's something i've had / am having trouble with and i found that for a long time i wasn't shoving my knees out as much as i thought i was... especially starting from the top. Once i started doing that things got better. I also am doing some hamstring and hip flexor stretches ... but don't know the impact that's had.

Thanks for the reply! I take the "have you even read the book??" statements with a grain of salt, since I have read the book and know that my squats are at least somewhat close to good form. Your comment above and others will help me get even closer

Thanks!