What the hell is wrong with my squat?

[CaptainNalgas]

Last month I posted some videos to check my form, and have been working on improving my technique.

But for the life of me, I cannot squat right!

The original post is here

All around form check please

Compare my squat then to my squat now,

Help - YouTube

If I go too deep, my lower back rounds, even when I try to keep it tight at the bottom. But when it doesn't round, I am doing half squats.

It's pathetic how I struggle with a lift that is supposed to come natural. And while I can do high bar squats well, I don't want to settle for something that doesn't give the same results as low bar.

Thank you for your patience.

[Chris Griffith]

I highly recommend getting some weightlifting shoes. I think my squat form in flat shoes was similar to yours. Once I bought some Adidas Adipowers it was so much easier to hit full depth with a flat back. Maybe there are other form flaws that people can point out, but a shoe with a 3/4" heel helped me enormously.

If $150+ for shoes is out of your budget, you can pick up some ~3/4" heel lifts on Amazon for cheap. I haven't tried this, but its probably better than nothing.

[melody]

You can get weightlifting shoes for $60. Google is your friend.

[Chris Griffith]

You can get weightlifting shoes for $60. Google is your friend.

True. I sprung for Adipowers since that seems to be one of the most popular options (along with Nike Romaleos). But you can definitely get a set of weightlifting shoes for less.

[reediculous1534]

Last month I posted some videos to check my form, and have been working on improving my technique.

But for the life of me, I cannot squat right!

The original post is here

All around form check please

Compare my squat then to my squat now,

Help - YouTube

If I go too deep, my lower back rounds, even when I try to keep it tight at the bottom. But when it doesn't round, I am doing half squats.

It's pathetic how I struggle with a lift that is supposed to come natural. And while I can do high bar squats well, I don't want to settle for something that doesn't give the same results as low bar.

Thank you for your patience.

1) Why are you backing all the way out of the rack? You are disabling all the safety features of using it.
2) Stop looking in the mirror and keep your head down; eyes focused on the ground a few feet infront of you. this is for the entirety of the squat.
3) You are not breathing correctly. Take deep breaths into your lower chest (makes your belly stick out) and brace HARD; flex your abs and lower back as hard as you can before starting down and maintain for the entire movement
4) focus on keeping your lumbar straight as you near the depth that your ass tucks; if you focus on trying to tuck your crotch down and back it is the opposite movement of your butt tucking under.
5) Shove your knees out on the way down and up; this was a critical part for fixing this exact problem for me.
6) Test widening your stance 1-3 inches and see if that helps you break parallel more easily

It is hard to tell with a dark shirt on, but to me it looks like you have the bar sitting on top of your rear delt instead of on the delt at the scapula spine. If this is true it impacts the angle of the whole squat as keeping the bar over midfoot is a different position.