Watch his hips, when you can see them, and when he actually gets below parallel. What do you see?
Don't let your elbows drop at the bottom.
Hello everybody! Last week on friday I had the opportunity to work out at the powerlifting and weightlifting gym in a town nearby. This was the first time I was actually meeting people lifting more or the same weight as me with proper form. So as I was doing my first set of fives of squats that day @365 lbs one of the more experienced guys turned up to me and said "yeah, well your technique is bad, because you have a lot of weaknesses and you should do some isolation exercises to strengthen yor back muscles, also your hips come up too fast and I bet you can't do the weight without the belt" Turned out that this guy was Andrej Mostovoenko, one of Germany's best powerlifters in the -90 kg class who squatted 688 lbs raw at a bodyweight of 187 lbs in competition. So I said "Wanna bet?", took off my belt and proceeded with my squats:
1. Februar 2023 - YouTube
His reaction was: "The first rep was sort of ok, but in all the other one's the hip comes up too fast". In fact sometimes I tend to overdo the hip drive cue but have incorporated in my mindset, that one grindy rep per set is not that big of a deal. What do you guys think? Sometimes the bar rolls up a bit, because I guess I'm actually trying to squat with a too vertical back angle when going down, that evens itself out, once I come out of the hole. Also in my opinion the fifth rep had a bit too much of flexion in the thoracic spine. Should I consider lowering the weights to the point where every rep looks exactly the same? I weigh about 215 lbs and train since almost 5 years now. Any tips?
By the way here is also a video of Andrej squatting 300 kg:
Squats on a bad day - 300kg - YouTube
His Technique is defniitely different from mine. That Guy is a freak...
Watch his hips, when you can see them, and when he actually gets below parallel. What do you see?
Don't let your elbows drop at the bottom.
If I may,
that's an interesting adverb, from someone who normally writes with great precision.
Is this implying that he does not go below parallel on all his reps?
For what my opinion is worth, i.e. zero, his warm-up sets (certainly up to 230Kg) seem visibly deeper than his work sets; not sure how relevant this is though.
Thanks,
IPB
I thank you both for replying!
That actually also was an issue that bothered me, too. Once the weight is heavy enough, the hip drive in any below parallel squat will always be the leading factor. I think the main challenge will be explaining to the other trainees why I squat the way I squat, since I'm not the strongest guy there...I guess not the explaining is the hard part, but understanding it for them is a totally other issue ...
I'm going to try to widen my grip a little bit, so that I don't push the bar up if the horizontal lean get's out of hand.
Also I'm going to work on reducing the variety of my back angle during the squat and maybe increase the lean forward a bit more.
Would have loved to attend the seminar in April, but unfortunately the vaccine restrictions prohibit a flight to the USA. Any idea when they will be revoked for tourists and non-immigrants?
You will find that narrowing your grip and taking the extension out of your wrists will be the best way to hold the bar.
Director's Cut - Hip Drive | The Essentials of Loaded Human Movement