Critique my Front Squat, Please

[quote]Flow wrote:
maraudermeat wrote:
everyone’s given you good advice so far. one other thing that may be helpful would be doing them off of pins. if you don’t have a rack, you can build up a surface on both sides to elevate the bar so you only have to concentrate on the concentric portion of the movement. starting in the bottom position requires you to be really tight to get the bar moving.

i prefer squatting off of pins or an elevated surface to a box anyday.

Thanks for stopping by, Marauder. Your videos get me pumped for breaking PRs

How would you recommend I do those? Do you think it’d be best to do a few sets of normal front squats and then do some off pins, or just use the pin front squat on its own? I appreciate the advice![/quote]

i find that front squats are best done for multiple sets with lower reps. the core fatigues quickly and form goes to shit. i don’t go above 6 reps on any set for this reason.

i would try all different ways. that will keep it new and keep you progressing. you could do sets off the pins heavy, then drop to light weight for full ROM. you could also do full ROM and pause the bar on the pins then back up. the variations are endless.

[quote]maraudermeat wrote:
Flow wrote:
maraudermeat wrote:
everyone’s given you good advice so far. one other thing that may be helpful would be doing them off of pins. if you don’t have a rack, you can build up a surface on both sides to elevate the bar so you only have to concentrate on the concentric portion of the movement. starting in the bottom position requires you to be really tight to get the bar moving.

i prefer squatting off of pins or an elevated surface to a box anyday.

Thanks for stopping by, Marauder. Your videos get me pumped for breaking PRs

How would you recommend I do those? Do you think it’d be best to do a few sets of normal front squats and then do some off pins, or just use the pin front squat on its own? I appreciate the advice!

i find that front squats are best done for multiple sets with lower reps. the core fatigues quickly and form goes to shit. i don’t go above 6 reps on any set for this reason.

i would try all different ways. that will keep it new and keep you progressing. you could do sets off the pins heavy, then drop to light weight for full ROM. you could also do full ROM and pause the bar on the pins then back up. the variations are endless.
[/quote]

Alright, thanks again. I’ll grab something and go for it.

Looks pretty good mate. Better then my 5reps x 5sets at 330lbs…

Koing

How about my front squats? Thanks in advance!

[quote]Doenitz79 wrote:
How about my front squats? Thanks in advance!

deep and strong!!!

Am I leaning forward too much as well?

After doing pin front squats for 4 weeks, things are looking much better.

There is still room for improvement.

Thanks again everyone!

to me, it now looks like you are almost deadlifting the weight up after your bottom position (which, i think, can afford to be lower while we’re at it).

i’d love to see a video of you squatting down with just your bodyweight or an empty bar to see what it takes to get your body into and out of the bottom of a squat, and then i’d advise you not to load beyond the point where you lose that.

i think there is a video of Dan John teaching some folks how to squat on google video. there is a link to it floating around this site somewhere, if you search for it. i found it to be really useful way back when.

for me, i like to see a bottom position where your hammies are touching the calves (or at least near there), which is, i think, when unloaded, a really natural resting position (and if that changes when you load it, then reduce the load until it is no longer so). for instance, try squatting down to there and just sort of chilling out… maybe with your arms up on your knees or whatever.

as for getting to and from that position, try to do it (unweighted… this is just a drill) facing a wall, with your toes and nose on the wall. see how far you can get down, and every day try to get lower, without losing your balance.

this taught me how to keep my lower back and ass tight when squatting, and gave me an image of what going straight down actually FEEELS like, because it is very easy to feel like you are going straight down and still, in reality, ahve a HUGE forward lean.

it will also help keep everything in alignment as you go up and down (as opposed to your thing, which currently seems ot be that you have this weird thing going where you are leaned forward for the duration of your concentric, so you end up having to fire your glutes at the end in order to “lockout”. it is really odd, in my opinion).

hope this helps…
dan

You have to remember, leg length plays a major part in the perception of depth. A long limbed lifter will look at lot deeper than a stumpy guy.

-versus-

And he’s doing it with flat feet and not oly shoes.

FWIW, other than getting kicked forward at the bottom, I think it looks really good and is a big improvement.

[quote]LiarPantsOnFire wrote:
to me, it now looks like you are almost deadlifting the weight up after your bottom position (which, i think, can afford to be lower while we’re at it).

i’d love to see a video of you squatting down with just your bodyweight or an empty bar to see what it takes to get your body into and out of the bottom of a squat, and then i’d advise you not to load beyond the point where you lose that.

i think there is a video of Dan John teaching some folks how to squat on google video. there is a link to it floating around this site somewhere, if you search for it. i found it to be really useful way back when.

for me, i like to see a bottom position where your hammies are touching the calves (or at least near there), which is, i think, when unloaded, a really natural resting position (and if that changes when you load it, then reduce the load until it is no longer so). for instance, try squatting down to there and just sort of chilling out… maybe with your arms up on your knees or whatever.

as for getting to and from that position, try to do it (unweighted… this is just a drill) facing a wall, with your toes and nose on the wall. see how far you can get down, and every day try to get lower, without losing your balance.

this taught me how to keep my lower back and ass tight when squatting, and gave me an image of what going straight down actually FEEELS like, because it is very easy to feel like you are going straight down and still, in reality, ahve a HUGE forward lean.

it will also help keep everything in alignment as you go up and down (as opposed to your thing, which currently seems ot be that you have this weird thing going where you are leaned forward for the duration of your concentric, so you end up having to fire your glutes at the end in order to “lockout”. it is really odd, in my opinion).

hope this helps…
dan[/quote]

Thanks!

I front squat to where I feel I can keep an arch in my lower back, and I’m improving my hip mobility daily so that I can do full ATG front squats every time I do them.

I know what you mean about the glutes finishing at the end. Every day I do overhead squats with bands around me knees with focus on maintaining an arch in my lower back, a tight core, and glutes activated throughout the movement. I feel like I’m making progress.

You should check out the videos again though, liarpantsonfire, you’ll find that my hammies are touching my calves, at least slightly, on every rep.

I do have some goofy anthropometry for weight lifting- that’s for sure :slight_smile:

And your wish is my command.

It is my observation that, when front squatting, longer limbed oly lifters tend to push their knees forward to maintain an upright torso. I tend to see this technique at the mid-point of the concentric portion of a heavy front squat. One ex.:

Due to my previous observation, it should be added that the wall-facing drill is a faulty model for optimizing a lift where the knees travel forward depending on anthropometry. Although it is a good squat teaching tool, it doesn’t seem to apply well to my limb lengths and the resulting front squat form I’m trying to improve.

I’m going to try pushing my knees forward much more next week when I’m in a power rack and I can afford to fall over, lol :slight_smile:

I really appreciate the input!

[quote]Hanley wrote:
You have to remember, leg length plays a major part in the perception of depth. A long limbed lifter will look at lot deeper than a stumpy guy.

-versus-

And he’s doing it with flat feet and not oly shoes.

FWIW, other than getting kicked forward at the bottom, I think it looks really good and is a big improvement.[/quote]

Thanks Hanley. I think I need to work on getting my glutes through the movement from that bottom position up. Next time I’m trying to push my knees forward like nuts and we’ll see what happens.

Your form looked pretty solid to me.

maybe my imagination but it looked to me like you were relaxing your abs/glutes before descending, i find making sure thats locked in place give me a much more stable consistant squat, other than that, for me its continueing to flex abs/glutes, push through heels, keep the bar back as far as possible and drive elbows up and try to straighten neck/chest up

[quote]brian.m wrote:
maybe my imagination but it looked to me like you were relaxing your abs/glutes before descending, i find making sure thats locked in place give me a much more stable consistant squat, other than that, for me its continueing to flex abs/glutes, push through heels, keep the bar back as far as possible and drive elbows up and try to straighten neck/chest up[/quote]

Thanks, brian.m!

I’m doing Single Leg RDLs and other money unilateral exercises to get my glutes stronger and I’m slowly seeing a difference.

So you actively engage your glutes before you even start the descent?

Tomorrow I’ll do some form practice and try that out.

yes, well i always do glute activation stuff before my weights, or even between sets (i attribute much of my progress the last year on this) but also, after i unrack the weight, i pull my hips under myself so to speak, buy squeezing my glutes and abs, and then try to carry that through while i squat straight down between my legs, i find it has definitly helped as my core (slowly improving) used to be about as stable and steady as a wet noodle

[quote]brian.m wrote:
yes, well i always do glute activation stuff before my weights, or even between sets (i attribute much of my progress the last year on this) but also, after i unrack the weight, i pull my hips under myself so to speak, buy squeezing my glutes and abs, and then try to carry that through while i squat straight down between my legs, i find it has definitly helped as my core (slowly improving) used to be about as stable and steady as a wet noodle[/quote]

I see what you’re saying. One problem though: when I tighten my glutes as you describe, I get a good amount of posterior pelvic tilt (an action of the glutes and hamstrings). When the pelvis tilts posteriorly it flattens the lower back out, eliminating the arch that I am trying to maintain when I squat.

Do your tilt your pelvis ‘under’ your body when you do this?

I’ve been doing glute activation daily for a few months now. Only recently have I put my efforts into exclusive glute involvement extending the hips when I do supine bridges. I guess I was doing them wrong for a while :X

Probably tmi, but after yesterday’s session my glutes are ridiculously sore. Gotta be something going on with em’

many people might potentially think this is wrong or missunderstand this, but yes, i literally pull my hips under until my back is flat, as i have too much lordosis anyways…before, i would arch hard before, but i couldnt maintain the same arch all the way down, so my pelvis would rotate around as i squatted down, and then rotate back into lordosis when i squat back up fully, rather than pure hip flexion/extension…

i think this is partly why it was so unstable before, and this puts much of the focus on the lower back rather than on the glutes…and i also think this is why my back was soo tight forever…this way, i can keep almost the same angle, and i actually feel like its better for my posture and strength and everything to be honest…

but there are many more advanced and stronger lifters here so maybe one of them will chime in…hope it helps though

[quote]brian.m wrote:
but there are many more advanced and stronger lifters here so maybe one of them will chime in…hope it helps though[/quote]

It has helped, Brian.m. It makes a lot of sense that it would help you to tilt your pelvis posteriorly if you already had a large amount of anterior tilt.

I’ll make glute activation throughout the lift a focus.

Thanks for your posts.

not a problem flow, i recommend you try the hip alignment thing atleast on your warmup sets the next time you squat/front squat just to see what you think, and just try to focus on squatting straight down between your legs with that rigid core/tight glutes

Will do.

Off to do some push presses now.