Deep Squats

Bigger Stronger Leaner Competitive Bodybuilding
21

Hey ya’ll,

This is a form question. I was squatting the other day and some trainer guy came up to me and told me my shins should be at a 90 degree angle with the floor at all times and that letting my knees travel forward was bad for my knees. Now its not like my knees are going past the end of my feet or anything but was he right? I thought that your knees had to travel forward in order to for you to drop down for a full squat. Also would like to know if the same applies to front squats?
Andrew

22

Phsiologically impossible without EXTREME forward lean of the back. I’ve seen this recommendation before, and I just don’t understand it. Just ask him to show you that 90 degree shin squat. Bet he can’t!

23

The shins remain perpandicular to the floor-type squat is a classic powerlifting squat. Nothing wrong with this style of lifting. The shins will definitely move forward when high-bar squatting olympic-style and there is also nothing wrong with this style of lifting.

24

I’ve traditionally given two reasons why full ROM is preferable, barring any extenuating circumstances: 1) Studies have shown that strength gains in partial ROM do have carry over to other ranges, but certainly not 100%, and the carryover quickly drops outside a narrow angular range. Do I understand why this happens? Not entirely, but my GUESS is it has something to do with conditioning cross-bridge interactions along the myofibrils at those points. What matters, though, is that the effect has been demonstrated in studies. (I forget exact references; I believe I found them in Zatsiorsky). 2) It does seem that the most precarious position is at parallel. Not only is the lever-arm, and therefore the torque, relative to the knee highest there, joint laxity is greatest there. (I’m taking the latter point on faith from Poliquin.) Combine this with the fact that the most force is going to be applied to the (protracted) lever arm at that point, since the greatest velocity change occurs from the eccentric/concentric transition, and it seems reasonable to assume the knee would be put under more stress with parallel squats. (Also, people can do more when they only squat to parallel.) Are these good reasons, Berardi? Let me know if you disagree.

25

The knee is at it’s most vulnerable position at a point just above parallel. This is what is termed in olympic lifting as “No Mans Land”…An olympic lifter doing a clean or a snatch who catches the bar in a position between a 1/4 squat and a parallel squat is putting an extreme amount of stress on his knees. The solution to this problem is to ride the weight down into a full squat position. This takes stress off the knees and puts it on the stronger hips. This also involves more muscles (hamstrings, glutes, v.m.)
When comparing a powerlifting squat vs an olympic squat the powerlifting version places less stress on the knees with more stress on the lumbar, hip, and glute areas. However, the goal of a powerlifting squat is to move the weight, not work the muscle…so an individual looking for optimum quadriceps development might not find powerlifting version squats sufficient.
On a high bar olympic style squat the movement does stress the knee more but also stresses the quadriceps more. In order to stress the muscle you must also stress the joint at least to a certain extent. If you do everything correctly, the joint will respond with increased density and strength. Fred Hatfield mentions in his book “Fitness, the Complete Guide” that autopsies done on powerlifters have demonstrated structural knee density and thickness second to none.
Tall individuals need to really work on flexibility and pay attention to the lumbar area. Because they may have a hard time reaching a paralell or full squat position without excessive rounding of the back they need to make sure the spine stays below a 45 angle and utilize slower tempos in the descent due to the increased stress on the knees if they cannot reach a paralell or below paralell position.

26

Full squats are bad for you because when you go ass to grass in your old pair of green adidas shorts, they’ll rip down the center, exposing your Superman Fun Pal underwear to that hot chick doing hamstring curls. When you realize your pants have ripped, you sure as hell can’t get out of the hole, and your good-for-nothing training partner is too busy rolling on the floor crying to help you get back up. sigh I suppose these things happen.

27

I have one word: ACL. How do you test a ligament for instability? At it’s weakest point or angle. Where is this weakest point? Well, the ACL is tested with the hips at 45 degrees and the knees at 90. These angles sound to me like the exact position of a parallel squat. I could certainly be wrong about something here, but draw your own conclusions. :slight_smile:

28

Great discussion…Im not an anatomist or biomechanist but since Im a fairly good critical thinker Ill add my 2 cents…

Jason, great post. I agree with your first comment about the well documented fact that partial ROM work does not carry over into full ROM stuff. For isometrics, the transfer is 15% ROM so if you do isometrics in a certain position you will be stronger thru 15% of a ROM around that position. (I cant believe I remember this crap!)

However this doesnt support an argument that full ROM is best. If you are an athlete youve gotta train thru the ROM that mimics your sport demand. Why do full squates if your sport doesnt ever demand explosive power or pure strength in the bottom position. You are just then limiting the weight you can use in the relevant ROM. If you're a basketball player and much of your game is spent in a crouched stance, all you need to do is squat thru that position (or even do heavy isometrics). And if you do so, you will be able to load WAY more than you could if you were squatting all the way down!

And if you are a bodybuilder, the transfer isnt really all that necessary anyway since what are you trying to transfer to? I will agree though that as a bb/weight lifter, muscle balance is another thing as you might not want different force curves throughout different ROM. Especially if you are an olympic lifter.

Now as far as your second comment. Good stuff. But the lever arm is longest at parallel IF you are completely upright (i.e. the weight is distributed over your butt while the torque is huge thru your knee due to the distance of the wt deviation from your knee). Then your argument has validity. Especially taking into account the fact that load is greater and switching direction applies great torque strain. However, very few people squat this way. If you look at a typical powerlifting squat, they lean far enough forward so that the weight is pretty well distributed directly over the knee rather than the butt. So therefore the lever arm is not loaded and torque is minimal. See what I mean.

So I guess the important point is what type of squat you are doing determines depth. I have never back squatted too much lower than parallel (unless Im doing front squats-again because of the upright position and the torque strain on the knee at parallel when completely upright). By going to parallel I have enough forward lean to avoid excessive torque on the knee joint. Ive always found that full back squats bother my spine as well as limit the loading (which is very important to me...what can I say, like being strong - but before people chime in and say Im an ego lifter I am anything but that).

In the end, as usual, the answers are much more complex than we want them to be!

29

To Jason Braswell: Its funny, but I just re-read the Zatsiorsky chapter dealing with this last night. I will try to write this from memory. The Zatsiorsky study looked at the carry over in strength from an isometric leg extension to squat performance. Two angles were studied – 70 deg. and 130 deg. (180 deg. is a straightened leg). The 70 deg. angle (i.e., past parallel and at the approximate point where the least force is generated) caused a strength gain carry-over at all angles. Isometric training at 130 deg. (i.e., a 1/4 squat) had a force gain carry-over that was highest in the angles trained and much lower in the non-trained angles. The average strength gain in the squat was was significantly higher for the 70 deg. trained group versus the 130 deg. trained group. I seem to recall that the transfer for the 70 deg. group was .42 versus .30 for the 130 deg. group. The conclusion I would draw from this is that if strengthen the force generation at the weakest angle you will improve strength throughout the range of motion – hey wait!! Isn’t that what powerlifters and in particular the WSB club have been doing for years?

30

I agree with John (assuming that I understand his post) that there is a time and place for both full squats and for 1/2 squats. Clearly an OWL should perform a large amount of their time performing full squats because the clean and snatch are both caught in a full squat position. But what about PL’s? They are only required to drop to parallel in their sport. Moreover, a PL squat stresses the posterior chain more than an OL high-bar squat. One of the reasons bandied about for full squatting is that it will correct imbalances between the quads and hamstrings (see Poliquin) since the below parallel position requires greater activation of the posterior chain. So maybe OL style high-bar lifters require deep squats for full development and correction of “imbalances” more than PL’ers. Also, when is the last time you saw a volleyballer or basketball player drop below parallel to jump? These athletes require strength primarily in the 90 deg. plus range. This is not to say that some of their GPP training should not be spent performing full-squats, but my guess is that not more than 15-25% of their squatting should be performed in this manner.

Bottom line, in the realm of both body building and sports both 1/2 and full squats (and 1/4 squats for that matter) have their place.

31

John, I’ve been researching for things to support the following opinion, but can’t find anything specific. Now, nothing so far that you’ve written has raised an eyebrow, in fact, I owe so much to you for all your efforts. Anyway, while I do agree that a basketball player would benefit from parallel squats because that’s the range of motion he most often uses, my gut tends to agree with what Matt had to say in regards to training the full ROM at least part of the time. With any sport, especially basketball, anything can happen. I have landed funny and have had to squat into a bigger ROM than parellel to support myself … so then wouldn’t I want to concentrate at least part of my training to accomodate everything? And after reading the recent “Heavy Metal” article, Ian King praises squats for not only working the legs, but also so many stablizers, the trunk, etc., which will add to your overall mass and strength. I’m still searching on something for this, but Matt’s citations seem pretty damn good about strength ratios. Thanks so much for all your input.

32

How deep should explosive athletes squat? I’ve always been going to parallel and was thinking of doing some westside style squatting and the vertical leap workout from a previous issue. My main goals are to increase my vertical leap and 40 time.

33

HardcoreMF, yeah I remember doing the same thing, so I started squatting ass to grass just to make SURE I wasn’t cheating myself. Then there’s always the looks you get when you do a full squat, that should be reason enough (LOL). Growth, I totally agree. There’s more to getting into good condition for a sport than training yourself for what you plan on happening. No football player wants to end up in full squat position somehow with 4-5 guys piled up on him, but what if he does? Now I will say that partial range squats are appropriate sometimes, as JB made a good point in that you can use greater overload if you only go through part of your ROM. PL’ers only go to parallel in competition, so in the last part of their cycle they’ll want to do parallel squats exclusively… but in the first part of their cycle I think they could really benefit from a full range squat, for injury prevention down the road if nothing else. But when you see guys doing partials in the gym, do you think they’re doing it with a purpose in mind, or are they just trying to stroke their ego? Probably the latter.

34

One of the things that compounds the confusion with respect to squatting depth is why is the trainee squatting? Is it for body building, maximal strength, sports etc. If it is for sport, then it really depends on at least two factors – first, the training age of the athlete and second the specificity of the movement. In fact, Zatsiorsky tackles this question on pp. 153-154 of “The Science and Practice of Strength Training” (lest you think I am a genius and came up with this on my own):

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SQUATTING OR SEMISQUATTING?

A conditioning coach recommended exercises for the enhancement of leg extensor strength for six groups of athletes – elite, intermediate, and beginning volleyball players and ski jumpers. The elite and intermediate athletes had proper weight training experience including squatting with a barbell. The beginning athletes were only slightly accustomed to these exercises. The exercise the coach considered were squatting with a barbell, semi-squatting, leg press against weight and leg press against isokinetic resistance. [The coach] then analyzed the following pros and cons:

– Exercise specificity. Ski jumpers perform takeoffs from a deep squat position; volleyball players almost nover jump for height from deep squats.

– Force-posture relationships. Athletes are able to lift a greater load using a semi-squat versus squat technique . . . . When full squats are performed the top effort is required only when the knees are deeply bent. However, at the range of joint motion specific to a volleyball takeoff, the leg extension force generated during full squats is far from maximal. . . .

– Load impsed on lumbar and spine and injury risk. These are highest in semisquatting [!!!] (because of the extremely high load) average in squats, and minamal in leg presses.

After consideration, the coach recommneded the following (percentage of sets):

Volleyball players

Elite: 60% Semisquats
25% Squats
15% Leg Press (against weight)

Inter: 30% semisquats 40% squats 30% Leg press (against weight)

Begin: 0% semisquats [!!!] 25% squats 75% leg press (40% weight/35% isokinetic)

Ski jumpers

Elite: 20% semisquats
50% squats
30% leg press (against weight)

Inter: 10% semisquats 50% squats 40% leg press (against weight)

Begin: [exactly the same as the begining volleyballer]

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interstingly, according to Zatsiorsky's example it is the 1/2 squat that poses the greatest risk of injury and is the more sports-specific type exercise (evidenced by the fact that beginners in both sports use the same routine with full squatting and no semi-squats and that even intermediate VB players full squat more than they 1/2 squat).

Any thoughts/comments? Note, the quoted example went only to sports and made no comment with respect to bodybuilding. Obviously full squatting limits the force generated. Of course more muscle groups are activated in a full squat. However, greater total force is generated in a 1/2 squat (due to the greater loads) but fewer muscle groups are activated. I have to believe that the total work generated (force x distance) in a 1/2 squat is greater than the total work generated in full squat (the force would be higher in the 1/2 squat and the distance traveled would be higher in the full squat) – but the question remains, is there a correlation between total work and hypertrophy? Comments? Thoughts?

35

Matt, thanks for the research! Great excerpt.

36

Yes, John, I agree that possible exceptions to the deep squat rule include training for a sport that requires no force production in the extreme position. (I almost mentioned that with my last post, but I was worried the post was getting a bit long.) For me personally, I use full squats because, dammit, I just want to be strong everywhere! It’s a good point, though.
As for your second comment, I guess I’ll have to give you that one. I thought about that after I posted the message later that night, and I figured you might get me on it. I usually try to keep my torso upright unless I’m just trying to hoist as much weight as possible, but you’re surely correct that in a standard powerlifting squat, the longest lever arm is from the hip, not from the knee. However, I think the other points concerning potential dangers of squatting to parallel only have some force. I have no idea what the final “total” stress on the knee joint would be as a result of the interplay of all those factors, though. (I guess the factors wouldn’t come into play at all if the bar was directly over the knee, as the lever arm would be zero, but I doubt that’s the case.) Anyway, in conclusion, it would be nice to see some more research investigating all of this.