They actually raise your full BACK SQUAT!
They give you a core of granite. They improve your posture .
You can go literally ass to grass with them plus you remain upright and you can hardly cheat on them and .They help your olympic lifts as well.
Perosanlly i consider front squats a better indicator of leg/hip/overall strength than back squats.
Front squat is a personal favourite for sure 
good job stating the obvious
Amen to that son
My favourite too
[quote]JimmyJamesMD wrote:
good job stating the obvious[/quote]
At least he actually gets the obvious. A couple weeks ago, I had someone come up to me I was doing my squats wrong, and that the bar was supposed to be behind my head. After telling him I was doing front squats, he was bewildered as to why I would be doing them, when there are already the normal back squats that I could have been doing instead.
[quote]JimmyJamesMD wrote:
good job stating the obvious[/quote]
No kidding. Where has he been for the last 80 years or so? I mean, he’s from Greece, where one of the best Olympic lifters reigns from!!! If you just heard about front squats, there must be a million other things you’re missing out on! 
They aren’t the best strength indacator at all. The low-bar backsquat is.
Show me one man who can frontsquat 1000+ lbs.
Haha, i know… pyrros is a genetic freak. He squatted 250kg @ the ironmind tapes easily :o
Actually my intention was to state the obvious
I think improving your posture in your everyday life is the single most important benefit.
I’ve also found them far easier on my screwed back (disc damage). I can now front squat 286lbs for doubles with little pain, which is far more than I would be able to back squat without putting my back out for ages.
[quote]Roy wrote:
They aren’t the best strength indacator at all. The low-bar backsquat is.
Show me one man who can frontsquat 1000+ lbs.[/quote]
no, you are very wrong. Powerlifters do low bar squats (with suits) to improve leverage, to shorten the lever arm (from the hip) as much as possible, so the force requirements to get the weight up is as small as possible.
Front squatting lengthens your lever arm considerably so the torque needed to move the weight is MUCH greater than back squats.
Thats just simple biomechanics and physics.
Although, most people avoid front squat. (because it’s so friggin tough on your core + you need to swallow your ego) They never take the time to practice and learn the front squat, they never perfect the intramuscular coordination , hence the can’t express their strength with them.
Plus you recover more rapidly with front squats and they give you nice quads as well. They are invaluable for athletics as well
I feel both the Front and Back squat are great indicators of strength. It’s difficult to say one is better than the other. It’s the simple fact that most athletes do not perform the back squat properly or all the same as each other. When one athlete says he back squats 405X1 and one says he back squats 495X1, there?s so many variables in the exercise, you could argue the athlete that squats the 405X1 was actually doing more work.
Is it low bar or high bar? Close stance or wide stance? Quarter squat, what he thinks is a parallel squat, an actual parallel squat or a full squat? It’s so hard to compare numbers unless seen in person. Where the full squat is a little easier to judge, from experience I see athletes will squat lower with the front squat, just from the nature of the exercise and as well posture is kept throughout the exercise because if it isn’t your falling or dropping the weight.
If all variables are kept the same, both lifts are great indicators of strength.
[quote]acidhell wrote:
Roy wrote:
They aren’t the best strength indacator at all. The low-bar backsquat is.
Show me one man who can frontsquat 1000+ lbs.
no, you are very wrong. Powerlifters do low bar squats (with suits) to improve leverage, to shorten the lever arm (from the hip) as much as possible, so the force requirements to get the weight up is as small as possible.
Front squatting lengthens your lever arm considerably so the torque needed to move the weight is MUCH greater than back squats.
Thats just simple biomechanics and physics.
Although, most people avoid front squat. (because it’s so friggin tough on your core + you need to swallow your ego) They never take the time to practice and learn the front squat, they never perfect the intramuscular coordination , hence the can’t express their strength with them.
Plus you recover more rapidly with front squats and they give you nice quads as well. They are invaluable for athletics as well
[/quote]
Dude, the front squat is a good exercise. So is a regular squat. If you like front squats more, that is great for you.
But you don’t have to knock down the classic back squat. If the front squat is a better test of strength, why isn’t it used in powerlifting meats?
It’s OK to like both front and back squats. Some prefer one over the other, but you don’t have to make a point to claim how much greater one lift is over the other.
Good points from everyone. I am competitive lifter and crush a lot of people in meets.
I love the front squat for assistance work- it gives diversity to the workouts and is a very solid multijoint exercise which goes into GPP involvement, ROM, and great carryover to both the DL and SQ.
European lifters obviously do much more narrow lifting and they are better for them than a Westside, widestance, monolift, demin wearing lifter.
Gear wont help a front squat much so that is also why people dont do them, their real RAW strength is not that impressive, or the exercise crushes your lungs, tough on the lowerback…
I can squat 3X bdwt with single ply poly gear, I can only front squat 2X…I need to work on my weaknesses.
[quote]acidhell wrote:
Roy wrote:
They aren’t the best strength indacator at all. The low-bar backsquat is.
Show me one man who can frontsquat 1000+ lbs.
no, you are very wrong. Powerlifters do low bar squats (with suits) to improve leverage, to shorten the lever arm (from the hip) as much as possible, so the force requirements to get the weight up is as small as possible.
Front squatting lengthens your lever arm considerably so the torque needed to move the weight is MUCH greater than back squats.
Thats just simple biomechanics and physics.
Although, most people avoid front squat. (because it’s so friggin tough on your core + you need to swallow your ego) They never take the time to practice and learn the front squat, they never perfect the intramuscular coordination , hence the can’t express their strength with them.
Plus you recover more rapidly with front squats and they give you nice quads as well. They are invaluable for athletics as well
[/quote]
[quote]T.J. wrote:
I feel both the Front and Back squat are great indicators of strength. It’s difficult to say one is better than the other. It’s the simple fact that most athletes do not perform the back squat properly or all the same as each other. When one athlete says he back squats 405X1 and one says he back squats 495X1, there?s so many variables in the exercise, you could argue the athlete that squats the 405X1 was actually doing more work.
Is it low bar or high bar? Close stance or wide stance? Quarter squat, what he thinks is a parallel squat, an actual parallel squat or a full squat? It’s so hard to compare numbers unless seen in person. Where the full squat is a little easier to judge, from experience I see athletes will squat lower with the front squat, just from the nature of the exercise and as well posture is kept throughout the exercise because if it isn’t your falling or dropping the weight.
If all variables are kept the same, both lifts are great indicators of strength.[/quote]
good post
Indeed.
Most people down a gym don’t even back squat properly let alone front squat properly.
I see NO ONE front squat.
But yes front squating is an awesome exercise.
Try over head squats for some more fun, now that is a rare sight to see in any gym.
Koing
I just started training at an oly lifting gym to learn the c&j and snatch, and the front and overhead squats are humbling.
It will be a blast to gain some proficiency in them.
[quote]Koing wrote:
Indeed.
Most people down a gym don’t even back squat properly let alone front squat properly.
I see NO ONE front squat.
But yes front squating is an awesome exercise.
Try over head squats for some more fun, now that is a rare sight to see in any gym.
Koing[/quote]
I’ve literally seen maybe 3 or 4 people squatting at my gym in nearly 2 years. Only 1 of them was doing them to around parallel and using 225. The rest were some smaller guys doine half squats with like 15 per side. Front squats are unheard of. IMO they are the hardest exercise for me. They tax me like no other. I have a love/hate relationship with them. haha.
Just finished a workout:
Power Cleans, Pc from hang
Push Presses
Front Squats 285lbs, 3X3 @ BW 180lbs!
Great exercise
[quote]Koing wrote:
Indeed.
Most people down a gym don’t even back squat properly let alone front squat properly.
I see NO ONE front squat.
But yes front squating is an awesome exercise.
Try over head squats for some more fun, now that is a rare sight to see in any gym.
Koing[/quote]
Koing, I see you posting here more often…it is because your regular site is temporarily down?
Yeah man Front Squats are freaking awesome!! And at my gym (going there for 1 1/5 years now) I have yet to see somebody front squat. A couple of guys have done good back squats. Then a few other do Squat Rack Curls…
Although front squats are great, my personal favorite is the Overhead Squat.
i find that i can’t do heavy front squats becuase either my grip starts to hurt my wrists or myshoulder bone starts to kill…