[quote]I might ask you the same thing. Do you recommend everyone use a belt, then? Is it necessary to have a medical degree to make general statements? Where, then, did YOU go to medical school?
[/quote]
I marvel at your ability to misread. When did I say anything about medical school or MDs?
Again, he’s maxing at 255, not 225. If you can’t read the initial post, why should I waste time correcting your response?
I recommended a belt because it will help stabilize his torso, improving his form and increasing his max. The routine I wrote involves maximal weights, and it would be very poor indeed to leave the belt at home on that day.
Further, he can do any variety of movements to isolate and strengthen the lower back after this, but squat workouts won’t do diddly shit for quads and hams if back weakness cuts the sets in half.
I’ve read in numerous articles (and have seen from experiece) that full squats where you go rock bottom puts your lower back in a bad position for your back. I’ve seen it in people squatting rock bottom their lower backs curl instead of staying straight.
When I mean rock bottom, I mean down to a catchers position.
[quote]KnightRT wrote:
Vic:
I recommended a belt because it will help stabilize his torso, improving his form and increasing his max. The routine I wrote involves maximal weights, and it would be very poor indeed to leave the belt at home on that day.
Further, he can do any variety of movements to isolate and strengthen the lower back after this, but squat workouts won’t do diddly shit for quads and hams if back weakness cuts the sets in half.
DI [/quote]
But, if he wears a belt it will only encourage back weakness, prevent proper development of stabalizers, and encourage bad motor patterns.
Belts are a crutch. I recently read Stuart McGill’s back performance book, and there wasn’t much positive to say about belts. They inhibit development of proper core strength and motor patterns, encourage injury during times when the belt is not worn, and injuries sustained while wearing belts tend to be more severe. He also said that they are most helpful when a person is using bad lifting technique, so if you were lifting properly to begin with the usefulness of the belt would be negated. He did make exceptions for cases where a person absolutely needs to lift a few more pounds (i.e., weightlifter or powerlifter in competition), where the belt may provide some advantage, but that’s not really the situation here. Those guys already have super-strong cores and (one would hope) good technique. Even max effort days for a non-competitive lifter should not require a belt. Remember we are talking about a basketball player here.
Using a belt during squat workouts to make up for a weak back is insane. Why plaster over a weakness and become even more imbalanced and susceptible to injury? Take the back out of the squats and it’s never going to catch up! If your core isn’t up to what you’re squatting, you have no business using a belt to make up for it! That’s putting ego before safety. If a weak back cuts the sets in half, too damn bad… Your body’s trying to tell you something! Live with half the sets, focus on technique and do extra work to bring up the back until you can squat that weight safely.
We already have a weightbelt- all the muscles that stabalize the spine during lifting. It’s much better, and safer, to condition them properly and learn how to use them.
[quote]ZEB wrote:
I have not read all of the posts, so forgive me if this was mentioned prior: Do not squat parallel! Do a full squat. You will engage many more of your “jumping” muscles this way. And believe it or not a full squat is safer than a partial squat.
Also, forget about how much weight you are using. Just do the movement correctly and regularly and you will have great gains!
Take care,
Zeb[/quote]
Why?
The biomechanics of the ass to the grass squat look nothing like a vertical jump. Unless he does ass to the grass vertical jumps…
just curious
[quote]naturalatlas82 wrote:
I’ve read in numerous articles (and have seen from experiece) that full squats where you go rock bottom puts your lower back in a bad position for your back. I’ve seen it in people squatting rock bottom their lower backs curl instead of staying straight.
When I mean rock bottom, I mean down to a catchers position.
Just my .02 cents[/quote]
I know exactly what you mean, where a guy bottoms out to the extent that his hips and knees can flex and then the butt curls under while the low-back rounds?
That’s bad, and the danger of squatting deep to your back is directly related to how much you flex your spine. As long as you keep the spine neutral, the stress on the low back does not increase significantly as you go deeper.
IMO, any sensible definition of “full squat” or “deep squat” has to assume that you keep the back neutral through the whole ROM. If you have to break form to go lower, don’t go lower. If you still need to go lower, then work on flexibility so you can do it safely.
I think anyone who squats should get a feel for what a neutral spine feels like through a full ROM. Activate all the muscles in your core to brace the spine in a neutral position while you’re lifting. Get used to what this feels like and keep it tight. Don’t think you’re using proper form, develop an awarness that lets you know when you are and are not lifting properly.
I like to practice bodyweight squats with one hand on my stomach and one on my low back so I can feel if/when I’m bending my spine instead of my hips (you’ll probably be surprised). Get used to what a properly set spine feels like, and what it feels like when you start to round. It’s a learning process, but it’s been worth the effort to develop an instinctual feel for my back at all points in the lift, and also what it shouldn’t feel like so I know when I’m losing form.
[quote]The_Incubator wrote:
But, if he wears a belt it will only encourage back weakness, prevent proper development of stabalizers, and encourage bad motor patterns.
Nick[/quote]
Using a belt only on your heaviest sets will still allow for the development of stabilisers and motor patterns although I personally don’t bother as I am injury free, have a strong back from ignoring all that straight back bullshit designed for those with injuries, not the population as a whole and am relatively untrained so am not putting the same stress on my body that CT or Dave Tate does. There is a difference, believe me.
This is a key point. How many people have you seen with truly good squat form? Further, how many tall people?
I’ve squatted for four years and I still find points of form that I could improve. In that span, I’ve seen two people squat correctly. Simply having the belt around the stomach to push against is a mental reinforcement to keep the back arch and tense the gut, even if the belt pressure itself is negligible. This is apparent in those I train, who seem to adapt to the movement more quickly and with better confidence with than without.
I’d like to clarify further than I’m not recommending belt use ALL the time, merely on those days where potential for injury is greatest.
Why?
The biomechanics of the ass to the grass squat look nothing like a vertical jump. Unless he does ass to the grass vertical jumps…
just curious[/quote]
No, when vertically jumping, you don’t descend into a full squat. But, then again, you also don’t descend into a parallel squat either. If you did, you’d be spending way too much time on the ground. The amortization phase, or the time it takes for the eccentric to concentric portion of the jump to take place occurs within hundredths of a second. A quarter squat best resembles an actual vertical jump. Obviously, these wouldn’t help an athlete much, since they only hit the posterior chain in a very limited manner; While, on the other hand, full squats hit the posterior chain completely, and like nothing else. They also improve flexibility, which is another factor that makes them very athelete oriented.
On a side note, I had a pretty good workout at the gym today, did some somewhat heavy full squats. First, I warmed up with 1 set of 8 leg curls, leg extensions, and back extensions. I did it as a superset, and it really got me warm. Here’s the workout (Burried Squats)…
155 x 5
175 x 5
185 x 5
195 x 5
225 x 6 (Parallel)
I did some leg pressing and bulgarian split squats as well. Tommorow, I’ve got some reverse hyperextensions and jump roping to surmount. At the start of this thread, I wanted to improve my squat into the 300 range, right now, I want to just improve my full squat and do it with good form.