Squat-ATG VS PARALLEL

[Bodybygamma]

Originally Posted by Bodybygamma

This has nothing to do with this thread, but I just felt like ranting. The problem is too many people don't actually compete, so you have all these professional a-hole critics always bashing someone else's style of lifting. What bamazav said is right on. Its all about form and purpose.

No matter what you do you should strive for perfect form. Now from varies based on a persons body type and accommodating leverages and can only be perfected with in the 80+% to be truly of use. Good technique is one that holds through for what ever your purposes are. If your a body builder and do cheat curls but control the top contraction and that is your purpose then your ok. If your not contracting then your not building any muscle your conditioning its fast twitch fibers with speed work.

The bro science goes something like this on the rate from slow to fast: bodybuilding(slow-controlled movements), powerlifting(medium-fast movements), olympic lifting(fast as possible).

Both powerlifting and olympic lifting focus more on acceleration, but being bulky and having static strength still will help in powerlifting, as olympic lifting it is a hinderance.For bodybuilding your focusing on the shape and size of the muscle so everything is primarily contraction work. If you a gym rat then you do what fits your goals.

Same principles with atg squats, wide squats, narrow squats, high bar, low bar, its all variations relative to ones goals. So set your goals first then pick what is most appropriate to them.

Fact of the matter is, anything done right will work, everything done wrong won't.

Another thing in terms of depth also is flexibility and muscle conditioning for more info read here:

Stretching and Strength! The Real Reasons Heavy Lifters Can’t Stretch | Muscle and Brawn Bodybuilding, Powerlifting and Muscle Building.

[Bodybygamma]

“Russian Olympic weightlifters avoid full range movements of the muscles surrounding the hip and knee joints. Too much flexibility in that area makes the lifter sink too deep when he is getting under the barbell. The same is true for powerlifting.” So basically go as low as you need to. Just don't quarter squat and say you legitimately squatted that much. But ask Jaime from Chaos and pain and ask him if quarter squats aint worth squat. Or even better Ricky Bruch

[Kyle Aaron]

Originally Posted by CoopDawg

I have been reading alot about ATG being really bad for the knees when going heavy,

I note that by "heavy" I assume you're meaning relative to the individual's strength. I don't claim to know about 300kg squats, I'm talking here about the typical person I have coming to my gyms, where it is rare to see a twice a person's bodyweight on the barbell.

I have heard of the dangers of deep squats many times, including from exercise physiologists. None have been able to tell me exactly the nature of the injury risked by deep squats.

I can tell you about the injuries risked by bench-pressing, by improper deadlifting, by "power curls", by kipping pullups, and so on. And exercise physiologists and the like can tell us in greater detail than me.

But nobody can tell me exactly what bad things are supposed to be happening to the knees during deep heavy squats. They start talking about forces etc, when I ask which muscle or ligament is going to tear, they cannot tell me. Nor can they give examples of healthy individuals who have been injured while performing deep squats with correct technique.

In gyms I get many people come to me, I say, "we'll start you out with a simple bodyweight squat, let's see how you do it."
"Squats hurt my knees."
"Show me how you squat."
They stand with feet shoulder-width apart, kneel down onto their toes, and their knees collapse inwards. Since they're bending their knee in a way it's not designed to bend, I'm not surprised it hurts. I then teach them correct squatting technique and it's almost alway okay - the only exceptions so far have been one guy who'd had a botched knee reconstruction and the femur and tibia were in direct contact, and another guy who had arthritis.

As for how deep to go, I would observe that sitting in a parallel squat position against the wall is used as a punishment in the military, whereas sitting in a deep squat is done every day by about 3 billion Asians and Africans.



The parallel squat causes pain, the deep squat is used as relaxation. In general, pain is the sign of an increased risk of injury, that's the way our bodies work. So I say: go deep.

It's quite right to consider a person's goals when thinking of which exercises to perform, and how to perform them. Looking at the typical gym-goer we have to consider first of basic health. Good health is the basis of good looks and good performance. So what about the health of the beginner? Our bodies don't only adapt to what we do in the gym, but to our day-to-day lives as well. Our Western society is a seated society, we sit down for work, sit down for transport, and sit down for leisure. Our bodies adapt to that. Our hamstrings are unused but tight, our glutes and abdominals are unused. As a result we get anterior pelvic tilt, lower back pain, torn hamstrings in sports with vertical jumping, and so on.

So the problem is that our abs, glutes and hams are weak. Abs are a postural muscle, best worked by maintaining posture - if you can stand up straight with even 40kg on your back, you can stand up straight with no weight. As for glutes and hams, they are hip extensors - they straighten the leg at the hip. In a bicep curl, the biceps are worked more going from straight out to bent right up than those half-curls you see. Likewise, the more the hip is flexed the more the glutes and hams are worked.

Tight hamstrings will also be more loosened by a deep squat than a shallow one. I have a client who began at 165kg bodyweight, with no stretching except a few times after a workout to lessen DOMS, he has improved his mobility so that he can now touch his toes. How? Deep squats.

Thus, deep heavy squats will strengthen the muscles made weak by our Western seated lifestyle, improving our posture, and improve joint mobility. Parallel squats will not strengthen nor loosen those muscles as much. Deep squats mean we use weak muscles. This is why most people avoid deep squats - they're bloody hard. They would rather use their strong muscles than their weak. Thus the legions of bench press and curlz boyz in the gym.

[Abaddon]

^Great post Kyle. Repped.

[Kyle Aaron]

Thanks Abaddon. In answer to your question about what I thought of your becoming an exercise physiologist, my answer is that as with all things, it depends on your goals. What sort of job do you want to do afterwards?

Commonly EPs are against deep squats

[Bodybygamma]

Originally Posted by Kyle Aaron

I note that by "heavy" I assume you're meaning relative to the individual's strength. I don't claim to know about 300kg squats, I'm talking here about the typical person I have coming to my gyms, where it is rare to see a twice a person's bodyweight on the barbell.

I have heard of the dangers of deep squats many times, including from exercise physiologists. None have been able to tell me exactly the nature of the injury risked by deep squats.

I can tell you about the injuries risked by bench-pressing, by improper deadlifting, by "power curls", by kipping pullups, and so on. And exercise physiologists and the like can tell us in greater detail than me.

But nobody can tell me exactly what bad things are supposed to be happening to the knees during deep heavy squats. They start talking about forces etc, when I ask which muscle or ligament is going to tear, they cannot tell me. Nor can they give examples of healthy individuals who have been injured while performing deep squats with correct technique.

In gyms I get many people come to me, I say, "we'll start you out with a simple bodyweight squat, let's see how you do it."
"Squats hurt my knees."
"Show me how you squat."
They stand with feet shoulder-width apart, kneel down onto their toes, and their knees collapse inwards. Since they're bending their knee in a way it's not designed to bend, I'm not surprised it hurts. I then teach them correct squatting technique and it's almost alway okay - the only exceptions so far have been one guy who'd had a botched knee reconstruction and the femur and tibia were in direct contact, and another guy who had arthritis.

As for how deep to go, I would observe that sitting in a parallel squat position against the wall is used as a punishment in the military, whereas sitting in a deep squat is done every day by about 3 billion Asians and Africans.



The parallel squat causes pain, the deep squat is used as relaxation. In general, pain is the sign of an increased risk of injury, that's the way our bodies work. So I say: go deep.

It's quite right to consider a person's goals when thinking of which exercises to perform, and how to perform them. Looking at the typical gym-goer we have to consider first of basic health. Good health is the basis of good looks and good performance. So what about the health of the beginner? Our bodies don't only adapt to what we do in the gym, but to our day-to-day lives as well. Our Western society is a seated society, we sit down for work, sit down for transport, and sit down for leisure. Our bodies adapt to that. Our hamstrings are unused but tight, our glutes and abdominals are unused. As a result we get anterior pelvic tilt, lower back pain, torn hamstrings in sports with vertical jumping, and so on.

So the problem is that our abs, glutes and hams are weak. Abs are a postural muscle, best worked by maintaining posture - if you can stand up straight with even 40kg on your back, you can stand up straight with no weight. As for glutes and hams, they are hip extensors - they straighten the leg at the hip. In a bicep curl, the biceps are worked more going from straight out to bent right up than those half-curls you see. Likewise, the more the hip is flexed the more the glutes and hams are worked.

Tight hamstrings will also be more loosened by a deep squat than a shallow one. I have a client who began at 165kg bodyweight, with no stretching except a few times after a workout to lessen DOMS, he has improved his mobility so that he can now touch his toes. How? Deep squats.

Thus, deep heavy squats will strengthen the muscles made weak by our Western seated lifestyle, improving our posture, and improve joint mobility. Parallel squats will not strengthen nor loosen those muscles as much. Deep squats mean we use weak muscles. This is why most people avoid deep squats - they're bloody hard. They would rather use their strong muscles than their weak. Thus the legions of bench press and curlz boyz in the gym.

Good flip side of the coin for all the "mortals" and normal people I always forget about.

[Carl1174]

Another point - full range of motion = full development. How many other exercises do you see people doing with only half the range of motion? Okay so somtimes they are done by bodybuilders wanting to concentrate on aesthetics, but its not recommended as the norm. In gerneral we are told to use FULL ROM on our exercises as this recruites the most fibers and thus gives the best development. Most people with truly impressive leg development are in fact full squatters, or atleast to below parallel. Obviously there will be exceptions to the rule and there will be people who have only ever squatted 1/4 squats with big quads etc etc... but as a rule of thumb....

just my 2p worth

Carl.

[jwood]

This is a little off topic for this thread, but I thought I would throw it in here. My question is: Is it safe and healthy to have your heels raised like on a board on a plate while doing atg squats?

I tried this just with body weight about a week ago, and it was much easier for me to get down to a full squat position and I was still pushing through my heels. What do you guys think?

[glwanabe]

I squat in these, and I love them. I will never go back to regular shoes again for squatting. Oly shoes give me a hard stable platform to push from.



VS Athletics > Main Section

YouTube - VS Athletics Weight Lifting Shoe

YouTube - VS Athletics Weight Lifting Shoe

[BendtheBar]

Originally Posted by jwood

This is a little off topic for this thread, but I thought I would throw it in here. My question is: Is it safe and healthy to have your heels raised like on a board on a plate while doing atg squats?

I tried this just with body weight about a week ago, and it was much easier for me to get down to a full squat position and I was still pushing through my heels. What do you guys think?

Good question. Which I do not have the answer to...

I let my wife use a block. But I have never tried it. I would prefer a sloped piece of wood rather than a block or plate.