That’s just how it is: there is no perfect exercise. When an exercise has been praised for years (even decades), sooner or later scientists come forward with experimental results claiming that this long-respected and supposedly safe exercise is in some way harmful to the skeleton and not recommended after all. Whatever the case, today I intend to write about the squat again, in more depth.
True, a lot has been written about this exercise, and probably even more has been said. Here on fitness.ee, too, a three-part article on the squat, translated by me, appeared a couple of years ago. It is thorough, so thorough that you might ask what else there is left to know about this exercise??? Of course, there is nothing fundamentally new to add, but in the meantime a number of insights and experiences have emerged that help to unpack the nature of the squat as an exercise even more thoroughly. I will also look at the different ways to squat and the risks of practicing each of them.
What prompted me to write this article at all is that quite a few trainees probably still don’t know that squatting is not just squatting. There are many ways to squat, and a squat can load our body, its various muscles and joints, quite differently. I believe every educated gym-goer should know what works, or what is being loaded, when I squat this way, or where the emphasis of the training load falls when I squat a little differently.
I titled this piece the way you may have read it because, true, there is no perfect exercise, and how we squat is a matter of choice. Perfect in the sense that every exercise loads some joints more and others less when we train. The effect is even more pronounced when we train with heavy weights. The same goes for the squat, and that is what I want to reflect on.
It is clear that nobody should doubt the importance of the squat any more. I certainly don’t; it is the king of all exercises. I do have a leg extension machine, a leg press and a hack squat machine, but I can credit 2/3 of my leg development to the squat and only the squat… that is a plain fact. So leaving the squat out of training plans altogether is out of the question. That’s how it is for me, but surely very many other trainees feel the same.
It has long been known that you can squat in many ways, and there are plenty of squat variations too. But sticking with the traditional squat (bar on the upper back), we can talk about two different ways of squatting… the powerlifters’ squat and the classic lifters’ squat (you could probably call it the bodybuilders’ squat too). Many people (especially those just starting out in training) may not know that with these two squat variants the emphasis of the training load falls on different muscles, and on different joints as well.
In the powerlifter’s squat, the bar sits lower on the back, not so much on the “neck. The stance is wider than shoulder width, and the weight is squatted up more by the hip extensors (the glutes and the back of the thigh, plus the spinal erectors, the extensors of the spine). If you compare the actual work done when squatting wide in powerlifting style versus in a more upright position, then in powerlifting style you have to travel down with the weight considerably less than when squatting upright (in order to achieve a squat that meets the rules).
The more you squat in an upright position, letting your knees travel past your toes at the same time, the more the quadriceps are loaded during the squat. For the squat to meet the definition of a squat, with a high bar position and an upright body position you have to do considerably more work and squat down deeper. At first glance this second variant might seem especially good for bodybuilders, but here lies the real dilemma, because not everything can always be treated so straightforwardly… first, which muscles you want to prioritize training with the squat, and second, injuries and how much training load you let the squat place on which joints.
Much has been said about proper squat technique. A very brief description of the most common safe squatting technique might go like this: the bar sits on the middle of the trapezius, feet shoulder-width apart and parallel or toes turned slightly outward, eyes forward. When starting the squat, you first push your hips (butt) back, your back must be straight or arched, the knees travel parallel or slightly outward, the knees should not go noticeably past the toes. At the bottom you must not bounce, and when coming up out of the squat we should push mainly through the heels.
For quite a few years I shared this view and thought it was the one and only correct one. And it is correct, of course. True, as a coach I still recommend a similar technique to young lifters. The technique described above is a relatively good option and safe for the joints (especially the knee joints). But as an active competitor, a bodybuilder who loves squatting and diligently experiments with it, I have by now realized that I can’t squat based on this technique description alone, and that in the pursuit of perfect development you always have to pay a toll somewhere.
When I decided in 2007, after a competition in Latvia, to train with somewhat heavier weights, I learned the squat variant described above as well. True, I have never been a wide-stance squatter, but I did get the hang of pushing the hips back and not letting the knees pass the toes. That was good… it was good, because before that I had squatted too, but had always let my knees travel quite far past the toes, and the emphasis during the squat was clearly on the knees. As a result I suffered a lot from knee injuries and from aches too. Since I stopped letting my knees go past the toes, I have not felt knee pain again. But that is only one side of the matter; the training load has to go somewhere. And it does… when you squat in powerlifting style, pushing the butt back (squatting from the hips) does take a large share of the load off the knees, but it falls instead on the hip joints (1). This, by the way, has been established repeatedly in scientific experiments. Likewise, if we squat so that the knees do not travel far past the toes, then our upper body has to lean forward all the more as we descend (to keep our balance and not fall over), but a greater forward lean of the torso in turn increases the negative shear forces on the vertebrae of the spine (1). So, you see, we face a dilemma… which joint(s) to load more??? Obviously, squatting from the hips with heavy weights for years isn’t healthy either. Having squatted seriously with heavy weights for only a couple of years, I experienced for myself how my hips started to crack with a dreadful sound, and ached from time to time.
I certainly don’t want to suggest with all this that, look, the squat is bad. Absolutely not… the squat is good and you have to squat, and as for the various ailments, I’ll simply say that whoever does the work will run into a few knocks… everything that moves wears out.
That’s not all. We bodybuilders have one more problem that comes with practicing the powerlifter-style squat, which is safer for the knees. It’s a disproportionately big butt, which I had the honor of experiencing myself :))). Moving big numbers felt great, and it numbed any sense of proportion. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t even a goal back then (2007–2008), but yes, the glutes were visibly filling out.
There’s one more important point. When I analyze it now, but also back during my heavy squatting period, I sometimes caught myself wondering: how curious that after squats my glutes and hamstrings are left insanely sore, yet the quadriceps always ends up only slightly sore after such effort and weights???
Well, the reason is obvious. When a man squats from the hips, off the posterior chain (hamstrings, glutes, but also the spinal erectors), the quadriceps is only minimally involved.
So how should we squat, all things considered??? If you squat with a wider stance, from the hips, with the bar low on the back, we do move heavier weights, but we put heavy emphasis on the hip joints. Also, with a restricted squat (the knees aren’t allowed past the toes and the shins stay almost vertical), the shifting of the vertebrae relative to each other and the negative loads on them increase (because we’re forced to lean the upper body forward more during the squat). The glutes also grow big.
But if we squat letting the knees travel past the toes, we do effectively load the front of the thigh and the glutes work less, but the load on the knee joint is very high. Unfortunately, the back doesn’t get off the hook with a more upright squat either. Since the bar position is then usually high too, the distance between the lower back and the bar grows and the lower back has to cope with bigger loads, especially when balance and technique already start to break down under the heavy weight. What to do and how to act, when it all seems bad one way or another???
This is where we need to discuss and analyze… what, for whom, how much and how??? Powerlifters, of course, squat the way they squat. That technique is fully justified too. So what if the squat range is shorter, and the top of the hip is lowered to the same level as the knees or slightly below, since the rules don’t require more. It’s mostly done with a wide stance and a pronounced backward movement of the hips. In powerlifters, the hip joints carry the heavy load. But on the topic of squat vs. hip joints vs. knee joints, it should be said that concentrating the emphasis of the load on the hips through the corresponding technique is all the more justified because the hip joints are able to cope with considerably greater loads than the knee joints. As for the size of the butt, powerlifters don’t care… their goal is simply to squat as much as possible within the rules.
So how should a bodybuilder squat, but also an ordinary trainee who wants to change the shape of their body???
It’s clear that a bodybuilder, who has to take the proportional development of different body areas into account, can’t always be guided by the squat technique described above, which is more common in the powerlifting world. There are two important aspects that a bodybuilder must follow when squatting in the interest of balanced development: first, the squat should ensure sufficient development of the quadriceps, and second, it’s important to squat in such a way that the glutes don’t get overloaded.
How can the aspects mentioned above be achieved when squatting??? There are ways, but obviously it isn’t possible to squat so that only the front of the thigh works and the glutes are completely out of the picture. The fact is that if we want to load the front of the thigh in particular, we have to let the knees travel past the toes during the squat and try to rise out of the squat by pressing through the balls of the feet. True, this contradicts many descriptions of squat technique, but that’s how it is. Otherwise we’ll grow ourselves mighty butts, which are neither useful nor aesthetic on a bodybuilding stage. Lately I too have been letting my knees travel past the toes when squatting, but of course with light weights and longer sets (15–30 repetitions, sometimes even more). I’ve been squatting like this for a year now and my knees haven’t given me any trouble so far. At the same time, it’s quite clear that you really have to stay moderate with the weight. In addition, I put a 2.5–3 cm block under my heels to shift the emphasis to the quadriceps even more. I’ll repeat once more: this squat technique (letting the knees go past the toes without restriction) only comes into question with light weights; otherwise, be prepared for knee injuries.
As for the glutes’ involvement in squatting, this is a bit more complicated. More complicated in the sense that it’s not possible to completely rule out glute involvement in the squat. Nor is there any need to rule it out completely, but if we squat twice a week, with heavy weights, very deep and with high volume, the rear end may start to swell excessively. It is, however, possible to regulate glute involvement in the squat to some extent. Glute activity during squatting depends directly on squat depth (2, 3). The deeper you squat, the more actively the glutes work, again established with the help of EMG.
None of this means that I recommend starting to do quarter squats. These can be done occasionally too, but really only occasionally and for variety.
To be continued…
Author: Janar Rückenberg
Come and train! ArtGym
