The Squat: You "Kneed" to Do This

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Good heavens, this is painful to look at.

(If you like, you can scroll down to the end of this article and watch a video related to this topic.)

You’re ready to squat - your lifting shoes are on, the barbell is situated on your rear delts in that snug, low bar position, and you’ve got your focal point nailed down. What’s next?

Reach back with your hips, point your chest down, and Shove. Your. Knees. Out.

When we say “shove your knees out,” we mean that your knees should go sideways. Of course, your knees will also go forward (after all, that’s what knees do when they bend in the squat), but we’re also going to shove them sideways. In other words, when you’ve taken your shoulder width stance with toes pointed roughly 30 degrees out, you’re simply going to point your knees (and thus your femurs) in the same direction as your toes. Simply put, your toes will act as arrows for your knees so that the knees go forward and out.

This . . . is much better.

When we do this - when we shove our knees out and keep them out as we squat down and back up again - we force our abductors and external rotators to perform the task of keeping our knees out - so we get to train that muscle mass - and this also allows our adductors (i.e., groin muscles) to contribute to coming back up again, so we get to train that muscle mass too, and it helps us lift more weight, so we can get . . . you know . . . stronger. Getting our knees out also has the added benefit of making it easier to achieve depth in the squat.

Lots of muscle mass, a long range of motion, and lots of weight lifted . . . these sound like three very nice criteria for a lift designed to help us get stronger.

As always, we hope this helps you get stronger and live better.

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