Squat Tip: Hips Back AND Chest Down

(A Blast from the Past article originally posted on 01/14/22)

Here’s a quick squat tip: When you initiate your squat by reaching back with your hips (i.e., your butt), you need to also point your chest at the floor (i.e., lean over). The converse is also true - when you point your chest at the floor, you need to reach back with your hips. 

Note that Tyler’s hips are traveling back while he points his chest at the floor.

These two movements - hips back and chest down - go hand-in-hand with each other, and if you briefly think about it, it will seem rather obvious why this is so. On one hand, if you reach back with your hips while trying to maintain an upright torso, you’ll fall over backward, which is rather unfortunate in any circumstance and especially when squatting with a barbell on your back. On the other hand, if you lean over (i.e., point your chest at the floor) without reaching back with your hips, you’ll fall over forward. Again - preposterous.

So remember, when you initiate your squat, if you’ve got a cue like one of the following running through your head . . .

• Hips back

• Butt back

• Reach backward

• Sit back

. . . it can be useful to also tell yourself one of the following cues . . .

• Chest down

• Lean over

• Point your chest at the floor 

This will help your balance, and it will also help you get into a position where you can effectively drive your hips out of the bottom of the squat.

We hope this helps you get stronger and live better!

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10 RULES to Make You a BETTER Squatter (2 Minutes!)

We cover 10 rules to help you get a bigger, better squat . . . right now.

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The BEST Squat Accessory Ever?!

What is the best squat accessory ever? Answer: The TUBOW. What is a TUBOW, you ask? Let’s quickly dive into that, as well as why and how you use one.

I also recommend watching the included video for a demonstration of how to use the TUBOW.

What is a TUBOW?
The TUBOW is a Terribly Useful Block Of Wood. It’s a 2-foot long block of 4” x 4” wood, and while you are welcome to use a section of 2” x 4” instead, I’d recommend sticking with 4” x 4” for stability. If you go to Lowe’s, Home Depot, or a similar big box home improvement store, you can often have them cut it to length for you, or you can cut it yourself. If you’d rather order one and not have to deal with any measuring or cutting, just click here, and you’ll be good to go.

Why Use a TUBOW?
Two common squat errors are 1) allowing the knees to continue traveling forward throughout the entire descent - thus ending up too far forward at the bottom of the squat - and 2) the lifter doesn’t allow the knees to move forward enough in the first half of the descent with the result being that the knees will eventually shoot forward at the bottom of the squat - resulting in problems with back angle and often balance as well.

The TUBOW solves these problems by giving the knees a target at which to aim. Using the TUBOW allows the lifter to set the knees’ correct position about one-third to one-half of the way into the descent. This makes sure that the knees go far enough forward at the right time while simultaneously ensuring that they don’t go too far forward.

How Do You Use a TUBOW? (hint: it’s not complicated)
First, position the TUBOW right at your toes - perhaps a half-inch or an inch in front of your toes depending on anthropometry (you’ll figure this out with practice). You can use one TUBOW or two.

Next (after unracking the bar and taking your squat stance), as you start your descent, cue your knee to touch the TUBOW lightly about one-third to one-half of the way into your descent. Again, touch it lightly - don’t knock it over.

After this, you simply keep your knee glued lightly to the TUBOW the rest of the way into your descent. Since the TUBOW won’t allow you to shove your knee any further forward, this will force you to reach back with your hips, and this, in turn, will force you to correctly lean over as you reach the bottom of the squat. The result is that, by fixing the knees’ position, we automatically fix the hips’ position and back angle as well. For this reason, we often refer to the TUBOW as the portable squat coach (especially useful for those who train without a coach).

Once you reach the bottom of the squat, drive your hips up out of the hole as normal.

A Second Benefit of the TUBOW
The TUBOW can also help fix the knees’ lateral position. You want your knees to travel in line with your toes, i.e., they shouldn’t be traveling inside of your toes (“valgus knees”), nor should they be traveling outside of your toes (“varus knees”). With the TUBOW in place, you now have a target for your knees, and this can help you fix any issues you might have with the lateral positioning of your knees.

Last Thing . . .
When needed, use the TUBOW during your warm-ups - don’t use it for your work sets (at heavy weights, the TUBOW will be a distraction). Also, don’t use the TUBOW forever - it’s a tool, not a crutch. Use it a few times to get the sense of where your knees should be, or use it if your suspect that your form has degraded over the past few sessions, but after that, use your brain to position your knees correctly. The TUBOW taught you how to control your knees - now it’s your turn to execute.

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

(Some links may be affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Testify earns from qualifying purchases.)

If you found this helpful, you’ll love our weekly email. It’s got useful videos, articles, and training tips just like the one in this article. Sign up below, and of course, if you don’t love it, you can unsubscribe at any time.

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How to Squat Heavy ALONE! | How to Fail a Squat Safely

When lifting weights, it's generally a good idea to not end up dead or - for that matter - even injured. With this in mind, let's quickly cover how to avoid getting yourself trapped under a heavy squat that you just failed.

Figure 1: For so many reasons, this is stupid. don’t spot like this.

Spotters are fantastic (when possible)
Ideally, when training, you don't want to fail a rep. You try to avoid it whenever possible, but sometimes these things happen, and in the squat, the best solution is to have spotters that you trust. Specifically, get two spotters, i.e., one on each side.

Forget the whole “spotter-behind-you” thing (Figure 1). It’s stupid, the back spotter is in a terribly mechanically disadvantaged position, and it’s a good way to get both you and your spotter injured. It can, however, make for viral “YouTube-fail” videos.

The video included in this article covers how to spot the squat as well as how to squat alone, so I’d recommend watching that.

The great thing about having spotters is this: the moment you start to fail, i.e, the moment you start to go back down, the spotters immediately take the bar. You don’t have to go all the way down to the pins.

figure 2: This is much better.

If you start to fail a rep, you only descend an inch or two, and your spotters step in and support the bar (Figure 2). At this point, you and your spotters - because you stay under the bar and never abandon your spotters - lift the barbell up and put it back in the rack.

What if you train alone?
Spotters are indeed great; however, if you often train alone (and I understand that as I usually do also), you need to be able to set the safeties (AKA “pins” or “crash bars”) correctly. Whether you’re using pin/pipe safeties, spotter arms, or even strap safeties, the concept and process are both quite simple:

Set the pins low enough that they don’t cause a problem but high enough that they save you from a problem.

The process is as follows:

Figure 3: Parker helps check for adequate clearance.

Step 1: Make sure the pins are low enough
As you’re warming up with the empty bar, look to the side at the bottom of the rep (don’t do this on a regular basis, but doing this a few times with the empty bar is fine). Make sure that, when you’re at the correct depth, you’ve still got a couple inches of clearance between the bar and the pins (Figure 3). You want a couple of inches (and not just a tiny sliver of space) because you need to be able to accidentally go a bit too deep on your squat and not immediately run into the safeties. Going an inch too deep on a squat happens every now and then, and running into the safeties makes the ascent much harder, so give yourself a little room.

figure 4: Parker helps me perform a practice fail.

Step 2: Practice failing a rep
Next, either with the empty bar or with a very light weight on the bar, do a “practice fail” (Figure 4). To do this, perform a couple of normal reps, and then on the third or perhaps fourth rep, go down, start coming back up an inch or two, pretend it’s too heavy, then simply relax your upper back, squat back down, and set the bar on the pins.

At this point, you’ll perform the COS (Crawl of Shame), and crawl out - either forward or backward - from underneath the barbell.

Don’t envision this - actually practice it. You need to know you are still safe in the even of a missed rep.

WARNING: STUPIDITY
I do NOT recommend ever dumping the bar backward off your back and onto the floor. I don’t recommend it with a high bar squat, and I certainly do not recommend it with the squat we teach, which is commonly referred to as a low bar squat. It’s a silly practice, requires a decent amount of nimbleness - which you may or may not possess when grinding out a challenging, exhausting rep - and lastly, it encourages you to quit on a rep that you very well might have been able to get if you had spotters or safeties that you trusted.

You’re welcome to dump it off your back if you like - it’s your life - but be forewarned that it’s stupid. At the very least, don’t do it in my gym.

Wrapping it up
Back to sanity . . . be sure to practice a failed rep, and then adjust the safeties accordingly if they are too low. Again, the safeties need to be low enough that they don't cause a problem but high enough that they save you from a problem.

Don't wait until it gets heavy to find out whether you've set them correctly.

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

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Starting Strength Squat Looks HORRIFYING, Here's Why

We posted a video a few weeks back, and some people were very concerned by one aspect of the squats they saw. What was it?

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FIVE Squat Mistakes You're Making with Your KNEES...

Let’s identify and fix - in lightning-quick fashion - a few problems we commonly see with lifters’ knees in the squat.

Mistake #1: Knees Too Far In (Valgus Knees)
You’ve got your stance correctly set with your heels at roughly shoulder width and your toes pointed out about 30 degrees. Your knees, however, are tracking inside of your toes - in other words, your knees are going forward and not traveling in line with the direction your feet are pointing.

To fix this, simply cue “knees out,” “knees apart,” or “knees sideways” as you start your descent.

Mistake #2: Knees Too Far Out (Varus Knees)
This is the opposite of Mistake #1, and while less common, it’s still certainly common enough to merit discussion. In this case, you’ve done too good of a job of shoving your knees out - to the point that they now track outside of your toes.

To fix this problem, cue “knees forward” or even “knees stay in.”

Mistake #3: Knees Bending After the Hips Bend
When you start your descent, you want the hips and knees to break (i.e., bend) at the same time, but you’re making the error of bending at the hips first and then bending the knees second. This causes balance and knee positioning problems (the knees usually travel too far forward at the bottom of the squat).

To fix this problem, cue “knees and hips together” or even “knees first,” but remember that this last cue is actually an overcue (i.e., an exaggeration of what we actually want to do).

Be sure to watch the included video to see this problem and the solution in action.

Mistake #4: Knees Slide Too Far Forward
You are breaking at the hips and knees together (i.e., you’re not making Mistake #3), but your knees are traveling far past your toes, and as a result, your balance is either forward or your back angle is too vertical.

To fix this problem, remind yourself to set your knees in their final position (roughly above your toes or just slightly in front of that) at one-third to one-half of the way into your descent. They will still bend after that, of course, but you’ll keep them in that location. Check out our video on using a TUBOW to help with this.

Mistake #5: Knees Not Moving Far Enough Forward
This is simply the opposite of Mistake #4 and can sometimes occur in combination with Mistake #3. In this case, your knees move forward, but only slightly, and as a result, you hit the bottom of your squat with your knees well behind your toes and nearly vertical shins.

The fix here is the same as that for Mistake #4: set the knees during the first portion of the descent. You may need to cue yourself to “set the knees forward” to help with this. Again, check out the TUBOW video to see what this looks like in practice.

As always, we hope these tips help you get stronger and live better.

(Some links may be affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Testify earns from qualifying purchases.)

If you found this helpful, you’ll love our weekly email. It’s got useful videos, articles, and training tips just like the one in this article. Sign up below, and of course, if you don’t love it, you can unsubscribe at any time.

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At Testify, we offer small group training, private coaching (in-person or remotely via Zoom), online coaching, and form checks. Would you like to get quality coaching from a Starting Strength Coach?