HOW TO: BOX SQUAT
The box squat is an excellent exercise for teaching people how to squat correctly, by engaging the majority of the muscles that are surrounding the hips.
Common issues I see with this exercise, is people driving the knees forward. What I want to do is reach my hips back and get my hamstrings and my hips engaged.
Point to note, all the same principles are going to apply when we go into our lower body based movements, and that is creating tension and stability through the feet and hips.
To think about the tension we want to create, we will play around with foot position prior to loading under the bar.
I plant my feet hip width and parallel, then I'm going to drive my feet into the ground, grip, screw, build my arches, and pretend there's an elastic band between my big toes. I'm going to pull that elastic band apart.
Okay. Watch what happens to my arches. My arches build, which gets the stabilisers of my feet firing, whilst also getting my hip rotators and hip abductors firing, to stabilise the pelvis. So that's the first thing that we want to be talking about when we're going into the box squat.
So from here, I'm going to set myself up. The bar's going to go across my traps. I get under the bar, hips knees and ankles all relatively aligned under the bar. Create that stability. Take a step back from here.
Take my feet wherever they're comfortable, ideally a little bit wider so I get more muscles firing, and I pull the bar down into my back, creating tension through the back.
I grip, and screw through the feet. Then I'm going to hinge my hips back, reaching my bum back. My shins stay relatively vertical. Then I stand tall. I'm going to reach back again. I'm not resting. I'm not sitting in this bottom position...I'm thinking about just lightly touching my backside to that box.
Drive those knees out, create as much rotation and tension in the feet and hips as you can.
So let's talk about some regressions here. Ideally, I'm going to start with a dumbbell or kettlebell. I'm going to be set up in this goblet position.
The same principles apply; Elbows tight, create tension through the upper body, grip, screw through the feet.
Then I'm going to hinge.
Drive those hips back.
Load those hamstrings, reach the bum back. Shins stay vertical, light touch of the bum, and stand tall. I'm going to build up to my heaviest weight there.
Now lets discuss ways of progressing to the loaded barbell variation.
One way is by adding more weight with a kettlebell or dumbbell until you've built the strength
required to transition to a barbell.
Another way of progressing the movement is simply increasing the range of movement. So I might remove this bench and stack up some plates. I might stack up say five, six plates to increase range of movement by an inch or two.
Once I get good at that, and I can lift some good weight, with good stability, good control, etcetera. then I take away one of those plates, and I've progressed that movement. Continue that process until you can transition to the barbell, and rinse and repeat.
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