Learning to Squat -- Part 1: Body Weight Squats

Most people, if asked to squat on their first day in the gym, will not feel comfortable with it, and their attempts to squat will be rather ugly. There are a few generic reasons why untrained novices suck at this movement:

1. They may lack the strength to squat.
2. They may lack the flexibility to squat.
3. They may lack the coordination/balance to squat.
4. They may lack the confidence to squat.

Most people, starting out, probably do lack the confidence. Often, they'll lack the confidence because they believe that they lack the flexibility and balance to squat, and they'll confirm this belief when they attempt to squat and can't get all the way down and up again in a fluid movement. However, in my experience, it's very often a case of low confidence preventing them from moving naturally. They don't trust that they can do the movement, so they overthink the movement and throw a large dose of inhibitions in the way, preventing themselves from going down properly, thus removing any possibility of coming up properly, either.

There are several paths around this. The path that I used (unintentionally, because I was taught that going below 90 degrees at the knees is bad) was deep leg presses and partial squats. When I finally decided to start squatting to parallel, I had developed enough body awareness and confidence that it was an easy transition. If you're not in a hurry to learn parallel squats, this is a viable option, and if the first reason not to do full squats (that you lack the strength for it) is true, then it may even be a necessity.

Coach Mark Rippetoe teaches a useful method of leg pressing

for someone who wants to learn to squat.

Yep. This was me.

If you do want to get on with learning deeper squats, then here's a much quicker method I developed after watching a Dan John seminar back in the day.

Wall Squat Drill

- Stand against a wall, facing away.
- Set your feet so that the back of your heels are about in line with the front of your pelvis, and are shoulder-width apart. Turn your feet out, each 15-45 degrees from parallel (30-90 degrees from each other).
- Slide down the wall as far as you can while keeping your hips and shoulders against the wall. Keep your knees out, pointing in the same direction as your toes.
- When you get to the bottom, spend some time down there holding that position (this will require you to activate your leg muscles), getting used to that depth. It will probably feel uncomfortable as your thigh muscles are simultaneously stretched and contracted, and you'll likely feel a lot of lactic acid accumulating in your quadriceps rather quickly. Keeping your hips and shoulders against the wall may also result in you activating your glutes and trunk muscles, which you'll need when it comes to actually squatting.
- Stand up out of that position. Get someone to give you a hand up if needed.

It may seem like I've just described a typical wall squat, but not quite. Typical wall squats have your feet way out in front, so that you end up with 90 degree angles at the hips and knees. Instead, I'm recommending that your feet be closer to the wall so that your knees have to move out over the toes and your glutes come down towards your heels.

If you can do the above drill, then you definitely have the flexibility in most muscles to squat. Calf flexibility might be an issue, but other than that, the ROM's there. Standing back up will also demonstrate the required strength, and getting used to the position will develop some coordination and confidence. Do the above wall drill a few times, then, once you're confident with it, make the following adjustment:

Wall Squat to Air Squat Drill

- Once set at the bottom, push yourself forward so that your weight is over your feet, rather than locked between your feet and the wall.
- Set your posture by lifting your bum slightly (actually, thinking of lifting your tailbone might be a better cue) and lifting your chest. I find it easiest to make use of this position by putting my hands out in front, which allows me to be a little more upright.
- Once you've established your posture at the bottom, stand straight up.

When you perform air squats, always remember to be pretty.

Voila, you've now learned how to do body weight squats. Other methods, like the one I used that enabled me to do my first parallel squats, can take a long time to get you doing full squats. But with this method I've managed to teach several people (who watched me demonstrate squats and said: "I can't do that") to do full ROM body weight squats in a matter of minutes.

I suspect that what makes this method work is that we're generally confident with standing, but not so much with being at (or getting down into) the bottom of a squat. By sliding down a wall, we get into that bottom position with support behind us the whole way. Once we move forward from the wall, we're in the bottom position of a squat. By standing up straight from there, we learn the path between the bottom of the squat and standing upright, and so it's mentally much easier to trek back and forth along that path. That's my theory, anyway.

Once you've got that up and down path figured out, it's now time to start thinking about technique points.

Body Weight Squat Technique Points

- Set heels shoulder-width apart and turn toes out slightly.
- Lift chest and contract abs.
- Look straight ahead.
- Spread the floor with your feet and push your knees out throughout the movement.
- Keep your tailbone lifted.
- Sit down onto the air between your legs and then come back up by driving your heels down and chest up.

A lot of sources say to begin the squat by breaking (unlocking) first at the hips, then at the knees, and sit back. In my experience and observations, this appears to work well for sumo squatters with good body awareness. For beginners with a narrower stance (as I'm teaching here) this seems to result more in lower back/pelvic rounding, which is something we want to resist. So, for now at least, just go up and down, sitting between your legs.

Alongside body weight squats, it can help to do goblet squats. Goblet squats are traditionally a kettlebell exercise, but can be done with a dumbbell, or even without weight (making them just a specific way of doing body weight squats). In the goblet squat, you take a weight (real or imaginary) and hold it to your chest with both hands, keeping your elbows in against your sides. At the bottom of the goblet squat, your elbows should brush against your inner thighs, which helps to cue keeping the knees out. Goblet squats can also help with learning to keep your chest up.

Goblet Squats

Now that you're getting up and down and developing technique, it's time to accumulate a lot of reps. How many? Well, "they" say that it takes 300-500 repetitions of a new exercise performed well to ingrain the technique, and 3,000-5,000 repetitions to fix a bad motor pattern. So, I won't prescribe a specific amount of sets and reps to do in each session, but I will say that you should be emphasising technique. You might only be doing 5x5 in your first session, despite possibly having the strength and endurance to do much more. Use technique as a gauge to determine whether you should continue the set you're on or rest for a minute before doing it again.

Over time, build up to being able to do 3x20 with consistent technique. Early on, you'll find yourself struggling with all the technique points to focus on. Chest up! Tailbone up! Knees out! Spread the floor! Drive through your heels! Abs tight! It's a lot to take in (remember, goblet squats may make some of these cues easier to cover). The need to think is one of the more frustrating parts of being a beginner. Persevere, and in time you'll reach a point where you don't have to think as much about what you're doing and how you're doing it. This is the first level of mastery, and you want to reach it before you start using barbells or squatting to failure. It's wise to achieve this level before adding intensity to your squats (through heavy loads and approaching failure), because there's additional technique in how to position the barbell (so you want to get the general movement down before you add even more stuff to think about), and technique starts to break down towards failure (so if you get into the habit of approaching failure before you're ready for it, you're more likely to develop bad technique habits).

Coach Nick Horton discusses the first level of mastery.

As a programming point, I would like to see people achieve 3x20 good body weight squats on 5 separate training sessions before they touch a barbell. This may seem like an overly conservative approach, but I'd really like to see people develop a solid foundation before they go making things harder for themselves. Those 5 sessions should be close together -- I'm talking a period of 1-2 weeks. I've never enforced this before with anyone I've trained, but looking at the struggles people tend to have once the barbell gets added into the mix, it's something I would like to trial with any future beginners I work with. In theory at least, 3x20 across 5 close sessions demonstrates that technique is pretty well locked in. At this stage, it should be on the verge of second nature to set your feet up, lift your chest, sit down between your legs, drive your knees out and keep your bum lifted. The frustration of trying to get it right shouldn't be there anymore. Furthermore, by doing it over 5 sessions, the 300 reps to ingrain technique are being covered (on top of all the reps it took to get to that stage). And if you can do 3x20 and be good to go 1 or 2 days later, it shows that you have the strength to handle an empty barbell on your shoulders. So then, it's time for the next chapter in your lifting journey.