How I Cured My Squat Woes (so You Can Too) – Part 2

In part 1 of this series, I talked about how correcting my hand position helped clean up my squat technique. Next, I’ll talk about my bracing strategy and how one subtle fix completely changed how tight I could get during my squat setup.

TO ARCH OR NOT TO ARCH

“Arch your back” and “keep your chest up” are common squat cues that have been used for years. Unfortunately, they’re not always interpreted properly and have led many lifters (myself included) down a frustrating path of poor lifting technique.

Arching your back refers to extension of the spine at any of its many segments. Extension is a funny thing. Extension in and of itself is not bad. It’s just a muscle action. Without it, we couldn’t move very well. Without extension, we couldn’t put our arms down after we lifted them overhead. We couldn’t straighten our legs, leaving us doomed to walk like crabs for the rest of our lives. And we definitely couldn’t lift heavy ass weights.

But extension, just like flexion during the “sit-ups are evil” campaign of recent years, gets demonized as a motion that should be avoided in the weight room. What gets missed is that when most people grunt “EXTENSION BAD!” like a caveman who just audited a community college kinesiology class, they usually mean that lumbar hyperextension is bad. Which it can be. 

The purpose of this article is not to argue whether lumbar extension is good or bad. What I will discuss is why my strategy of using lumbar hyperextension to brace during the squat was a limiting factor in my squat technique.

TO BRACE IS TO BREATHE

When we talk about bracing during the squat, what we mean is how do we create the rock-solid stability in our torso and midsection so that we don’t crumble like a folding chair under heavy weight?

Arching the back is one strategy, as we just discussed. Hyperextending the spine creates tension that, if held tight, can keep the torso upright. However, hyperextension puts the hips in a poor position to produce an optimal squat pattern.

When you arch your lower back at the beginning of a squat, you’ll run out of room for your femur (upper leg bone) to move in your hip sockets as you squat down. To make room, your pelvis tilts back and your lower back rounds, also known as the infamous “butt wink.” Basically, you swing from one end of the movement pendulum (extension) to the other (flexion) with a heavy weight on your back. Not good.

In the past when I’d stick my butt out and arch my back during the squat, I always felt like I was choking after the first few reps. I couldn’t inhale any air, which is a crappy feeling with or without a few hundred pounds on your back. Check out this video of me attempting to squat 315 pounds for 26 reps on my 26th birthday (I only got 20). Watch how much lower back movement occurs.

It’s also worth noting that I COULD NOT BREATHE after the first few reps. What a terrible feeling. Ultimately, this loss of stability from lack of a good breath would cause me to fall forward during squats. No matter how hard I tried to keep my chest up, it just wasn’t happening because I couldn’t inhale.

A much more effective bracing strategy is to get your pelvis and ribcage into a good position and inhale as much air into your chest and belly as possible. With your back hyperextended, it’s nearly impossible to get a full breath of air, but if you BRACE by squeezing your butt and your belly to bring your belt buckle up toward your chin, you can get MUCH more air into your body.

Now, instead of arching, I think about exhaling first to get my hips under my belly button. Instead of sticking my butt back, I’m squeezing my butt tight and flexing my abs to keep my lower back straight. Then and only then do I inhale into my chest and stomach, which allows me to get much tighter than I would if I just arched my back. I explain this technique in this video (which talks about front squats, but the same exact technique is applicable to back squats):

Greg Robins was the first coach to really effectively teach me the “ribs down/chest up” approach. You need some extension to keep your chest up and some flexion to keep your ribs down. Together, this creates an insane amount of tension and stability. Watch Greg explain:

More recently, I attended one of Dan Green’s seminars and he’s adopted the same technique. It’s refreshing to hear a world-class powerlifter say that arching your back at all costs is not the best way to squat. Watch and learn:

It’s easy to see at the 0:11 mark how Dan turns his belt up towards his chin to brace his abs. If he was arching his back, the belt would tip down toward his feet.

Now that I’ve applied this technique to my own squats, I’m able to stay almost perfectly upright with weights that used to tip me over into a good morning position.

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So to recap this installment:

• Hyperextending your lower back is a suboptimal strategy for getting tight.
• Using your glutes and abs to get yourself in a good position to inhale “big air” is a better option for most squatters.
• Thinking about getting your “belt buckle toward your chin” or your “ribs on top of your hips” are good ways to visualize a good bracing position.
• Dan Green does it, so you should too.

Stay tuned for the third installment, where I unveil the tricks I used to undo perhaps my worst squat technique flaw of all.