I must admit I love squats. I love all the different variations and how strong it makes you feel afterwards. But I also recognize there is a lot of people who find this movement very painful and do not enjoy it all. And often the pain they feel in their knees or their back puts fear into their mind and is something they try to avoid. This is a real shame for often the reason behind their awkwardness or pain with this movement is a lot to do with their technique.

What is even worse is that this avoidance of pain and continual use of poor squatting from will transfer into daily life and eventually ruin joints, cartilage and tendons.
This video I show you how to use a method that teaches good form but also encourages an increased range of motion, an increase in gluteal strength, and an increase in core activation. All of these things are critical elements to ensuring a movement that can deliver incredible strength gains and efficient movement.

Make sure you read the detailed article about squat technique in the link below for more detail as I only briefly touch on some of the finer points in the video.
https://noregretspt.com.au/index.php/...

Don’t be fooled into thinking it is easy because it is only a bodyweight exercise, most people find this much harder than a weighted barbell back squat when they are not used to this!

This takes advantage of the fact that you will learn how to squat from the bottom up, as opposed to the top down. This is exactly how you first ever learned to squat as a toddler when attempting to stand for the first time and something I have discussed in detail before in the article about infant development exercises. The way we are taught to squat in the gym or at school is completely against the way we use this in nature where you would not be able to do this, unlike the deadlift which is completely in harmony with how we lift things.

The reverse squat enables the person to set up at the bottom and position the joints as close to perfect as possible and use the right muscles to stand. For many people this is the first time they have experienced squatting to full depth with good form and not surprisingly it is extremely difficult. The only way to get up without losing your posture and falling backwards is to use the core and the glutes as discussed earlier.

When core strength is lost you will see the person round their lower back to prevent falling backwards as their body tries to find a way to engage the quadriceps. Unfortunately, this creates stiffness that robs the glutes and the stabilizers of the pelvis from firing and as a result all strength is lost.

When this happens I may need to explore mobility restrictions that prevent them from achieving this position but I may also need to make it easier for them to learn this. This is where I will often use heel plates to assist them in finding the correct position more easily and allow them to feel what the squat should be like for the first time. Many people think this is cheating but I have found it to be a huge advantage in learning how to position all of the other joints and develop the skill and strength required by muscles not used to working like this to hold a good posture throughout the movement.

I used to think it was a lack of ankle mobility as the reason why they needed the plates but in most cases it was more to do with the body finding another way to use the quads that was the real problem. Sure, there are some cases where the ankle mobility is a definite problem and in this case I would include a few ankle mobility drills to improve this but other times the mobility was already fine. The problem was that mobility of the ankle was seen by the brain to be a necessary sacrifice to find the lost strength from the glutes.

This also explains why I often teach the deadlift before the squat so the person has the adequate hip mobility and strength requirements before learning a more difficult movement.
Read the article below to see more about this
https://noregretspt.com.au/index.php/...

Once you have your basic technique covered you can begin to experiment with more advanced versions. You can check out several versions here
https://noregretspt.com.au/index.php/...