What's going on Nation? Today, We're going to talk about the five dumbest mistakes
Sabotaging your leg growth, and if you missed the last video, I did where I talked about the eight dumbest mistake
sabotaging your chest growth
I'll post a link to that down in the info section below and I'll also include a link to a video
I did where I compared the front squat to the back squat and before we get started if you haven't turned on notifications
Yet to make sure you get notified as soon as I upload a new video. Make sure you do that right now now
Let's take a look at these five mistakes
Mistake number one is that you're doing no stretching or mobility work
Before you start squatting and you should also be doing this throughout the week as well to improve [your] overall
Flexibility. What I want to do with you guys [are] start from the top and work our [way] down
So we're going to start with the shoulders if you have really tight shoulders
It's going to severely impact your form when doing a squat and I'll explain to you
Why put my hands in this barbell right here and get into my squat position
So the barbell should be resting across your traps
Now if you have really tight shoulders chances that you're already starting to feel a little pain
Just from holding the barbell on this position, [and] we don't even have any weight on the bar yet
And we haven't started descending now
What happens when you have tight shoulders
And you you'll see this a lot in the gym and you might be doing this right [now]
You don't even realize it yet is that as you descend instead of descending down
With your chest up
And then coming back to the top of [the] movement what's happening is because your shoulders are so tight as you squat
You're actually pushing the barbell into your neck and then you start lifting your head up like this and now all that weight is
Resting on your neck and that's also forcing you to lean [forward] and now not only is your squat form jacked up
But you're also pushing more through your toes
To perform the movement which is obviously going to be much weaker than pushing through your heels let alone cause some knee pain as well
so if you have really tight shoulders
And you're forcing the barbell
Into your neck you run the risk of compressing discs in your neck and pinching nerves and causing a wide variety of problems
So what I want you guys to do is take a look at this video that on a link to right here
And practice these dynamic warm-ups before you start squatting and also throughout the week
And I'll tell you one of my favorite ones to do is shoulder breakers
And you guys want make sure you're doing dynamic warm-ups not static stretching to perform a shoulder breaker
All you need is a resistance band you can keep this in your gym bag you can do this at [home] or at the gym
doesn't matter, I would do it as soon as you wake up and
What you're going to do is create resistance by pulling on the band
Go up and over like this
Touch your butt
up and over touch your thighs and just do like two sets of [ten] to twelve reps up and over and
You're going to loosen your [shoulders] up if you do this for a while
They'll start getting really loose, and you shouldn't feel any shoulder pain
now moving down to the hips if you have tight hips
obviously
It's going to severely impact your form because you're not going to be able to fully descend
Properly and a quick tip for [you] guys with that is I mean you can do air squats to warm up like this
But [chances] are if you have really tight hips when you're doing your a squats
You're probably still not having the best form when you do them
So what I want you to do to work on some hip mobility is
Do air squats, but do it next to a pole that [way] you can actually control
yourself as you go down and control yourself as you go [up] because if you're standing this close to the pole and
Keeping your chest up
it's forcing you to stay in that perfect squat position as
you do the movement and as you practice these things you'll get better and better with your
Flexibility and mobility and it's going to make your squatting much easier the second mistake
Is that you stop in at 90 degrees if you guys are trying to build muscle
[you] want to make sure you're going as low as possible in every single
repetition when squatting this is because the lower you go the more you're going to recruit your glutes and
Hamstrings into the exercise and if your goal is
Bodybuilding then your goal is to build as much muscle as possible
So you want to get as much muscle fiber activation as possible on your repetitions now there is a difference between
powerlifting and
Bodybuilding power lifters stop just below 90 degrees all they have to do when they compete is get below 90
So the hip bone passes their knees, and then go back up, and that's fine because they're training for powerlifting if your goal is
Bodybuilding and you're trying to build or increase the [overall] growth of all the muscles [in] your lower body
so you glutes quads and hamstrings then you need to make sure that you're going ass the grass and
Then coming all the way back [up] on every single
Repetition now we'll also say
That if you're going ass to grass that also places you in a bit of a better position
to get your hips underneath the barbell to push back [up] through your heels there is a benefit to going that low and
again guys if you're having a hard time with hip mobility
Just make sure you doing those stretches that I mentioned before mistake number
Three is that you're pushing through your toes to complete the movement
you guys should be pushing more for the middle of your foot during each repetition in
Order to complete your reps and even though you might [have] good shoulder [mobility] and hip mobility to squat properly
There could be a few other things that are holding you back
And we'll talk about those right now the first thing is you're not breaking at your hips and knees
fluidly as you perform the movement you should be bending at your hips and knees at the same time as
You descend and then come back to the top
so hips go back as your knees break all the way down all the
Way up now if you're breaking [at] your knees first and what I mean by [that] is it's like you're basically kind of squatting
Forward and then sitting you can see my heels are coming off the ground
Same thing if you break it the hips first, so you have a slight bend in your knees
And you break at the hips and now what's happening is as you break it the hips and you're leaning forward
All that weight of your shoulders is going to push you forward like this
And then you're going to come down and push through your toes
So make [sure] that you're breaking fluidly at your knees and hips practice with no weight first
The second thing that might be happening is you're having Valgus knee collapse throughout the movement
That's when your knees collapse in either on the way down [or] on the way up, [and] if this is happening to you
And you're noticing it in the mirror you have to stop and fix this problem right away
Because it's number one cause for an ACL tear an easy way to fix this might be just take your form
You might have a bit of a narrow stance either get a bit wider with your stance or turn your toes out slightly
Just like this
That way when you squat your knees will follow your toes on the way down and on the way up
and then just mentally focus on pushing your [knees] out as you go down and keep pushing them out as
You go back up
Mistake number four is that you guys are
Breathing during the rep as soon as you start to breathe during the rep you lose all core stability
and it's going to cause you to collapse and get a lot of flexion in your spine and what I mean by that is you're
Going to take your breath and as you come [down] if you breathe out
You're losing all that internal pressure
And it's causing you to lean [forward] and if you have weight on your back
It's going to cause you [to] basically collapse like this
you need to keep a tight core and keep that pressure in there in order to be able to squat with heavy weight and
Maintain your proper form so the way you do this is you taking a deep breath at the top
Keep your core nice
And tight flex your abs and then hold that breath as you go down keep your chest up as you
go [up]
And then don't breathe out until you get to the top of the movement now this also still applies if you're using a weightlifting belt
I'll link you guys to a video that shows you an in-depth review on how to use one of these
But really quick when you put your belt on number one
You should be putting your belt on and tightening it
Before your set starts if you do your entire workout, and never adjust your belt, then your belt is way too loose
And it's doing nothing for you
That's why I use the Enza belt because it has this lever right here before my set begins
I get it nice and tight taking a breath and
Then I flex my core and push into the belt at the same time and this keeps my core nice and strong
When I'm lifting heavier weights
So if you're not breathing right make sure you start breathing correctly now
The fifth and final mistake is that you're not
resting enough between your sets if you're only taking like a 45 seconds [a] 60 second rest period In between your sets
You're trying to lift heavy
At the end of the day guys your body has [just] not recovered enough from the previous set to not only perform better and lift more
But the quality of your reps are probably going to be
Less because you're not well rested if you want to make [sure] you're getting
Quality reps and able to work with progressive overload and add weight each set you need to rest at least two to [three] minutes in
Between your sets now if you're going for one rep max, you can rest a little longer like three to five minutes
But if you start wandering around the gym in between sets you start talking to people
[and] you rest in like 15 minutes 20 minutes between your sets
What's going to happen is your body's going to start to get tight and when you get back [to] squatting you run a higher risk
Of injuring yourself, so don't rest too long, but don't rest too short either alright guys
Those are my 5 dumbest mistakes people make when squatting if you have any suggestions for a future video
You'd like to see some mistakes on be sure to leave a comment down the comment section below
Make sure you hit that like [and] subscribe button and as always more good stuff coming soon. See you guys