Front squats: Worth the pain?

[kever]

Originally Posted by beasty

Dude, the bar was unloaded and the bar was not even the standard universal bar. Think for a proper quad workout, I will stick to incline legs, squats and leg curls and if I got anything left, lunges. Front squats are too difficult for me.


I don't know if you're doing this already, but when you are holding the bar, make sure your shoulders are rounded forward. I like to hold it crossed arms if I'm doing slow tempo squats, but I can lift more with a "clean" grip. with both grips though, shoulders all the way forward and elbows as high as I can and it's comfortable enough. When I started front squats I was squatting about 275 rock bottom and deadlifting close to 400, and I had to go down to about 150 to get my form right on the front squats. Quit if you want to, but I like the different way it hits things like my lower back and quads. If you want to change things up a bit, try doing front squats with a 5-0-5 tempo, rock rock bottom, for 6 sets of 6. Thats 10 full seconds for each rep, 1 minute per set. You'll have to use a light weight, so your form can get better without feeling like you're going to crush yourself, and you will feel it when you're done.

 

[beasty]

Originally Posted by kever

I don't know if you're doing this already, but when you are holding the bar, make sure your shoulders are rounded forward. I like to hold it crossed arms if I'm doing slow tempo squats, but I can lift more with a "clean" grip. with both grips though, shoulders all the way forward and elbows as high as I can and it's comfortable enough. When I started front squats I was squatting about 275 rock bottom and deadlifting close to 400, and I had to go down to about 150 to get my form right on the front squats. Quit if you want to, but I like the different way it hits things like my lower back and quads. If you want to change things up a bit, try doing front squats with a 5-0-5 tempo, rock rock bottom, for 6 sets of 6. Thats 10 full seconds for each rep, 1 minute per set. You'll have to use a light weight, so your form can get better without feeling like you're going to crush yourself, and you will feel it when you're done.

Will try again especially since my next workout is legs day.
I am sure Mike Mentzer, Andreas Munzer, God rest their soul will look down and be pleased with my preserverence to the iron.

 

[why]

You're a piece of work, beasty.

 

[lefty]

Originally Posted by beasty

Dude, the bar was unloaded and the bar was not even the standard universal bar. Think for a proper quad workout, I will stick to incline legs, squats and leg curls and if I got anything left, lunges. Front squats are too difficult for me.

You can't hold 25 lbs on your shoulders and squat?

lefty

 

[spyderracing]

Front squats are to leg training what deadlifts are to back training. Back squats don't even compare.

 

[beasty]

Originally Posted by why

You're a piece of work, beasty.

why? Whatever do you mean why?

 

[beasty]

Originally Posted by lefty

You can't hold 25 lbs on your shoulders and squat?

lefty

I tried again. This time with those thick paddnig around the bar. I felt my shoulders ache more than my quads give out. In fact I think with that light weight I could squeeze a few more reps if I did back squats.

And the advantage of a front squat aint really there. So I will relegate this exercise to the scrap heap.

 

[nextlevel]

i'm tellin ya, front squats rule. when you flex your delts, you should see a crater between your front delts and your medial delts. rest the bar right on that. you'll probably have marks on your collar bones from it afterwards. that's where the bar should be though. it shouldn't be falling down at all. keep your elbows high when your arms are crossed and you'll be fine. if it still feels like it's falling, some other part of your form is fucked

keep tryin man!