How To Choose The Squat Variant That Is Perfect For You

The squat is the most important exercise in your arsenal for getting strong, sexy, and durable. So let’s talk about how to choose the squat variant that is perfect for you.

I’ve seen many a top-heavy man roll/break/sprain their ankles doing seemingly normal things because their leg and core strength were way behind their upper body development.

Don’t be that human. Lower body strength is one of the leading indicators that you will age gracefully and stay out of a wheelchair 1.

The benefits of the squat include but are not limited to:

• Increased butt2 strength
• They build up leg strength and stability
• They maximize core strength
• They crank up your ability to deal with physical stress
• They strengthen your work capacity
• They provide an overall increase in lower body mass
• They spike anabolic hormone production3
• Perhaps most importantly they increase confidence

“There is simply no other exercise, and certainly no machine, that produces the level of central nervous system activity, improved balance and coordination, skeletal loading and bone density enhancement, muscular stimulation and growth, connective tissue stress and strength, psychological demand and toughness, and overall systemic conditioning than the correctly performed full squat.” –Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training (3rd Ed.)

Yes, it makes you all around stronger and more capable. It also gives you the biggest bang for your buck in the gym. A few sets of heavy squats can be enough to work your entire lower body and core, part of your upper body, work up a sweat, raise your heart rate, spike your testosterone and adrenaline, get you mentally prepared for the rest of your workout, and make everything else in life seem easier.

Some would even argue that squatting will change your worldview, making you more humble in the process. There is a certain weight that will crush each and every one of us, for some it’s 100lbs for others its 1,000 lbs, either way, it helps keep life in perspective. We are all just a few pounds of resistance away from crumbling under the pressure, both in squatting and in life. Having a weekly, or god forbid, twice weekly reminder of this is the perfect way to keep life within realistic expectations.

Okay, now that I’ve basically told you that squats are the only therapist you need, let’s get into how to actually squat.

Compound vs. Isolation Movements

For simplicity’s sake, there are two types of movements that the average gym goer will encounter. Compound movements, these are movements that involve more than one joint in their execution.

• Squats
• Deadlifts
• Presses
• Pull ups
• Rows

These are the big-ticket items. When prioritizing what you do in the gym, do these first always. These are the movements in which you will be able to move the most weight. More weight moved over time means more gains, it is that simple.

The other movements you will encounter are isolation movements. These are exercises in which only one joint is in motion throughout the movement.

• Biceps curl
• Triceps extension
• Leg curl
• Leg extension
• Calf raises
• Forearm exercises
• Neck exercises
• Most core exercises

You can do considerably less weight with these exercises and they have the potential to seep strength from you on your compound movements, this is why you should conduct these at the end of your workout when you are already tired and are just looking for some more isolated stimulation of certain muscles.

Squats the Most Compound of All Exercises

Squats are a compound exercise, as noted above. Not only are they a compound exercise but they are probably the MOST compounding of any exercise. Squats recruit a lot of muscle groups, let me rephrase that, squats recruit the largest and highest number of muscle groups of just about any standard movement.

• Quads
• Hamstrings
• Glutes
• Hips
• Core Stabilizers
• Pretty Much the Entire Back
• Calves to a degree
• Abs

That’s a lot. No other exercise is this efficient. The deadlift is a close second 4. If you are going to do one exercise when you walk in the gym it should be squats.

And yet, so many people neglect them. Why?

Because they are hard.

There is a trend of people “lifting” and never breaking a sweat, never pushing through a plateau, never grinding a rep out.

What is the purpose of going to the gym if you aren’t trying to get better? The only way to get better is by progressively increasing the amount of stress that your body can withstand 5.

Types Of Squats

None of these are comfortable. There is a fundamental misunderstanding in the fitness world that things need to be comfortable and therefore enjoyable. My argument is that those two things are not mutually inclusive. You don’t need to be comfortable in order to get joy out of something. Squats are the perfect example of this. After completing a heavy set of hard squats, you are not comfortable, you are not calm, you are not a zero on a pain scale of 1 to 10. What you are after that set of heavy squats is satisfied, proud, stronger, more resilient, and dare I say it, joyful.

Keep this in mind when you are in the gym, you are not there to be swaddled into comfortable gains, you are there to work, overcome adversity, and become a stronger human. If you aren’t into becoming better then maybe the gym isn’t for you. Seriously. Don’t waste your time if you aren’t ready to work and grow.

Now, in no particular order.

Back Squat- This is where you will be strongest. The back squat6 is the squat that will allow you to recruit the most of those muscle groups and make you look strong in the gym. This is also the version of the squat that people tend to have the most difficulty with, be that back placement of the bar, shoulder mobility to get in the proper position, any number of knee or hip issues that may be preventing you from getting proper depth. What most of these issues boil down to is that you are not flexible or mobile enough to get into proper position and maintain proper movement throughout the whole range of motion. Have no fear there are plenty of progressions to get you to be able to perform this fundamental exercise.

You may also need to consider why you want to perform this specific variant of the squat? If your reason is anything short of you enjoy it7, you like the idea of a challenge, or you are competing in this lift then you may want to reconsider which squat variant you choose. You should always know why you are doing a certain exercise in your routine and how it is bringing you closer to your goal.

A great place to learn the fundamentals of this lift is in Starting Strength the book8.

A brief aside as to low-bar vs high-bar back squat. Here’s the rub, the high bar is your gateway drug to the back squat, it is often more comfortable and less technically demanding. However, the low-bar back squat is where you will truly achieve the most muscle recruitment and be able to get the strongest you possibly can, by nature of it forcing you to keep your hip angle more acute you recruit more hamstring than you do with the more erect torso of the high-bar back squat. If you are new to squatting start with what is more comfortable/ technically easy9 over time you can transition to the low-bar.

Front Squat- Wins my vote for most uncomfortable squat variant10. You can’t do this lift properly without feeling a little like you are being choked, but you know a friendly choke, a choke that is trying to make you a better person. In addition, you may experience bruising across your collarbone, sure you can use a pad to prevent this but that takes away from the real feel of the exercise.

This is a more quad dominant squat variant than the back squat11. This is because you are forced to stay in a more upright position with your torso than in the back squat. By having the weight on the front of your body you need to keep your core engaged or you will drop the weight. Front squats are a great variant if you are trying to teach yourself to stay more stable through the core if you want to focus more on your quads, or simply as an accessory to your back squat.

Zercher Squat- This is the lazy brother of the front squat. Instead of placing the bar across your collarbone you are cradling it in your elbow crease. It’s not much more comfortable than the front squat and is, in fact, more dangerous. Due to the fact that you risk elbow injury once you start to put any significant weight on the bar. The only time these are recommended is if you are recovering from some weird collarbone or back injury12 or, maybe, if you are doing a lightweight barbell complex and want to keep things interesting13.

Bottom line on Zercher squats, they exist but aren’t particularly useful.

Hack Squat — A classic old-time strongman lift. Why is it still referred to as a classic? you may ask. Because people don’t really do them anymore. The advent of the squat rack sort of made them irrelevant 14. The hack squat begins from the ground behind the lifter’s ankles, you grab the bar just wider than shoulder width apart and “stand up”, driving the barbell into your butt. From experience, they are generally awkward and make it difficult to maintain your balance. In addition, they tend to expose any weird anthropometry15 measurements you may have, including making you scrape the bar all the way up the back of your legs or getting it stuck in that crease just under your glutes16 and above your hamstrings.

Although they tend to have a learning curve the hack squat could be used as a rather effective accessory exercise to your main lower body lifts17. Although you will get weird looks at the gym because there are several other equally effective squat variants and accessory movements you can do that appear much less awkward18. That being said, if you are looking for an excuse to get everyone in the gym staring at your behind, this may be the exercise for you. 😉

Bulgarian Split — The Bulgarian split squat is an effective accessory exercise, that’s really where I’ll leave it. Its inherent problems include the fact that you can’t load it up heavy enough19, it is awkward, and a rolled ankle waiting to happen20, progression in this lift often stalls and lifting a heavier weight each week becomes untenable21.

Sounds like I hate this squat variant, I don’t. It can be very useful in a bodybuilding style program where you are trying to isolate certain muscles, the quads in this case. It can also serve as a solid accessory addition to a strength routine. I do not recommend it as your main lower body lift, however, at least not for an extended period of time.

Goblet Squat — The poor man’s front squat. Essentially you take a kettlebell or dumbbell and hold it in front of you at collarbone height, you then execute a front squat. This is good, again, as an accessory exercise, as you cannot sufficiently add enough weight to the exercise in order to truly work the lower body in that optimal strength range of 3–5 reps. Your arms will give out way before your legs do. When this happens, you will notice people “hanging” the weight down between their legs rather than holding it up at the collarbone. When you hang the weight it almost always cuts your range of motion down to a less than full range of motion22. Same rules apply as with the Bulgarian Split Squat as far as implementing it into your workouts23.

None Of These Seem Like Fun

I probably didn’t do a great job at selling you on any particular variant of the squat above. I’m really not trying to. There is a reason that one of the most popular bro-science memes on the internet revolves around hating/skipping leg day. It is hard, usually not fun, and very likely to make you regret your decision of going to the gym. The pump achieved on an upper body day has been compared to an orgasm, whereas the feeling of going hard on a leg workout gets more analogies to the 9th Circle of Hell24.

Nothing in life that is easy makes us better. This is why we need to seek out those things that are hard to test our wherewithal and tenacity. The squat rack is often empty at most commercial gyms, personally, I love this fact, it means that I can spend all the time I want in the place that most people are afraid of.

Seek out challenge! You don’t need to set out to climb Everest, all you need to do is schedule one day a week of squats25.

P.S. Is all of this a little too advanced for where you currently are in your health and fitness? No worries! I’ve put together a program just for you called 30 Days to Peak Performance. It’ll get you to where you want to be mentally and physically, at the end of the 30 days you will have structured a lifestyle around your new fit self. Check it out here and see how I used it to pull me out of a downward spiral!

P.P.S. Programming got you confused? All this talk about squatting spark more questions than answers? Set up an initial consultation with me and we can talk about where you currently are in your fitness and where you want to be. Yeah, I’ll try to sell you on working with me one-on-one. Don’t worry you’re an adult and I’ll respect your decision to maintain autonomy. The free consultation will probably give you all the information you may require anyway. I’m that good.

Originally published at www.composurefitness.com on July 17, 2018.