When it comes to exercises, learning the squat is one of the foundational movements. The problem with this is that most people don’t know how to squat. There are some who says that squatting is bad or complain that the exercise hurts their knees. I like the way Strength expert, Dan John, puts it, he says, “No, the way you squat is bad for your knees.” True statement.
But there are other reasons that can cause you to have bad form while squatting; lack of mobility, past injury, lack of strength, or you are just lazy. Let’s face it, heavy ass squats isn’t much a walk in the park. You sort of have to call upon your inner Hulk.
When it comes to learning or coaching the squat, the Goblet Squat is the best place to start. A proper goblet squat looks like so:
Master RKC Instructor, Andrew Read, shared a couple tips on how to find that proper stance and foot placement before you begin working on the goblet squat:
You’ll need a training partner or video camera for this, not a mirror. Begin on the ground in a four-point stance. Your hands should be roughly under your shoulders, but more importantly begin with knees under hips and ankles dorsiflexed (as this mimics the foot position we’ll need for the squat). Your back should be flat here.
Start with a narrow stance – knees hip width apart with feet in line – and push your butt back from there. What we’re looking for is that your back stays flat and your knees travel back behind your hip crease. The squat depth we’re aiming for is hip crease below knee so this is the same thing, just rotated ninety degrees.
You need to play with the position of your knees. Most of you may find it difficult to find the correct position with a narrow stance so slowly work your way towards a wider stance until you are able to keep you back flat and your hip crease goes below the knees. Remember this position, this is where you want to be when performing a goblet squat.
Dan John has another way of finding the proper foot placement. He writes:
Do three consecutive vertical jumps, then look down. This is roughly where you want to place your feet every time you squat. The toes should be out a little. You don’t want to go east and west, but you want some toe-out.
This drill, along with the goblet squat, teaches patterning. Unless you already have the pattern, you shouldn’t move into heavier work.
Performing the Goblet Squat
The best way to get the kettlebell into position is to perform somewhat of a swing high pull but then transition your hands, to grab the handles like bull horns. The bell should be at chest level, there’s no need to hold it any higher. You want to focus on squatting and not on trying to hold a weight at your head.
Now that you are in position, keep your eyes fixated forward, chest up, and initiate the movement with your hips. Drop your hips and aim for elbows to slide in between and pass the knees. Some like to have the elbows push the knees a little further out to create more space in the movement for extra mobility work. When you get to the bottom of the movement make sure you keep your chest upright and not hunched forward.
As much as you are trying to focus on the proper breathing, foot positioning, and holding the kettlebell, there is one thing to keep in mind – Don’t think too much! I found the more that my athletes think, the more they think of how they can screw things up. Remember, paralysis by analysis.
Now if you can’t get to the proper depth, your heels raise off the ground, and you have an exaggerated upper body forward lean, then you will have to work on your mobility, flexibility, and continue to exercise the movement pattern. When it comes to mobility and flexibility, there could be a lot of different factors which may need to wait for another time.
How Can I Progress?
So let’s say you can’t hit the correct depth or your body needs to continue to learn the movement pattern, should you not perform the Goblet Squat?
No.
Instead, continue to improve your mobility and test to see if you can perform the proper movement with no weight. But to progress your way to a full goblet squat, perform a goblet squat to a position where you can maintain the proper posture. This could be down to a box set at a specific height.
Sometimes people rule out things just because they can’t do it. I’d rather you do something that you can do while you work on the other pieces.
What Exercise Do You Want Next?
We are always fired up to share new ideas and approaches to exercise. We want to hear if there are any exercises out there that you’d like The Kū Project to break down for you.
There are so many exercises out there, but here are a few things to narrow it down slightly. Here are the following tools to choose from for your exercise suggestion:
- Barbell
- Kettlebell
- Sandbag
- Suspension Trainer
Looking forward to helping you out!
