Facts about squats

Last weekend, Ranidel de Ocampo, one of my favorite Gilas players, injured his back during a strength training exercise together with his teammates at Talk ‘N Txt. He suffered a herniated disc while performing routine back squats. He is said to be out around 6 to 8 weeks but he still can’t sit or stand.

Strength training and conditioning has been the main formula for teams to make their athletes fitter, stronger and faster. But the main benefit of such kind of training is injury prevention. Strength training helps in preventing injury during actual game. But sometimes when you workout with a group you tend to be challenged and lift more weights than you can. It is a good motivation, but know your limits.

So what is the squat? There are a tons of leg workouts or variation of the squats. There is the barbell back squat (which RDO did), barbell front squats,  barbell split squat and dumbbell squats, among others.

Squat is one of the best lower body exercises one can get. It hits literally every muscle on your legs from your quadricep, glutes, hamstring, calves and even activates your core.

Barbell back squats is putting a barbell on top of your traps behind your head. It stresses your lower back, abs and obliques. The tendency is you arch your back and literally stress your spine. Your lower back is bound to fatigue first before your legs, especially if you have a weak core strength.

There are tons of body weight squats or leg exercises that you can do, but  have the same benefits of barbell back squats.

Here are my 5 favorite squats or leg exercises:

Body weight squats: This variation is the safest. Grab a chair, sit down and stand up. Sit tall, back up right, shoulders out, chest out, and lower legs perpendicular to the floor, feet at least shoulder width apart. Hinge at your hips, weight on your heel and push your feet back that you will be able to stand up without having to rock backward and forward. Or change your body posture especially the back. Once in standing position, slowly reverse lower your body to a seated position. Now that is the perfect squat.

Single leg squats: Start at the same body position seated on a chair. Then lift one leg up, then slowly press your body up to standing position and still maintaining your other leg up around waist level. If you have a hard time standing up, you can always use your hand to push off the chair. Then slowly sit down with one leg up.

Body weight squat jump: As you get stronger on the squat, you can add a jump or hop. This will not only get your leg stronger, it will also give you a fatburning factor and raises your heart rate faster. Key here as soon as you land, immediately squat down and jump again. It is a good explosive training. Remember as soon as you jump, lift off last on your toes.

Box jump: Stand in front of a box and make sure it is stable and strong enough to carry your weight. Your feet shoulder width apart and squat down hinge on you hips and jump up in order for both feet land on top of the box and stand up straight. Step down and reset your feet and jump again. As soon as you get stronger, add height to your box. I suggest you start on a one feet high box.  Don’t jump down as you might injure your knee or ankle.

Split squat or lunges: On a standing position, plant both your feet shoulder wide apart. Bring your right leg one big step backward. Move your right knee up and down until it is an inch or two away from the floor. Make sure that your left knee should not go over your left toes. As you get stronger, you can start to elevate your back leg by stepping on a 6 inch box or platform, increase height as you get stronger. This will not only make your legs stronger, it trains your stability and balance as well.

I suggest you perfect the above 5 leg exercises before adding a barbell, dumbbell, kettle bell or medicine ball. It may be good to load on the weights, thus make you stronger and faster but always remember safety first. Never compromise your form just to impress your teammates on how heavy you are lifting.