“Yo bro, check out my sweet quads!!”

Did you just say that? Are you obsessed with making your quads bigger? I bet you are, and to a certain extent so am I. But what we need to remember is that the quadriceps are not the whole story. Squats, deadlifts, cleans, jerks, snatches, cardio bs all use the anterior part of the leg; however you need to train the posterior to execute these lifts at full efficiency.

To use a great buzz phrase, the posterior chain is crucial for maximizing the force production of the leg and maintaining proper posture. Today I’ll focus on the hamstrings, why? Because my hammies are weak. To fix this I always end my workouts with some exercise that hammers my hammies. My personal favorite is the back extension machine. I’ll focus on keeping my back right while pulling through my heels as hard as I can. This usually results in a great burn, particularly when done for high reps with a 100lb dumbbell in hand.

Are your hammies weak? How do you train them? There are plenty of great hamstring exercises think about which one works best for you, post to comments if you care to share.

A common squatting fault, both in the front and back squats, is not finding the correct balance and weight distribution on your feet. In order to teach the proper technique, coaches will often use the cue “heels” to remind you that you should distribute your weight evenly across your feet. The ideal balance in a squat is to have the center of mass of you and the barbell over the middle of your foot. Why is the cue not “middle” or “balance”? There are several reasons, the first of which is that both of those are incredibly lame.

They also don’t help to correct the main problem, which is that you are attempting to balance yourself and added weight over the ball of your foot. In order to correct this, the best cue encourages you to over-correct and shift the weight to your heels. Hopefully you will try, and more importantly succeed in making a change that places the weight over the middle of your foot.

It may be hard for beginners to squat to full depth due to flexibility or strength imbalance. If flexibility is an issue, cueing may not improve squat technique. Instead it is more important to get into a good stretching routine that will loosen up hips/quads/hamstrings so that you will be able to reach the bottom of a squat easily.

If strength imbalance is the limiting factor, cueing may be a good way to solve the problem. usually people who squat on their toes are attempting to use their stronger quadriceps (the front part of the leg) to move the weight instead of engaging the hamstrings. Over time, and with constant reminders, cueing to place weight on the heels will strengthen the back of the leg enough so that the balance comes naturally. Other assistance exercises can be used to achieve this balance; however the squat, when properly executed, will usually the be most effective training tool for a begginer.