I got a friend to join me in the gym for an NLP, and he’s been doing great! He’s at week 7 and already at 240 squat, however, the workout before today’s he wasn’t hitting depth the first 2 sets and his form had definitely degraded (Not that I’ve been terribly effective at coaching his form before that). I had him re-do the weight today and although better, it still needs work, so I’m posting the videos here today for input.
First, some things I already know and have told him are:
Shoes: He said He’ll ask for them for christmas, but I don’t think I’ll get him to do something better than the squishy things he’s wearing in the video any time soon…
TUBOW: He says he has something that should work but forgot to bring it today.
In the 3rd set, you can hear me quing him “Chest out, chin up” which is my failed attempt to try to keep the bar from going forward during the rep.
I also had to work on him a lot in the beginning to keep him from having the center of mass over the balls of his feet by using the advice immediately after figure 2-47 in SSBBT about over-compensating/squatting back on your heels, to teach the body to get off the balls of the feet.
Also, he’s intimidated by these form issues, and asks if he should add weight to the bar next session. He’s got the strength to do it IMO, but the form needs fixing.
Thanks for any input you guys can provide. I’m really excited that my friend’s gotten into the Barbell work with me, and he’s doing way better than I did in my NLP (He’s pulled 315x5 already, and I capped out at 290 in my NLP). He’s a bigger dude than me, but I’d like to think some of his success is because I’m there to help, but I’m not sure what to do about these squats.
I think he’s overextending het back a bit. Too much “chest up”.
He could be better off trying to stack his ribs on top of his abs (check out Calgary Barbell’s FormCheckFriday videos on YT). It works for me to keep a more neutral spine and rigid trunk.
The weight is too far forward, he is completely on his toes. His heels are coming all the way off the ground.
He needs to sit back and drive his hips up. You can watch the bar path start at the center of his foot and travel right over his toes at the bottom. If he’s not getting it, have him rock on to the balls of his feet, then back on to his heels then find the middle of his foot before he starts the lift.
I’d address this immediately. Once he’s got that you can see what everything else looks like.
Thanks, I worked on this with him some half way to this point (Even consulting the SSBBT book for methods to correct this, as mentioned in my OP) but apparently we need to do it some more.
Other than him doing the actual lifting, I’m driving pretty much all of this process for him, although I did send him a link to the topic. But unless you count myself, his is the only coaching I’ve ever done, and I need the help! As for why here, well I’ve got a lot of respect for the people here at BBM.
Ah I see, you’re coaching him. Are you trying to break out as a coach or are you just helping your friend out? The reason I ask is because if it’s the latter, you might be served well by posting a form check in the SS forums, much as I dislike admitting that. What’s true is that the fundemental basics of each lift are known by SS coaches, and they currently have a way to post form checks to coaches. I don’t say that to discredit us on here, but something to possibly help you.
Ideally, you could send a form check to Jordan and he could review it during his training vlogs.