Hi All,
I’ve been having issues with my squats recently which have made me nervous to increase the load of my squats.
In the bottom position of my squat, my heels end up lifting off the floor despite actively trying to keep them down. This occurs when I wear either flat or heeled shoes too and the only squat this doesn’t occur in his a box squat.
Anyone have any advice or tips to prevent this or does it really matter?
It does matter.
If your heels are lifting that means that your centre of mass is too far forward. I.e. either the bar is too high up your back or you are bending forward too much.
So you should either move the bar down your back or stay more upright.
I used to have this problem as well and fully agree with the above poster–the bar feels much more stable now. What was happening to me is I’d lose balance if I kept the weight back so my heels didn’t come up.
The things that helped me eventually fix this problem:
pin squats → Because the pins are there and you are supposed to transfer the weight from the barbell to the pins I was able to sit back because losing balance backwards wasn’t a safety issue with the pins there to catch the BB at just below parallel. The ascent is a little awkward at that spot, but that’s exactly the point in improving that range of motion.
I didn’t drop weight in working sets, kept those the same but the 5-10 warm up sets I’d do I’d really focus and sitting back and accept that i might fall backwards. Falling backwards with 300 pounds is one thing, falling back with 95 is less of a concern.
Video every set (even warm ups) and evaluate parellel, whether your weight was evenly distributed, etc.
This is what enabled me to work through it.
Thank you for your input guys - I’m gonna look at those points.
In regards to recent sessions, I had a lot of success today by keeping a straighter toe angle (my feet flared excessively) so next week I’ll try keeping a more upright torso (as I’m not sure my shoulders could handle a lower bar position at this time).
Try to shove both your upper back up, and ass up out of the bottom of a squat to maintain a near vertical back.