Squat depth and keeping heels on the ground

[Smokes]

@JamieC

It looks to me like you have pretty poor mobility in general. Are you knew to exercise?

I would have you do three things:

1. Practice squatting A LOT. Basically whenever you find yourself standing around the house , crank out 5 reps of bodyweight squats. Do them slowly, with your hands together like you’re praying, pause at or close to parallel, and use your elbows to push your knees out. Focus on “keeping your shoes glued to the floor” as Austin says. Google image search “tripod foot” for a nice visual of how to distribute your weight.

2. Very simple stretches on your calves every day and particularly before training. No need to go crazy, just stand on a step with your heels “hanging” over it for 20s between your warm up sets.

3. A couple of sets of 10-20 Superman’s or bird dog crunches before training or between warm up/ramp up sets. This is more to practice lumbar extension.

I’ve found these work well in gym members/clients with similar issues to yours. You shouldn’t have to do these for very long either, the squat itself is the best way to get better.

​​​​​​Others have mentioned weightlifting or at least hard soled shoes. I second that
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I’ve been working on regularly squatting, trying to get my knees out more and bought some weight lifting shoes. Here’s a video from a few days ago:

255 x 3 Pin HBBS Closer to Parallel

No, I’m not new to exercise. Until I started the bridge a few weeks ago, I could count the number of weeks in the last 15 years I didn’t run at least 20 miles on one hand and sport wise I play basetball, softball, tennis. RHR = 48 and my TDEE is 3700. I’m pretty active for a desk job, but I’m not sure what in that list would give me good mobility in general.