Front Squat and other exercises

nice_guy80

I want to add in some front squats to my workouts. Currently do back squats. and deadlifts etc along with host of other lovely stuff

but i'm reading and watching conflicting techniques on how to do the front squat properly. I tried the front squat with a clean grip. I find it is causing pain in my arms. the cross arm grip is awkward

which is best? advice please.

Also, what exercises can I substitute in for pull ups/ Lat pulldowns. i hate pullups.

squod

nice_guy80 wrote: »

I want to add in some front squats to my workouts. Currently do back squats. and deadlifts etc along with host of other lovely stuff

but i'm reading and watching conflicting techniques on how to do the front squat properly. I tried the front squat with a clean grip. I find it is causing pain in my arms. the cross arm grip is awkward

which is best? advice please.

Also, what exercises can I substitute in for pull ups/ Lat pulldowns. i hate pullups.

I use the crossed arms position in front squat. The bar is accross my neck and shoulders when I do them, also I find it easier to do wearing a sweatshirt.

http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/Quadriceps/BBFrontSquat.html

Best advice is to stop hating pull ups & lat pulldowns, start liking them.
They're bluddy fantastic, it's your fault that you hate them.

rubadub

nice_guy80 wrote: »

i hate pullups.

What about chinups, I prefer chinups and not just because I can do more. Negative only pullups are good though, I prefer them to normal ones, and they can destroy you.

Colm_OReilly

You're lacking flexibility in the shoulders and thoracic mobility to get your elbows up.

To help, load the bar with a sh!t load of weight, and get underneath it in a lunge or squat position, grab the bar and roll your elbows up as much as possible, hold for 15 secs, and relax. Then repeat a bunch of times.

Also, foam roll your shoulders/upper back, perform some kips, and shoulder rolls with a pvc pipe to help loosen out your back.

Before you take the bar, imagine touching your elbows together about a foot in front of you at eye level, this will help bring your shoulders up and forward for the bar to rest on.

When you're holding the bar, you don't need a grip on it, even just your fingers on it are fine. The bar is resting on your shoulders, your hands act as stabilisers on it.

Practice some squats with the bar in a 'zombie' position - arms straight out forward to get used to where the bar should rest.

And do some pull ups.

Roper

Colm's said it all there. The cross grip and all other variations should just be stepping stones to getting the proper rack position.

Transform

Colm_OReilly wrote: »

You're lacking flexibility in the shoulders and thoracic mobility to get your elbows up.

To help, load the bar with a sh!t load of weight, and get underneath it in a lunge or squat position, grab the bar and roll your elbows up as much as possible, hold for 15 secs, and relax. Then repeat a bunch of times.

Also, foam roll your shoulders/upper back, perform some kips, and shoulder rolls with a pvc pipe to help loosen out your back.

Before you take the bar, imagine touching your elbows together about a foot in front of you at eye level, this will help bring your shoulders up and forward for the bar to rest on.

When you're holding the bar, you don't need a grip on it, even just your fingers on it are fine. The bar is resting on your shoulders, your hands act as stabilisers on it.

Practice some squats with the bar in a 'zombie' position - arms straight out forward to get used to where the bar should rest.

And do some pull ups.

what he said

nice_guy80

cheers for the info

i'll just have to work on the grip for the front squat. the grip is the main issue which is keeping me using the back squat

as for the pullups, I find it very disheartening when I can only do 5/6. would like if my gym had an assisted pull up machine, but it doesn't. or even a small chair/box to let me assist the pullup with one leg, but it doesn't!

neilmct.com

nice_guy80 wrote: »

as for the pullups, I find it very disheartening when I can only do 5/6. would like if my gym had an assisted pull up machine,

5 or 6 is a great start. Build on it. Dont waste time on machines when you can already move your bodyweight.

Jimmy Bottlehead

neilmct.com wrote: »

5 or 6 is a great start. Build on it. Dont waste time on machines when you can already move your bodyweight.

I've only starting doing chins the past four weeks. First two weeks I could only do negatives while other guys working in were cracking out sets of 8. Embarrassing. Fast forward two weeks and I'm up to 3 normal chins before I have to resort to negs again. Work in progress.... but you're still kicking my ass!

nice_guy80

neilmct.com wrote: »

5 or 6 is a great start. Build on it. Dont waste time on machines when you can already move your bodyweight.

ok then. but what do i do when i hit the 3rd or 4th set and cannot get past 2/3 pullups?

Inspector Coptoor

nice_guy80 wrote: »

ok then. but what do i do when i hit the 3rd or 4th set and cannot get past 2/3 pullups?

do negatives.
jump up and get into the position at the top of the pull up and hold it for as long as possible.

another idea would be to do weighted negatives, add 10kg to your BW and do the negatives.

BossArky

nice_guy80 wrote: »

ok then. but what do i do when i hit the 3rd or 4th set and cannot get past 2/3 pullups?

Try this. Rest 60 seconds between sets.

Set 1: 1 rep
Set 2: 2 reps
Set 3: 3 reps
Set 4: 4 reps
Set 5: 5 reps
Set 6: 6 reps ... lets say you fail on the 4th rep of this one.

In total so far you will have done 19 (1+2+3+4+5+4). Now start again.

Set 1: 1 rep
Set 2: 2 reps
Set 3: 3 reps ... lets say you fail on the 2nd rep here.

In total so far you will have done 19 from the first batch, plus 5 from this batch... giving 24 in total.

Repeat until you cannot do any. Gradually this will help increase your numbers as you are getting volume in before maxing out.

Roper

Buy a band and do some assisted work. The difficulty with pull ups is that it's too easy to go to failure, most people fail at very low reps. To put it another way, do you think it would be beneficial to go to failure on every single bench press set you ever did?

If you get yourself a decnet band, or even a dynaband or something cheap, you could do some high rep work to go along with the stuff you'll do to failure (you'll do that anyway). You'll also be able to do lot's of prehabilitation exercises that will probably have more benefit to your pull ups than doing any of the above.

nice_guy80

thanks for the advice

one or two more questions to satisfy my curiosity...
1 - triceps. i currently do 3/4 sets (to failure) of triceps dips. is this the best exercise for these muscles? would i be better off doing bench dips with a weight in my lap
2 - calves. is there a need to work them seperately when i already do deadlifts, squats etc

Colm_OReilly

What's your complete routine? And what are your goals?

nice_guy80

my goals are to put on muscle mass and gain strength

i am doing full body workouts. 2 or 3 times a week, depending on whether i can get to the gym on a saturday

day 1
squat
chest - bench, flys
back - pull up, bent over row
arms - curls, dips

day 2
deadlift
chest - incline bench, incline flys
back - pull ups
shoulders - dumbell press, lateral raises
calves - barbell calf raises

doing this until near end of November, then switching to power training exercises

nice_guy80

thanks for the advice here people.

my pull ups have increased, especially if i do back work before the chest exercises.

still doing 4 sets. I do a few negatives once i go to failure on first two sets, then use a bench for pull ups (leg assisted) once i hit failure on last two sets as the negatives destroy me

still have not got the front squat sorted though. have tried doing it without weight on the bar but the arms and elbows positions are giving me trouble, so i've stuck to the back squat its frustrating