How to use your hips to do squats

Squats are a very common exercise method. Nowadays, people care a lot about their bodies and attach great importance to their body proportions, so they will choose to do some exercises to improve their bodies. Then squats are definitely the preferred exercise method. This exercise is very simple, but it mainly requires the hips to exert force, so that the effect will be better and injuries can be avoided.

Place the barbell behind your neck, hold it with both hands, keep your body straight, look straight ahead, and keep your feet shoulder-width apart. Bend your knees and slowly squat down until your thighs are parallel to the ground or slightly lower than your knees. Hold the position, contract your quadriceps and other muscles, and push your legs and knees to return to the original position. Movement rhythm: squat for 2-3 seconds, rest for 1-2 seconds, squat for 2 seconds.

The squat is a double-joint movement of extending the hip and knees, which can be divided into three stages: preparation posture, squatting and squatting.

1. Get into position. Beginners must first determine the exact location of the barbell. Keep your head up, chest out, and back straight, but don't hyperextend. After retracting your shoulder blades, place the bar on your raised trapezius and deltoid muscles to adjust your balance. The weight of the barbell is shared by four points, with the trapezius muscle bearing most of the weight, so there is no need for cushioning materials such as sponges. Even if you are thin and have weak deltoid and trapezius muscles, you can still eat heavy weights without any pain or other discomfort. Raise your arms to the side and hold the bar with both hands for stability. Place a wooden board or barbell plate about 3 cm thick under your heels.

2. After the shoulders are loaded with weight, the total center of gravity of the human body and the barbell moves backward, but the back cannot lean forward. Only by raising the heels and passively moving the center of gravity forward can the body be restored to a stable supported state. The restored balance also allows the quadriceps to be more stressed during the squat. After lifting the barbell, adjust the position of your feet. The distance between the two feet is generally the same as the width of the shoulders. If the feet are too far apart, the inner adductor muscles will be overstressed and overdeveloped, which is not good for aesthetics and life. Your feet should be in a natural stance with an angle of 30 to 45 degrees. Placing the barbell on the cervical vertebrae will cause pain and also form a chest-hunching and waist-arching movement, which will increase the tension of the waist and back muscles, straighten the limbs and straighten the back.

3. Squat. After getting into the ready position, slowly bend your knees and squat down in a controlled manner while taking a deep breath. When squatting, the direction of the knee joint is the same as the direction of the toes, and squat until the thighs are parallel to the ground or slightly lower than the knees. If the hips fall to the ankle joints, you are squatting too low, which is not only unnecessary but also easy to cause injuries to the knees, ankles and other joints. The speed of squatting should not be too fast, the rhythm should be mastered. At least the speed of squatting should not be faster than the speed of squatting up. Because there is an obvious time effect after muscles are stretched, the longer the time, the more the muscle strength decreases, and vice versa.

4. Therefore, the weight that a weightlifter can lift if he stands up immediately after squatting down may not be lifted if he pauses for a longer time after squatting down. The reason is that he immediately squatted down and took advantage of the stretching of muscle groups such as the gluteal muscles and quadriceps, which increased muscle elasticity and enhanced muscle strength. The requirements for bodybuilding exercises are different. You need to hold the squat for 1-2 seconds after reaching the lowest point, and then stand up again. Although the weight of the squat is smaller, the actual force on the lower limb muscles is not reduced, and it is relatively safer.