Frankenstein Squat
Trains the Quads.
- Equipment
- A barbell and a rack
- Mechanic
- Compound
- Force
- Push
- Level
- Intermediate
How to do it
- Set a barbell in a rack at upper-chest height.
- Step under it and rest it across the front of your shoulders, as in a front squat.
- Let go with both hands and hold your arms straight out in front of you.
- Brace your stomach hard — nothing but the shelf of your shoulders is holding the bar.
- Squat down keeping the torso as upright as possible.
- Drive back up without letting the chest drop, and take the bar back in your hands before racking it.
Common mistakes
- Loading it like a front squat. Without hands on the bar, the shelf is the only thing holding it and the load has to be one you can keep perfectly upright under.
- Letting the chest drop at any point. On a front squat a dropped chest rolls the bar forward and the hands catch it; here there is nothing to catch it.
- Using it as a strength lift rather than a position drill. It exists to teach an upright front-squat torso and to show exactly when that torso fails — which is what makes it useful and what limits the weight.
- Setting up without safety pins at the right height. A bar leaving the shoulders travels forward, and where it lands is worth deciding before the set.