Front Barbell Squat To A Bench

How to do it

1. Set a bench behind you at a height that puts your thighs at or just below parallel when seated.
2. Rack a barbell across the front of your shoulders with the elbows high, then step back to the bench.
3. Set your feet about shoulder-width with the toes slightly turned out.
4. Squat down keeping the torso as upright as possible until your backside touches the bench.
5. Touch without sitting, and without letting the elbows drop.
6. Drive back up through the whole foot, chest staying up.

Common mistakes

• Letting the elbows drop as you reach the bench. Elbows falling rolls the bar forward and the back takes it — and reaching back for a bench is exactly when the chest wants to drop.
• Sitting down. Touch-and-go keeps the legs loaded; sitting under a front-racked bar puts it on a torso that has stopped bracing.
• Reaching for the bench with the hips. A front squat travels down more than back, so the bench sits closer than it would for a back squat.
• Loading it from a back squat. The bar in front means a more upright torso and more quadriceps, and the usable weight is well below a back squat.

Muscles worked

Primary

• Quads

Secondary

• Calves
• Glutes
• Hamstrings