Olympic Squat
Trains the Quads.
- Equipment
- A barbell and a rack
- Mechanic
- Compound
- Force
- Push
- Level
- Intermediate
How to do it
- Rack a barbell high on the upper back — on the traps rather than across the rear delts.
- Step back with your feet about shoulder-width and the toes turned slightly out.
- Brace your stomach and set your chest up.
- Squat straight down, keeping the torso as upright as the high bar position allows.
- Go as deep as a flat back permits, which for most people is well below parallel.
- Drive back up through the whole foot without letting the chest drop.
Common mistakes
- Placing the bar low on the back. A low bar position leans the torso forward and turns it into a powerlifting squat, which is a different lift with a different depth and a different weight.
- Letting the heels lift at depth. High-bar depth asks more of the ankle, and lifting shoes or a small heel raise is the usual answer rather than cutting the squat short.
- Loading it from a low-bar squat. The upright torso puts more on the quadriceps and less on the hips, and the number comes down.
- Chasing depth past the flat back. Below parallel is the intent, and the lower back rounding under the bar is where the intent stops.