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Substituting for the Squat (part 1 of 3)

© Matt Danielson

When it comes to leg training, and Quads in particular, there's one exercise that keeps popping up: Squats.

Squats are good. It's a basic compound movement that builds overall power and strength, it's highly effective, and it's relatively safe. For some. For others, squats simply don't work! People in this category keep hearing the advice about "Squats are the king of power-exercises" and that they will never achieve world-class legs without them, but still, the result they end up with is pain in the shoulders, a sore lower back, and a sore butt. Not exactly signs that you got a good quad-workout.

As a general rule, short, bulky guys handle squats much better than tall, skinny guys, but of course there are exceptions to the rule. The bottom line is that you really can't tell until you're doing it - if you have professional help, do what you're supposed to do, and still feel unbalanced and get a general feeling of missing the quads, you're probably not suited for squats.

But before you jump to the conclusion that you belong to the no-squat category, make sure to have someone check your form. Squats are very demanding when it comes to balance, posture, and overall mental focus throughout the movement. If your mind is elsewhere, you're ASKING for injuries! So... Make sure that your mind is not the problem, before you start blaming your general composition.

Fortunately, the no-squatters have something to rely on for equal or, in some cases, even better results! Say hello to your new friends - Hack-lift, Legpress, and Leg Extension machines!

Hack-lift
For some reason, people talk about the Hack-lift, or "Hack-squats," as a "knee-killer" and it being a "fine-tuning exercise."

My response is: Bull!

In all leg-exercises, there's a golden rule - angle your legs in any way you feel the most comfortable, but make sure to keep your toes pointing in the exact same direction as your knees will be pointing in the bottom position! Imagine an invisible line going through the middle of your upper-quad, knee, and toes. As you bend your knees, all three checkpoints must stay in that line! If not, you're getting a twisting-kind of movement in your knees, and with extra weight behind that twist you're in the danger zone of some nasty knee-injuries. Once again, this goes for ALL these exercises - Squats, leg presses, hack-lift, and even deadlifts!

So, as long as you pay close attention to the positioning of your knees, you should be Ok. An advantage of hack-lifts is that you're partially leaning your back against a pad. This is definitely a good thing, as you're stabilizing your entire body, thus drastically reducing the risk of twisting your spine or knees as fatigue sets in! The opponents of this view say that you get a benefit of improved balance with free squats, but hey! The reason Squats didn't work for you in the first place was that you did NOT feel balanced, wasn't it? If balance is a problem, I say that it can be trained separately - there's a time and place for that - and when you have 400 lbs balancing on your shoulders just ain't it!

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