 Never been done before live in action the best tier list squat variations and accessories while I'm squatting so you want to know how to improve your squats grow some legs tune in subscribe like this thing let's dive in so if you have a poverty squat tune in you want to squat five six seven hundred pounds I've squatted six hundred pounds in competition and I've led some big boys to over eight hundred pounds squat so I know a thing or two about squatting narrow stance squats now I think for a lot of people something like a narrow stance squat or just moving your stance in slightly more narrow could be a decent variation to build up your quads depending on how you move obviously quads are one of the main movers and the top limiters on how we're squatting so I would say a narrow stance squat I'll probably put in like the beats here it's not going to make or break it you're not going to add it into your sprinkling into your program and all of a sudden be a god because we can still catch volume for our quads on something like a leg of press a belt squat Bulgarian something other than the competition squat and anytime we're moving our stance or moving our technical form on the real squat it may slightly take away practice from our competition style squat squat of the big three or actually probably any movement in the game is one of the most technically difficult because you've got balance the weights on your back bar path is all very very difficult there's a lot of nuances how to stay tight in the squat so as much as you can practice your comp squat the better narrowing your squat is still great but it does take away slightly from the practice so we'll say be tiered for now next we got wide stance obviously this is all relative to how your normal stance is I don't see a ton of value in widening your stance obviously everyone shows or talks about range of motion when they're talking about the deadlift or sumo cheating but if that was the case everyone would be squatting wide as shit and they simply don't there's just not a ton of value that I personally see in the wide stance squat probably put it down there with the Ds and Fs not something I would program for most people 99% of folks next on the list we got the front squat and though I enjoy the front squat and I think it has a lot of value for general athletics it's fun I think it can work your quads a lot obviously the front the load is loading the front body it works a lot of your core really like anti-flexion of the core your rectors your abs but if you're just focused on improving your back squat it's probably not the play again we can load our quads in different ways through dumbbells body weight leg press Bulgarians other methods right when we're thinking about any kind of programming we have like the goal and we have one or two exercises that directly hit that stimulus for that goal then we have variations of that then we have accessories to that and so if we're a powerlifter or just a strength athlete in general and we want to improve our squat number one is squat it's that simple you can choose a variation or two from there and then accessories which will dive into I think the list has both unless you're an Olympic weightlifter a regular athlete or just a gym enthusiast meathead I think everyone should be able to front squat and figure out a front rack but if you're just trying to improve your back squat competition squat I'm sorry to all my friends out there it's probably it's probably in the D we're probably in the D now we pause squat I actually think it's probably one of the most versatile variations when we're talking about choosing a variation or you're getting better at anything in life this law goes across all borders called law specificity right if you want to get good at something you got to do something similar so calm squat up down hit depth pause squad just slightly pausing at the bottom is literally as close as you can get to the main variation so in my opinion it's probably a or s tier variation of the squad biggest factor try not to gather any rebound we're trying to take out of that rebound the reflex of our hamstrings and our quads so if you pause first movement should be straight up a lot of people pause and then they'll bury back down to get some rebound that's the whole point of taking that out so we'll pause to find positioning tightness but we'll also pause to be a self-limiter you can't squat max volume max weights every single day we'll get too torn down doing something heavy and hard with a pause allows to train hard every single day without maxing out overall systemic fatigue zurcher squats are something that a lot of people kind of do now is like a circus move but it was quite common in kind of the geared Westside days as a variation somewhere in between a front squat and RDL and like a good morning old-school like a real zurcher you're taking it from the ground you're hooking your elbows in as a hook and you're pulling and you're going to standing other zurchers we used to use like handles it would be like this medieval torture sex device and I have some pegs down here like this and you lay the bar in it and you get on the rack like that and not like you get really tired and like really generally strong you're building your glutes you're building your low back you're building your upper back and you can load some weight on there like I probably zurchard 500 pounds I got powerful hips but if we're talking about building the squat the strength will come from the specificity of the movement so we need to build the skill of squatting and while building the skill of squatting we can build the strength of squatting I think zurchers are probably not worth it for 95% of athletes even other strength athletes I'd probably look at a good morning or an RDL before that kettlebell swing if we're trying to get a little bit more dynamic with it fun movement maybe something you should try I think you all need to try some hard shit but if I'm you know lining things up to be as optimal as I can to be a better squatter zurchers probably into the program down with the D down with the D my boy so the the camber bar became popular probably because the West Side barbell it does alleviate some shoulders right because you can go lower rather than you have to get cocked up all the time the bar cambers and when you're doing box squats which is very popular in the conjugate system the bar will swing so it'll be a little bit of stability issues because you're sitting back it'll swing a little bit you got to balance yourself for the free squat I actually think it's kind of underrated a lot of people maybe haven't used it or experienced it so they can't speak on it I used it hundreds of times it's almost easier and it's kind of cheating but you can manipulate the weight itself so it sits over your mid-foot better and in a way you can actually overload I know people speak of overload with like reverse bands and all these and heavy walkouts where you would handle over your maximum but if you're handling a camber bar you might be able to handle one to six percent more than your max while alleviating some shoulder pain I think it's a really great option actually so am I putting it in every regular program probably not but I think it's an amazing tool to have and probably one of the most underrated secrets because a lot of the newer generation has never really experimented with specialty bars majority of people just don't have that many issues with their shoulders and elbows especially in the Natty game but other lifters might and then if you're off-season you want to give your shoulders a little bit of a break I think it's a great tool and again being able to manipulate it so it really sits over your front foot I think it's a great tool so yeah let's throw it in the bottom of B so the safety squat bar known as the SSB kind of forces the weight it has a light camber itself towards the front of you and then again alleviates the shoulders has some pads so you don't have to use your upper body as much in the squat again I think you know it's probably one and a half one step half a step away from your comp squat if you're in off-season if you're just trying to build your legs better in general I think it's a great piece it really works your upper and mid-back you can really focus on your quads really focus on put pushing you can do something called like the half field squat also where you use your hands on a stable surface similar to something like a belt squat machine and you can really overload your legs and not worry about balance as much so as an accessory not a variation I think it's probably a tier as a variation it might be in the B tier really solid great movement in the off-season but again it's maybe a little bit too far away from your comp squat and we talked about kind of the differences between variations which very closely emulate the move and something like an accessory that maybe builds muscle to help then raise the bottom level of our strength and that's where the Bulgarian split squat comes in absolutely S tier movement in my opinion as an accessory I wouldn't call it a variation it's more of like a bodybuilding hypertrophy accessory is the most common term or supplemental lift so you can really build muscle raise that foundation you can do it with a more vertical shin and work on your hammies and glutes you can tuck that heel back in get a positive shin angle which means my knees are heading more towards my toes and really focus on that quad loading it's easy with kettlebells dumbbells or even a barbell using that safety squat bar as a load as you get stronger for the Bulgarian I think let's just keep so the box squat it's actually a movement I really enjoy and I think it's misunderstood like many of us that look like a heart now for raw powerlifting it's too far steps right because the whole goal of the box squat is to break up the eccentric and the concentric portion right take away that elasticity similar to the pod squat except now we can really allow our body to relax on the box although you're staying tight in your midsection the other big goal is to keep a neutral if not negative knee angle right so shin angle is going backwards now we're really focusing on those hands as I'm sitting on the box it's actually going to be similar to this and then I'm going to hamstring curl myself back up so different too far away too many variations from deviations my statistical analysis from the regular squat as a general strength builder as a general movement I think it's something you should have in your pocket strong men athletes even powerlifters if they're injured or things that we you know it's a tool that we can implement here and there but as the core of our training 99.9% of raw powerlifters do not need the box squat wheezy F baby down in the F tier and the F is for that fucking sucks the other one a lot of these are kind of basis from the conjugate West Side system because that system of training is what I grew up in my direct mentors and powerlifting in my early early days were there a lot of people I interviewed you know five through one Wendler Brandon Lilly Matt winning Mark Bell all these guys are West Side disciples or like number two guys are all at West Side that's why I learned under I eventually got to learn under many other people like Eric Helms Bryce Lewis Lane Norton many others that I've interviewed but the original core I learned from was the West Side because that's all that was dominating powerlifting bands and chains accommodating resistance allows you to explode in the movement all movements get harder at the top using them and they're lighter at the bottom so again for athletes even for some raw powerlifters I do think there's time in the offseason offseason when I say that I mean more than like the the peaking blocks so further away than like 12 16 weeks we have a longer break in training before competition I think there's something that you can really use to again control the fatigue have fun which matters get strong in different variations that don't conflict with your regular form and these are tools we can use chains I think are a tool that are probably under utilized that some people could use it can allow you be a little bit more explosive cutting yourself through some of the weak points in your training or weak points in your lift where you tend to slow down you can hopefully learn yourself to be slightly more explosive the other point is that it can control and manage the overall fatigue the overall bar weight you have to handle day in and day out can go down on one of your squat days if you're a higher frequency squatter so for that reason I'll probably throw in the middle tier of B something you can use we have to learn how to use it correctly when why and how I would probably use it on my lighter day squats if I'm programming for most raw lifters are heavier day we want to be as specific as we can or do something like a pause which again is very close to it maybe even a tempo which isn't on the list but I'll throw that in the S tier also three seconds going down three seconds going up maybe a pop one second pause in the bottom really allow you to control your bar speed your bar path excuse me and use the most specific as we can the bands or the chains I would use up my secondary day where I'm handling you know sets of three to five maybe a little bit in the 60 70% range with RPE 6 to 7 where we're just trying to get some general volume in practicing it's really good as a practice day and that's it man hopefully that helps improve your squad hopefully like the cheer list this one's a little bit more free-flowing a little bit more rocks I had to get a squad session in new videos every single day new content please please please like subscribe appreciate y'all so much join the discord good company discord.com for 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