When doing squats, your knees should not go beyond your toes? "Fitness Girl College Student" solves 3 myths

If you want to lose weight healthily, promote metabolism, or even build strong butt and leg muscles, "squats" are the best choice. However, some people are both looking forward to and afraid of getting hurt when doing squats. They worry that "doing squats will hurt your knees" and "the lower you squat, the easier it is to hurt your knees." In addition, there are myths circulating on the Internet such as "when doing squats, your knees cannot go beyond your toes." Now let the Internet celebrity, a female bodybuilder, debunk these myths.

Myth 1: Squats can hurt your knees

The idea that squats hurt your knees should be left far behind. Decades ago, there was very little research on weight training movements, and most of it was conducted by medical professionals involved in sports injuries, which resulted in "sampling bias." This means that the samples these researchers had were all people who had already been injured, so it was easy for them to conclude that "squats are dangerous and hurt the knees."

Yuan Kaiyun, a well-known blogger and fitness coach, said in her new book "Fitness Starts with Squats" that as weight training becomes more popular, more and more examples show that as long as the operation and guidance are correct, squats are not only safe, but can also prevent possible knee injuries in the future. Many injuries that appear to be caused by squats are actually not directly related to squats themselves, but rather come from complex causes, such as incorrect posture, abnormal bone structure of the original body, the superposition of daily activities or exercise, fatigue or overtraining, and even nutritional imbalance and lack of sleep.

Myth 2: The lower you squat, the more likely your knees are to get hurt

This myth is similar to the previous one, and there is no evidence to prove it. The same goes for injury rates. There are many related factors, and of all the data related to squat depth and injury rate, the only thing that can be measured and digitized is "the force exerted on the knee at different depths during squatting." After actually measuring these forces, the results show that the cartilage and ligaments in the knee structure that are most commonly injured are not subjected to the greatest force when squatting to the bottom, but rather at the angles of movements that are unavoidable in daily life, such as half squats, horse stances, and "shallow squats" when standing up from a chair, rather than "deep squats."

In addition, in terms of training efficiency, the full squat (squatting all the way down, with the back of the thigh almost touching the calf) has a larger range of muscle contraction. Both the full squat and the half squat should be done 10 times. The full squat stimulates the muscles more and has a better training effect. From a health, practical, daily and long-term perspective, as long as there is no problem with your current joint mobility, you can try to "squat as low as you can" under the guidance of a fitness coach.

Myth 3: Your knees should not extend beyond your toes

The saying "Don't let your knees go beyond your toes when squatting" is very common, and you can see coaches using this instruction to teach in major gyms. However, few people can perform a correct and full-range squat without their knees going beyond their toes. The biggest reason is: if the knees do not exceed the toes, the pressure on the lumbar spine will decrease, but the pressure on the lumbar spine will increase significantly. Deliberately avoiding letting your knees go beyond your toes will cause your body's center of gravity to move backwards. At this time, in order to maintain balance, your upper body must lean forward a lot. The more tilted your upper body is, the more strain your lumbar spine will experience, causing the body to make too much compensation and making it difficult to make progress.

There is another biggest reason why squatting with the knees not exceeding the toes is not recommended: in your daily life and leisure sports, you do the "knees exceeding toes" action dozens or hundreds of times every day: getting up from a chair and sitting down, going up and down stairs, or even just the simplest walking. If you observe, you will find that if you try to keep your knees from going beyond your toes, you will have difficulty doing these movements. You will suddenly become unable to move, and either your body will become stiff and you will have to slow down to avoid falling, or you will have to hold on to something nearby to be able to do something as normal as drinking water. Since the knees go over the toes so often in everyday life, there's no reason to completely eliminate it from your training.

You can force your knees not to go beyond your toes, imagine the insufficient dorsiflexion angle mentioned in "Common Mistakes in Squats". Think about it, in this kind of posture, it is difficult to maintain a neutral spine with bare hands. If you add weight (such as barbell squats), wouldn’t it be even more impossible to get the posture right?

Now, follow the "female bodybuilding college student" Yuan Kaiyun to do the basic "bodybuilding squat" action:

Basic squat posture: "Squat Tips for Freehand Squat"

●Foot center of gravity

Turn the sole of your foot over and you'll find that there are three most prominent balls that are directly in contact with the floor. When squatting, the center of gravity of the whole body should be evenly distributed on the three points of the soles of the feet, and the toes should be lightly touching the ground, not completely leaving the floor, but there is no need to dig them down hard (if they do, it means your center of gravity is too forward. You can move your center of gravity slightly backward until your toes can slightly leave the floor without falling). In a stable squat, these three points on the sole of the foot will not leave the ground.

Ankle

When you are not proficient in squats, your center of gravity will move back and forth on the soles of your feet as the height of the squat changes, causing your ankles to move inward or outward (most of the time, they move inward), which will cause problems in the alignment of all the joints above (imagine that when the foundation is unstable, the house will fall to pieces). Therefore, a proper squat must ensure that the ankles remain neutral throughout the movement.

Knees and stance

The appropriate stance width will be slightly different for each person. Although "feet shoulder-width apart, toes facing forward" is a very common squat stance guide, it is difficult for most people to maintain a stable center of gravity on the soles of their feet and a neutral spine throughout the squat. The ideal stance for most people is a natural stance with the feet wider than shoulders and toes pointed slightly outward. You can start with your feet shoulder-width apart and toes facing forward, and gradually adjust until you find the most comfortable stance that allows you to squat until your thighs are parallel to the ground, with your feet stable and your spine neutral throughout the entire process. That's the stance width that's best for you.

Below are three different stance widths for squats. Among them, the "medium stance" is suitable for most people.

Regardless of your stance width, your knees must move in the direction of your toes (the direction of your second and third toes) as you bend during the squat. Because the knee is a hinge joint, it can only move in the same plane. If you fold it in other directions, it will cause stress on the joints and other injuries.

●Spine and pelvis

Although squats are a leg exercise, the alignment of the spine and pelvis will affect the position of the hip joint and the surrounding muscles (the gluteus maximus, hamstrings, and quadriceps are the most important muscles for squats). In addition, when doing weighted squats, the weight is on the upper body, which puts extra pressure on the spine. In order to keep the back muscles working, the spine must stay in a straight line throughout the squat, so that the extra pressure is absorbed by the back muscles rather than the spine itself.

Shoulders and scapula

When squatting, the upper body posture is good, mainly relying on the muscle groups near the spine to help. However, our upper body has a very special structure called "shoulder girdle", which is mainly composed of the scapula and shoulder blade, covering the shoulders like a shawl. When we consciously lift our chest up and push our shoulders down, this muscle contracts to help us stabilize our upper body and keep our spine upright.

It should be noted that the action of "lifting the chest up" is different from "pushing the belly forward". The former will make you feel your chest is straightened, your upper back muscles are exerting force, and your abdomen is slightly exerted, but the latter will make you feel your lower back is exerting force, your waist is protruding forward, and your stomach is relaxed, which will make the entire spine more unstable.