FuBarbell

Jennifer Hsia did a recap of her experience this past weekend with Coach Wu (@wuchuanfu) and his lesson in squatting. Jennifer is a student of weightlifting. She travels around the country listening and absorbing all the different philosophies from modern day coaches.

By @gojhsia:

There are many ways to #backsquats. IMHO each method has pros and cons. There is no right or wrong, as long as you understand what you are trying to accomplish when you squat. ChuanFu squats (more info at @dianefu):

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(1) emphasis is on making this a quad dominant movement. It will obviously strengthen your quads and have carry over to coach’s style of weightlifting since he teaches a more quad dominant style of lifting.

(2) knees track over toes - no knees out and no knees in.

(3) depth: you go to depth in which you can maintain good technique and tempo. For me, that was just below parallel. Can I squat deeper? Yes. Can I maintain control of my body at rock bottom? Not at this time.

(4) tempo is key: controlled on the way down and then propel/bounce/explode up.

(5) shoulders, traps, back are relaxed (not loose, but not tense either).

(6) bar should travel in a relatively straight line up and down which means don’t be shifting your hips, particularly on the way up.

(7) always maintain your center of balance Coach has me change my back angle to a little more forward so that my center of balance is better. Being completely upright is okay if your center of balance is over your midfoot but if not, then you have to find the correct back angle. My tempo was not quite right until the last one. Due to my back, I haven’t back squatted for 5 months. I was a little nervous to squat as it typically causes pain even at this relatively light weight (83#), but with this style of squatting, I had really no pain. I even made it up to 113# with no pain. My leg strength was lacking and couldn’t maintain a good bounce that Coach approved of. So that is something that I need to work on. And hopefully, over time, I will be able to increase quad strength and squat depth.