Great Squats You NEED To Do!

Having a better understanding of how your body works, isn’t something you do just so you can show off online. I truly believe, “knowledge is power”, when we truly understand concepts of movement strength training. A great way to illustrate this idea is realizing that not only are there a lot of ways to perform squats, but not all squats are the same!

For example, fitness trainer, “Joe”, realizes that moving laterally is kinda important. It develops a more well rounded glute area, builds real functional core strength, and develops flexibility at the same time. After all, he just read how awesome all this stuff is, so let’s go do it. However, he didn’t prep his clients so the first time they move laterally and he was modeling everything after a demonstration like the one below AND…..

The client’s eyes almost pop out of their head like a Saturday morning cartoon character and they feel like every part of their lower body was split in half. Horrified, the fitness coach decides this lateral movement is just too hard for people and leaves it alone. They write off such squats as “cute”, or “too functional” (whatever that means!). The key to great squats is the same as any movement…progression!

We didn’t use the right progressions people! Lateral movement is more difficult because of more stress on one side and the greater flexibility demands. That means we have to ease people into these movements. Just like any other exercise, lateral motions require building blocks. 

Lateral squats are a great lower body movement to progress mobility and single leg training! One of my favorite drills for really building tremendous glute and core strength, stability, and mobility all at once. Now, we teach this by first building HOW to move into lateral squats and then build strength in it. This will lead us into another important friend of ours in the world of squats.

That is easy if you understand one of our DVRT Ultimate Sandbag Training principles of changing holding position. Simply by changing how we hold a weight, we can build on the progression of a movement. In the DVRT Ultimate Sandbag Training video below, you will see how I move from building the movement to challenging the movement. 

Learning to move in these ways is the way our strength goes beyond the gym! Remember, the glutes are tri-planar muscles. That means they both produce and resist forces at the same time. That means we need to train them the same way. It also means, that we can have specific strength and flexibility, sometimes you will see big deadlifters or squatters that can’t come close to HALF the weight with such exercises. So, don’t become that fails when it comes to being strong in life! 

This knowledge in understanding how we use holding position of the Ultimate Sandbag to build better movement is far different how most people see squats. The majority of people either look at going heavier or lighter, but the truth is the success in squats and most of our other movements is through connecting the body.

Another great example is a rear foot elevated split squat. A closer step got going more single leg. Most people think that doing such squats is just a lower body issue. However, the more we can integrate the core, the better we can do in developing such a wonderful type of squat that builds stability, mobility, conditioning, and strength all at once.