PB Your Back Squat pt.1

One of the things I remember being the most frustrating in my first few years of training was hitting plateaus in the squat. The squat was really my thing, I found it quite easy to squat with good form and it seemed like putting a few kegs on my 1RM every month was like clockwork.... until it wasn't.


We all remember when the newbie gains stop, when just going to the gym and doing 5 x 5 or 3 x10 ad nauseam doesn't do shit anymore. 

One of the things that is great about being a beginner is once you get your form sorted the squat is as simple as - put it on your back, sit down and stand up for this many sets x reps with this much weight.

In this little series I'm going to give you a few strategies that I have used and still use to break through road blocks you will encounter during your training to get a big squat. In this part we're going to go over intent during your squat and also how to properly use speed work to improve your power so the squat increases and your strength carries over to over stuff like jumping, sprinting, hitting, weightlifting etc. 

One of the thing I see people NOT doing is having the intent to move the weight with speed and aggression.

Move the weight with the intent to produce maximal speed and force.

Compensatory Acceleration Training (CAT)
"Lifting a submaximal weight with maximal force will provide many of the strength training adaptations of lifting maximal weights. On the same token, lifting a maximal weight with the intent to move it as quickly as possible provides explosive strength benefits. The take home point is that your body adapts, in a large part, to your CNS's intent to move the weight as quickly as possible." - Josh Bryant

What do you actually intend to do during your squat ? 
I know for the longest time I just tried to stand up, that was it, stand up. 
​Until I read about CAT, when you start trying to put as much speed and force into the bar with each rep no matter the weight you make even the light weights (<50%) a viable training stimulus, rather than only the heavy or hard sets being the worthwhile ones. 

This is probably what immediately gave me and the people I coached transferable strength from the squat into jumping and sprinting and also made our squats a lot better. When you step under the bar your intent has to be to move out of the hole with maximum speed and force! 

Get Faster to Get Stronger

Two very simple ways to start improving your speed are to start having "speed squats" and jumps in your training. 

1. Speed Squats

One day of the week try using 50-70% for sets of 3-5 reps for pause back and/or front squats. 

5 x 5 @ 50% or working towards 5 x 3-5 reps at 70%, with aim of pausing in the hole for 1-2 seconds and exploding out of the hole as hard as possible. ​

The reason for using lighter weight is you can practice moving faster, accelerating the weight as hard as you can. 

The lighter loads allow you to add training volume without it beating you up too.

a weekly progression for a speed squat session could work like this: 
week 1 - 50% for 5 x 5 
Week 2 - 55% for 5 x 5 
Week 3 - 60% for 5 x 5 
Week 4 - 65% for 5 x 3 
​Week 5 - 70% for 5 x 3 

2. Jump Before Every Squat Session

Jumping, especially resisted jumping can improve your ability to move heavier loads at speed, it also serves as a great warm up to make sure you're ready to go before you squat. My two favourite variations for improving the squat are seated box jumps and weighted seated box jumps. 

These rep schemes done EMOM will work well: 
5x5 
5x3 
10-12x2 

The emphasis is trying to achieve violent triple extension as you come off the box, the box height you jump to doesn't matter so much. 

Mix up your jump training, one week use light weights and see how higher box you can use for 12 x 2, 5 x 5etc. 

Next week have a day where you jump to a low box and see how much weight you can hold in each hand. 

These two strategies can be enough to jump start your squat progress again and keep it going for quite a while, give them a go for a month and see how it affects your squat and the rest of your training and performance too!