Inquiry Post #8

Weekly Check In and Form Focus 2

Felt a lot better this week! Last week I caught some kind of stomach bug and I wasn’t eating properly and the workouts were bad. Luckily by Monday this week, I was feeling better. The weight is still below 150 unfortunately, I weighed in this morning at 148. I was able to get back on track with all my meals this week so hopefully we will be back up to 150 by next week.

Form Focus

For our last form focus, we covered the Romanian Deadlift which is a lower-body exercise. This week I have decided to cover another lower body exercise people often do wrong, the back squat. Mistakes when squatting can compromise technique, increase the risk of injury, and limit the effectiveness of the exercise. Some common errors include inadequate knee alignment, excessive forward lean, lifting the heels off the ground, and losing balance due to forward or backward movement. Rounding or arching the lower back, lack of core engagement, and overloading the bar with excessive weight can also lead to issues. Neglecting warm-up and mobility exercises before squatting and ignoring pain or discomfort during the movement can further these problems. To squat safely and effectively, it’s crucial to maintain proper form, including achieving adequate depth, maintaining knee alignment, keeping the torso upright, and engaging the core and lower body muscles. Its important not to load too heavily when squatting until you have mastered these fundamentals. Here’s a great video by Squat University that goes into depth on squatting, and specifically making accommodations for your own anatomy.