Squat Development
Mark Brown
December 27, 2022
Going into 2022, the squat was the weakest of my main lifts. I restarted squatting in summer of 2020 after a year and half break from it. I have been doing it much more consistently since the summer of 2021. During a 12 week program that was more heavily powerlifting focused in fall of 2021, I was able to push my squat up to 415 pounds by the end of November. Squat was neck and neck with deadlift for my 1RM in terms of weight but it lacked in terms of volume. I went into January of 2022 at the gym with the intention of increasing my deadlift. I planned on using the squat to increase legs strength to be able to do that with. What I didn’t realize was that the way I was executing the plan I was doing so much more volume on squat than I was deadlifting. By March, I realized that my squat was improving at a higher rate than deadlift. The volume was raising my raw strength but at the price of extra stress on my back.
I only really had access to straight bars so I did low bar squats followed by regular deadlifts on Mondays and high bar bar squats as a main with sumo deadlifts as a supplemental lift. There other various supplemental and accessories I did on those days but the vast majority of my sessions were what I just listed. That changed in the middle of March when the weather started to regularly stay in the high 40s/low 50s F for the afternoons, which is when I lift. I realized by the time I got back to the garage that my squat is the lift that was getting the most development during the first 2+ months of 2022 at the gym. I worked up to 405 for 2 sets of 3 on day when I probably shouldn’t have been lifting relatively easily. I know that because I couldn’t finish my deadlift part of the session after squatting. That was my first sign that my squat was starting to really improve. Going back to the garage for the rest of the year was the start of a lot of different elements of the squat changing for me this past year.
The plan to working in 3 week waves meant that mainly alternated squats with the safety squat yoke bar and the cambered bar during said 3 week waves. Each bar has its own specific characteristic addition to the squat movement. My initial thought was to include waves of straight bar work so as to keep my skill with it up, but it wasn’t physically worth the cost to my left shoulder and arm in late spring/early summer. Ultimately, working with both specialized bars every 3 weeks is what is most responsible for my squat becoming my best lift. Each bar worked something specific about the movement that helped the other, and the straight bar as well. I found I could use the waves as a way to see the effect of the previous one. In effect, I was getting more real time feedback than I ever had before. That’s a big part of the 3 week wave strategy I have learned over this year.
The yoke bar is produces a far more difficult squat than the cambered bar does. That way the bar sits on the body forces the core to really tighten up and brace when doing the movement because all of the weight on the bar is focused right down the middle of the back. The weight of the bar also pushes directly on the upper back. It forces the upper back to develop to be able to hold up to the stresses put on it. I got the yoke bar in 2020 but wasn’t able to use it until summer of 2021 because I stayed in the gym too long in 2021 and the fact I wasn’t strong enough to use it until then. This past year was the first full one I was able to really include it in my training completely with a higher level of understanding it. I was able to slowly put more weight on my yoke bar squats throughout the year. I did box squats to ensure I was getting down to mostly parallel. There was a few weeks of free squats in there. Most of my working sets were in the 315 to 355 pound range, always aiming to work in sets of 3. Towards the end of the year, I was able to increase those working free box squat sets to above 355. There was even a week I was able to work up to 405 pounds on it, which really surprised me.
Using the yoke bar as a primary movement on leg days throughout the year also forced development in other areas that I didn’t fully anticipate or understand until a bit afterward. I’ve known my upper bar has been developing and getting bigger for some time, even before 2022. People at work had commented on it in conversation. I mentioned above the physical effect of the bar on the upper back. What I didn’t understand at the time is that while that muscular development is good for all of the main lifts and overhead press, it doesn’t particularly help getting under a straight bar. That is especially true for a low bar squatter like myself. I don’t have to hold the plates but my hand placement is about as wide as can be without having to do so. That is the primary reason why I decided to ultimately ditch working in 3 week waves of straight bar squatting, free or boxed. There just wasn’t any reason to put my body in that position when I had 2 great alternatives. I did break a new straight bar pr in late spring at 435 pounds and missed at 445 just 5 or so minutes after that. I did notice that in my second to last squat session of the year that my position under the strait bar felt much better than before. I don’t quite understand why as of yet. Not being comfortable under a straight bar isn’t news to me. It’s been a thing for years now.
The cambered bar forced me to think of my leverages when squatting much more fully. Once again, this is a bar I bought in 2021 but only started fully understanding this year by alternating 3 week waves with the yoke bar. In terms of ease of use, it’s the easiest between the 3 kinds of squats I do regularly, which have already been mentioned. That is because a cambered bar squat is very much like a straight bar squat with space for hands to be placed in a way that doesn’t strain the shoulder and/or bicep tendon. The way the bar is loaded, at the hips, produces a movement that leans more forward than with a straight bar. The squat becomes more quad dependent while creating a need for the body to exert more effect to brace the spine at the same time to keep the loaded plates from swaying. That’s what I had to get more consistent with at the beginning. I remember quite a few times when I was too far back in the movement on the way down. I was never seriously threatened going backward but the bar was good at telling me not to do it again. I discovered the cambered bar and box squat are made for each other in late spring. It really helps getting down to the hole and having that box to sit on so I could be as far forward as I needed to be in the lift. I did do waves of regular squat with the bar just to ensure I could hit the same numbers as with the box, even hitting 415 pounds at one point. Cambered bar squats produced the highest volume of 90% and above 1RM free squats I did all year, boxed or not. The yoke bar prevents me working up in that range. That’s why working both into the program has been highly productive.
The yoke and cambered bars also show differences in other lifts that I do regularly. I’ve never been a fan of good mornings because I sucked at them for a long time. I noticed quite a bit of difference in them when I used different bars. The yoke bar produces a good morning that puts far more pressure on the neck and upper bar area. That makes sense since the entire weight of the bar is on the 6 inches of bar/padding that is resting on the body. It’s much more difficult than when I do it with either a straight or cambered bar. I can handle much more weight with the latter. The advantage of the cambered bar for good mornings is that I could really get that bar across the middle part of my lats. That made it more different, which is why different equipment is used to develop muscles and lifts. I discovered 225-235 was about the right weight for a cambered bar good morning for sets of 6, though I did a 265 pound good morning for multiple sets of 3 late in the year that made me really think what was possible.
I made a change in overall strategy to reduce spinal stress, given the amount of volume of lifting I did on most Tuesdays. The second leg/back day, typically a Saturday, would be done to do more for the legs and back in a general sense because Tuesday was so squat and pull specific. That led to me doing lifts I hadn’t done much. Clean and push press with a straight bar, goblet squats, hips thrusts in addition to other accessory lifts I am very familiar with. I have done some front squats with a straight bar in the past but found them difficult to maintain bar position. They will be in the 2023 program but I needed to figure out how best to do them. I found goblet squats with dumbbells are great for volume. They are capped by the dumbbells themselves, which is why the front straight bar squats are important to develop. The hip thrusts showed promise in developing some more power from hips. I noticed some more of it in my main lifts after I started doing them. The clean and push press started more as an attempt to learn clean and jerk, but it’s clear I’m not fast enough to jerk at higher intensity. The push press helped get in full body work while forcing some more leg drive. They will all be part of 2023’s lifting plan. I decided in November to put some more emphasis on recovery so I eliminated that second leg day, which was done at the gym because of equipment availability. Some of those weeks I wasn’t recovered from Tuesday’s lifting session until Friday. As a result, progress slowed in terms of muscular development at the end of the year. I made up for it by doing a higher volume on squats on Tuesdays.
The overall structure of the plan for 2022 was heavy on the volume. That didn’t produce a lot of improvement at the very top of the intensity peak, but did a very high amount of reps in the 80-95% 1RM rep range. That helped my working sets get heavier throughout the year. My back feels great, my legs feel strong and I am seeing/feeling some muscular development in my core even if it is covered up fat because diet isn’t great. Walking out all of those heavy squats reps, especially the yoke bar ones, is having a major positive effect on me. I have seen a fair amount of muscular development in my quadricep, mostly in thickening the muscle, but I don’t have a lot of definition in them. That is mainly due to the fact I don’t do a lot of lifts to bring it out. The main quad iso I did in the garage gym was an assisted squat. It allowed me to really focus on planting my feet and forcing my quads to push, much like a leg press or hack squat/ Hamstrings and gluten saw the most development this year. I feel them much stronger now than last year. The gym doesn’t have a GHR machine so I have to work around that a bit. The hip thrusts really showed me something.
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