How to Do Front Squats Without Injuring Your Wrists
The barbell squat is a great exercise to incorporate into our daily routine, but some of us find it difficult to get used to the bar right in front of our neck and wrists that are laid back. If this sounds like you, we have several options for you to try.
Check your positioning
Before we start talking about ways to modify the front squat, let’s just make sure we’re doing it right. (I hated the chest squat too, and that’s the main reason I don’t like them anymore.)
First, make sure the bar is resting on your shoulders. You are not trying to hold it with your hands. Sometimes people just keep one or two fingers under the bar instead of squeezing it all the way. This works because your fingers don’t really need to do anything; for comfort and perhaps a little stability, you just keep your hands on the bar. By the way, keep your hands off your shoulders so they don’t get caught between your shoulders and the bar.
Second, push your shoulders forward. I like to pretend I’m trying to touch my elbows to the opposite wall. When you do this, your shoulders will actually move forward in relation to your body (you “extend” your shoulder blades), and the bar will move further away from your neck. Ah, you can breathe again!
Finally, make sure your elbows are raised high and keep them there even when squatting low. You don’t want the barbell to start rolling down your arms (this also means you can’t bend your torso too far forward as in the back squat. Maintaining an upright position is what makes the front squat harder than the back squat) ).
Cross your hands
Once you’ve found a suitable place for the bar on your shoulders and removed it from your neck, you may still have trouble keeping your fingers on the bar if your wrist mobility is low. It’s okay, we can work with it.
Remember how our shoulders actually hold the barbell, not our arms? This means that as long as your shoulder position is good and your elbows are up, it doesn’t really matter what your arms are doing. Some people squat into azombie with their arms out in front of them. This can be a little scary, so take the barbell with your hands in a different way: place it on your shoulders, and then cross your arms so that each hand touches the opposite shoulder.
Consider using belts
If you have a pair of lifting straps in your gym bag – long and straight with a loop at one end – you can also use them for the front squat. You should still place your shoulders correctly, but holding the straps can give you a little more control over the bar than a crossed-arm grip.
To use the straps, loop them over the bar where each shoulder will be, and then thread the end of each strap through a separate loop. As a result, the two straps will dangle from the barbell when it is in the rack. (Double check they are symmetrical.)
Now, as you place your shoulders under the bar, you are holding the ends of the straps in your hands. This will look like a normal front squat, but with straps a few inches between the shoulders and arms. This way, your wrists don’t have to bend that far, and it will be more comfortable for you to hold them in your hand.
Getting used to the front squat just takes some getting used to, so give yourself time to try these changes and see if they help. But if you are still unable to get the correct posture, you may have problems with something else, such as shoulder mobility. In this case, you may be better off doing other types of squats – zerchers , goblet squats, or plain old back squats – or perhaps other exercises altogether.