Daily Maestroism

DM #69

Sunday, July 31st, 2016

DM #69: What looks good, what feels good, and what is good are many times not the same thing. When it comes to squatting, toes forward positioning is the champion of aesthetics and the king of mobility. However, toes forward squatting comes in second place when it comes to force production and loading the pattern.
The toes forward unloaded squat is used as an assessment tool that will demonstrate if the person has the prerequisite mobility and stability to perform the deep squat. However, once we go to load this pattern, turning the toes out slightly gives us some mechanical advantages.
With the toes turned slightly outward the line of pull for the surrounding musculature changes which allows for a few things: increased pelvic stability, improved hip extension moment for the adductors, and ideal centration of the femur within the acetabulum. The amount of turn out is going to vary, but needs to not be so much that one can no longer generate torque at the hips.
That all sounds pretty great, right? The caveat is that this toes out positioning needs to be an OPTION in your movement arsenal, not the only position in which you can squat (unloaded) because your mobility is whack.
Now some folks may never be able to perform a deep squat with the toes pointed forward because of boney deformities and whatnot. I'm not talking about them. So please spare me the ?? “But what about…?” questions.
Long story short, toes pointed forward squatting shows me that you have the prequisites to squat and earns you the right to load that pattern with the toes out.
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