Why is the greatest exercise so unpopular?

Oh, the squat. It’s rare to walk into a commercial gym and see a ton of guys standing around at squat racks ducking and bracing as they rub their shoulders up under the bar to start a new set or gasp deep breaths from an exhaustive set of squats just completed. It’s even rarer to see a bunch of guys putting even moderately heavy weights on their back and bending their knees deep down into the pits until their butts are resting on their calves and then pushing powerfully upwards til they are standing upright again. Typically what you’ll see if anyone is at a squat rack and happens to be doing a squat is something like this. A guy will be using weights that are about his own bodyweight (if not significantly less) and he’ll bend his knees enough so his butt is a foot or two away from his heels. He’ll rep out five to ten reps and finish the set without much huffing or puffing. He will certainly never require any initial pump music or hype up to get his nervous system in the mood for heaving up the weights he is moving around.

Why is this? The squat is known as the king of all exercises. Do people just not know this? I mean if I had to pick only one exercise to do for life, it would be the squat. You can steadily increase your squat strength for what seems like an eternity, literally making regular strength and mass gains for years upon years and building muscle mass along your glutes, hamstrings, quads, calves, back, abs, and - I’d be willing to wager also on your arms, chest and shoulders simply through the system anabolic effects alone. It’ll also make you a horse in any sports you play at. Don’t believe me? Try to take down a wrestler who can squat 500 lbs. Even if you weigh 250 and jump on the guys back, you’ll still feel like lightweight to him as you attempt to tug him to the ground. The same principle applies to football and basketball - try to box out a guy that has a 600 pound squat. You can forget it. He’s going to shove you wherever he wants to.

After I almost died from cancer and finally got out of the hospital, I got into working out with weights. I never trained my vertical jump once. I got my squat up to 405 and then tried to dunk for the first time in probably about 8 years. (For the purposes of transparency 8 years prior I had been very close to dunking again). When I tested my vertial jump, I found not only that I could dunk, I could do it with a single step and almost got it from two footed flat standing jump.

Most guys want to be great at their sports. Most of them also want to be strong. So again, why aren’t they squatting? What about the girls? They want sexy legs, well-shaped thighs and big butts - there is no exercise known to man better for getting exactly those results than the squat, particularly the heavy squat. So why do so many women squat under light weights or use machines instead?

The squat is so unpopular in commercial gyms and further inference in the general population of fitness goers, that many commercial gyms will have at most one or two squat racks! Can you believe this? I think there are many reasons for the unpopularity of the squat among the general fitness population. First, the squat is not an easy movement to get started with. Its not like using machines or doing a bench press or deadlift. It’s not incredibly self-explanatory or natural, especially in today’s society where we sit at desks all day, don’t work in the fields or outdoors and spend most of our waking minutes in a building somewhere sheltered from the light of day. The second, at least for guys, is that having big powerful legs is not perceived to be as “sexy” as having big arms, chest and broad shoulders. That’s at least why a lot of guys don’t prioritize it - nobody ever sees your legs so what’s the point right? Finally, nobody is ever going to ask you how much you squat, so even if you go to the gym and have a massive squat you’ll never get any respect from your peers for it.

These are some reasons that come to mind. Regardless, this needs to change. If you are an athlete you should squat and when your done squatting, keep squatting. There are thousands of variations to build and augment your strength and power. There are pause squats, front squats (perhaps even more useful in some sports than back squats), overhead squats, Bulgarian split squats, pistol squats, SSB squats and the list goes on and on. Squats and each variation will augment your the muscle and tendon strength and power from the soles of your feet up through your posterior chain all through to the back of your neck.

If you to be able to handle yourself in a fight, lift more weight, harden yourself and your body against injuries, if there is an exercise that can do it all in one sweep - its the squat, particularly the heavy squat. Technique must come first of course and practice makes perfect. Think the squat like a golf swing or the form of your jumpshot. Practice it all the time. And as your technique improves the weight you can move will improve more as well. For me, I found that squatting down into my hips allows me to maximally utilize the muscles of my glutes, hips, hamstrings and quads to rise up with the most weight possible. But everyone’s anthropometry is different. They have different hip sockets, femur and tebia lengths, and muscles and tendons positions. This means you will need to discover for yourself which position provides the most comfort, strength and power. There are some universals though, much like a golf swing or a jumper. To give you an idea of what I mean, for example, If your knees bend awkwardly inward and your knees don’t remain aligned with the direction your feet are pointed - your probably doing something wrong.

Here’s something you can try. Get in a squat rack with Take a barbell with just enough weight on it to provide at least some resistance - say 60 kg (135lbs). Then slowly perform a squat. Pause at different points along the way (especially at the bottom) and get a friend to kind of push around on you. If you feel unstable at any point or fall, it probably means your doing something wrong. You should always feel as sturdy and solid as a tree at every point along your down and up journey of a squat.

Now let’s get squatting!