Alright, you may have seen people wearing a belt in the gym and wondered if a weight belt is for you. In general, and for most of you reading this, a weight belt is probably something that should be used sparingly in your workouts, and maybe not at all.
Whether a weight belt holds back your core muscles from experiencing growth on heavy exercises is debatable, but the belt can provide safety when you’re doing very heavy lifts or when there is a possibility of injury.
There are 3 reasons you might want to wear a weight belt when you workout:
1. Reduce Stress: belts help to reduce stress in exercises where the spinal erectors are involved in holding your lower back straight. Think of exercises like the deadlift or squats.
2. Prevent Hyperextension: By helping you to keep your lower back straight, a weight belt can keep (more…)
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Doing squats is one of the best ways to increase your overall lean body mass and power. Squats involve more muscle groups than almost any other exercise, and if you’re not already doing squats, adding them to your routine can help you to add strength quickly.
Learning the correct squatting stance will go a long ways in helping you to avoid injury. Lower back and knee injuries can happen if you’re not careful to use correct technique, and having the correct stance is necessary to help prevent these injuries. If it’s done correctly, the squat can be a very safe exercise.
Taking the correct stance
One mistake that you should avoid is to place your feet directly forward when you take a shoulder-width stance. This causes your knees to travel directly forward and makes it very difficult to squat all the way down. Take a look at the picture below.
This is about as far down as you’ll probably get with a narrow stance and the knees straight forward. The awkward stance causes the weight to shift forward and away from your correct center of balance. This is bad for both your lower back and your knees. (more…)
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