smith machine squats with no hands!

[leonidas33]

has anyone ever done these?

i do my reps with the bar on my shoulders and at the very bottom of the decent of the rep place my hands on top of my knees which give me excellent knee and lower back support. I can feel it really isolate my leg muscles.

I have never seen/heard of anyone doing these before but it just came natural to me because of my knee/back pain. I can do much more "controlled" weight with these with a very good range of motion.

does anyone see any problems with doing these this way? any potential for injury? again, it feels much better to "me" than doing them with my hands grasping the bar. and of course this would not be possible without a smith machine as the bar would obviously fall right off of your shoulders.

 

[Sculelos]

Hmmm personally I like to stay far away from the smith machine. I don't see how you could place your hands on your knees efficiently if your going below parellel, just doesn't sound a good idea to me when you could do regular squats below parellel while keeping your back straight, those in my opinion would be much safer then anything else you could do.

 

[leonidas33]

Hmmm personally I like to stay far away from the smith machine. I don't see how you could place your hands on your knees efficiently if your going below parellel, just doesn't sound a good idea to me when you could do regular squats below parellel while keeping your back straight, those in my opinion would be much safer then anything else you could do.

bah... didn't ask for efficiency... ask if prone to injury... very efficient for me

 

[Sculelos]

Well in that case I would just listen to your body, if you don't feel any pain or anything unusual it's probably safe to do it.

Just make sure to keep your back straight and tight and make sure your going below parellel.

 

[TSO]

My first advice would be to forget about squating in the smith machine. My second point of advice...get out of the smith machine for squats. Finally I would tell you to make sure before doing anything else...

Get out of the smith machine for squats!

 

[deathdroprob]

I found doing Smith Machine squats in general with hands on the bar Isolated the legs more, not having to worry about balanced etc.This are ATG Im talking about.Plus your can put your feet slightly more foraward or backwards to isolate different muslces even better.

 

[AEKDB]

You can not do ATG squats in a smith machine unless your body is built 100% different than everyone else.

 

[riverrock]

If you are using the Smith Machine for safety reasons, then I would advise you to simply to trust the safety bars on the squat rack. I have lost count of the amount of lifts I failed to make. I simply left the Bar on the safety pins and started again.

 

[MsBeverlyHills]

"any potential for injury?" no

"any potential that other peeps at the gym are laughing at you?" yes

 

[s8nlilhlpr2]

I would not bother wasting my time with this. Don't try to come up with "new" exercises that you probably saw in a magazine....simple basic barbell deep squats.