Abstract
Barbell placement and stance width both affect lifting performance in the back squat around the sticking region. However, little is known about how these squat conditions separately could affect the lifting performance. Therefore, this study investigated the effects of stance width and barbell placement upon kinematics, kinetics, and myoelectric activity around the sticking region during a three-repetition maximum back squat. Nine men and nine women (body mass: 76.2 ±11.1, age: 24.9 ± 2.6) performed back squats with four different techniques, such as: high-bar narrow stance (HBNS), high-bar wide stance, low-bar narrow stance, and low-bar wide stance where they lifted 99.2 ± 23.6, 92.9 ± 23.6, 102.5 ± 24.7, and 97.1 ± 25.6 kg, respectively. The main findings were that squatting with a low-bar wide stance condition resulted in larger hip contributions to the total moment than the other squat conditions, whereas squatting with an HBNS resulted in greater knee contributions to the total moment together with higher vastus lateralis and less gluteus maximus myoelectric activity. Our findings suggest that training with an HBNS could be beneficial when targeting the knee extensors and plantar flexors, whereas a low-bar wide stance could be beneficial when targeting the hip extensors.
Highlights
When the goal is to strengthen the lower extremities, different variations of the back squat are frequently used in resistance training
Descent displacement was 0.64 ± 0.05, 0.6 ± 0.04, 0.63 ± 0.05, and 0.61 ± 0.05 m for the high-bar narrow stance (HBNS), high-bar wide stance (HBWS), low-bar narrow stance (LBNS), and low-bar wide stance (LBWS), respectively, whereas squatting with a narrow stance resulted in a greater descent displacement than the wide stance widths (p < 0.001; see Table 3)
A significant interaction effect for barbell placement with stance width and event was found at every event (F ≥ 4.8, p ≤ 0.05, η2 ≥ 0.30) for barbell displacement from v0, where the HBWS condition occurred at a lesser displacement compared with all the other squat conditions
Summary
When the goal is to strengthen the lower extremities, different variations of the back squat are frequently used in resistance training (van den Tillaar and Larsen, 2020). Lahti et al (2019) investigated the effect of wide and narrow stance width upon joint kinematics, and sagittal and frontal joint moments on the hip and knees on 14 amateur rugby players at 70 and 85% of 1 repetition maximum (1-RM) in the back squat. They found that the wide stance width resulted in a greater hip extensor and knee adduction moment. The narrow stance width resulted in a greater knee extensor moment at both 70 and 85% of 1-RM. A wide stance width has been shown in several studies to generate a different myoelectric activity profile than the narrow stance width in the back squat (Anderson et al, 1998; McCaw and Melose, 1999). McCaw and Melose (1999) found that a wide stance width resulted in greater myoelectric activity in the adductor longus and gluteus maximus.
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