Introduction
Pre-hinging squats is a technique that has been gaining in popularity in recent years. It can also be called a “two-part squat.” It is setting a slight hip hinge prior to starting the descent, so that the squat is simplified to almost exclusively just bending your knees. In a good pre-hinge, the lifter keeps their knees soft, shins relatively vertical, and reaches the hips back while keeping a neutral torso position.
Pre-hinging is a good strategy for people of all skill levels. I’ve seen elite lifters squat over 900 pounds like this, but it is also how I would teach my grandma to sit down into a low chair. However, I think that longer limbed, lankier people can particularly benefit from this strategy.
Pre-hinging simplifies the movement, because you aren’t dynamically moving at the hips and knees together and having to synchronize that. Furthermore, it helps a lot of people manage their center of mass and stay balanced easier. To squat well you need to remain balanced over the middle of your foot. This is made a lot easier when you start out by hinging to achieve that position and then you can just squat straight down from there. For these reasons, it is great for less experienced lifters. It also is great for advanced athletes though because it can help create a better and more consistent position in the hole.
The amount of pre-hinge required is not only relative to the individual and their build, but also to the task at hand. Squats with a more upright torso (such as goblet or front squats, or a lifter with a longer torso relative to their legs) will require less of a hinge than squats requiring more of a leaned over torso position (such as low bar squats, or a lifter with a shorter torso relative to their leg length). Therefore, each different way of loading a squat will fall on this spectrum of how much pre-hinge is necessary, based on how upright or leaned the torso will be in the bottom position. Additionally, if you walk out very bent over already, your pre-hinge may seem relatively small. In contrast, if you walk out very upright, you will hinge a lot more to get to your position.
Common Faults
There are four common faults that I see with people who use the pre-hinge technique:
First, some people just lean forwards rather than reaching their hips back and hinging. This shifts their center of mass forwards and they end up off balance, on their toes.
If you have this problem, to fix it you need to learn to hinge and reach backwards with your hips rather than just bend over. This could involve cueing the pre-hinge like a partial RDL. You may also need to practice hinge mechanics with RDLs and/or short range of motion good mornings, and then reintegrate that pattern into the pre-hinged squat.
Secondly, if you go into anterior tilt while hinging, you should learn good bracing and hinging mechanics prior to trying to learn to pre-hinge your squats. I recommend using a barbell RDL to learn to hinge, and in the meantime, do dumbbell goblet squats, where the position of the load will allow you to just sit straight down and stand up without requiring a hip hinge.
The third major mistake I often see – even in elite lifters – is that many people will lock their legs before starting their hinge, and they end up with a negative shin angle. It makes no sense to have your knees travel backwards as you hinge when ultimately we’re going to need them to travel forwards to squat. The problem with this is that we are increasing the range of motion for ourselves, and putting our legs in an awkward, disadvantaged position. This issue can happen for anyone, but seems more common in wider stance squatters.
You could argue the range of motion isn’t actually increased because we’re not vertically displacing the load during this, but the thing is we are increasing the distance the knee travels, and therefore the time spent in the hinged over position, resisting the load. So it is still a meaningful difference.
To fix this problem and to pre-hinge well, you should keep soft knees as you initiate the hinge. Don’t have the leg locked, instead allow a slight bend. The shin should stay roughly vertical, if not shift slightly forwards during the hinge. This will not only keep the range of motion from being increased but will also keep your lower leg in a stacked position, with the knee over the ankle.
The fourth common mistake is that some people will get really heel heavy either prior to or during the pre-hinge. The problem here is that the lifter will start to shift their mass forwards as they descend in order to get balanced over mid foot and use their quads better, but typically they will end up swinging from heel heavy all the way to the other extreme of on their toes as they go.
To fix this, try becoming more aware and conscious of foot pressure. Include something in your warmups that requires some lower body stability through the foot, like walking lunges, single leg RDLs, or a hip airplane. Then, when you get to squats, focus on getting balanced over mid foot before starting to pre-hinge or descend, and then press with the full foot.
Conclusion
Theoretically pre-hinging isn’t ideal in that you are spending more time in the most bent over position. Rather than spending only part of the time in the most hinged position because you’re progressively hinging more and more, you are starting in the full hinge and maintaining that the whole time. This does mean more stress to maintain that position for longer, but I have seen the benefits outweigh that theoretical downside more often than not. However, this is good to be aware of as to have a holistic perspective of the pre-hinge technique.
The bottom line is if you struggle with squatting, try implementing a pre-hinge and it may help a lot. However, if you’re already a great squatter without it, you don’t need to change anything.
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Best,
Michael Elrod-Erickson
Founder and Head Coach, Premier Power & Performance
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