How To Squat With Poor Mobility?

Last Updated: July 4th, 2022

A squat is a very important exercise for the lower part of your body. Being a complex movement, it works on multiple muscles at once. However, to perform squat, you will have to have good mobility in different parts of your body.

The problem arises when you have poor mobility. Movements like squats are difficult to achieve in such cases…

Then how to squat with poor mobility? In this post, we cover that in detail…

We specifically cover:

How to improve your mobility for squatting?

What variations of squat you can try instead of a squat?

and a lot more…

How To Squat With Poor Mobility?

To squat with poor mobility one has to improve their mobility first. Simultaneously, one will have to do squat variations to get their body used to squatting and eventually progress to squatting.

Trying to squat with bad mobility may increase your chances of getting injured. So the first step for you in your squatting journey is to improve your mobility.

For that, you first should know what are the muscles that are involved in squatting…

Muscles that are involved in the squat:

Quads (Main muscle)

Hamstring (supporting muscle)
Glutes (supporting muscle)
Knee joint

All of them work together to make squatting possible.

So, if you have poor mobility, then mostly you have mobility-issue with any of these areas. To improve mobility for your squat, here is a routine that you can do…

Mobility routine to improve squat

Squat Prying

You can do this mobility exercise with a dumbbell or a kettlebell. The weight you can choose as per your strength.

Steps:

Take a wide stance.
Your feet should be shoulder-width apart and toes pointing slightly outward.
Hold the kettlebell close to your chest.

Now try to sit down completely using your hips and knees simultaneously.
Now start pushing your knees outward with your elbows, as much as possible.
Hold this posture for 30 seconds and return back to the starting position.

Repeat the exercise 3 times.

T-Spine External Rotation

Steps

Sit on the ground with your legs folded backward.
Keep your knees near to each other with around 1-2 inches of gap between them
Place your left hand in front of you at an approximately 10-12 inches gap.

Your back should be straight and leaning forward.
Place the palm of your right hand at the back of your head.
Now bring your right elbow to your left elbow joint and then take your right elbow up in such a way that your spine completely rotates to that side.

Do this 10 times with each side and 3 sets.

Wide Stance Rocking

Steps:

Sit on the ground with your legs folded backward.
Spread your knees and lean forward.
Place your elbows under your shoulders.

Make a fist of your palms so that you can hold the posture comfortably.
Stay in this pose for 30secs.
Do the exercise 3 times.

Deep Squat Wall Slides

Steps:

Stand with your back on the wall and feet shoulder-width apart toes pointing front.

Gradually slide your back on the wall to go into a squat position.
Go as deep as possible for you.
Hold that pose for 30 secs.

Go back up and repeat.
Do this exercise 3 times.

Rocking Ankle Stretch

Steps:

Start with your toes and palms on the ground. Hip pointing upwards.
Place your left foot on top of the right and start rocking forward and backward with your toes.

You should be able to feel a stretch in your ankle area.
Do this 10 times on each leg for 3 sets.

Bridge

Bridge is one of the most effective mobility workouts for your hips. Here is how you should do it:

Steps:

Lie down on the floor with your back on the floor.

Bend your legs at the knees and place your foot around 10 inches from your glutes.
Now squeeze your glutes and pelvic area and push your hip off the floor as much as possible.
Do this 10 times 3 sets.

Forward Bend

This will stretch your hamstrings effectively.

Steps:

Stand with your feet hip-width apart.
Stretch your arms up.
Now bend from your hip and try to touch your feet.

You should feel a stretch on your hamstring.
Hold the stretch for 30 sec. Do it 3 times.

These mobility exercises should be done every time you are planning to do squats. Do them before your squat so that you will be able to improve your squatting performance.

Now that you have performed your mobility exercises, you can start doing your squatting routine. However, if it is not possible for you to perform a proper squat yet, perform any of these squat variations:

Squat variations for people with poor mobility

Box Squat

Place a plyometric box behind you. The height of the box should be such that, it allows your knees to bend at 90 degrees.

Stand in front of the box with your legs should width apart.
Stretch your arms in the front and make a fist ut of your palms with your thumb sticking out and upwards.
Use your hip to go down gradually until you can touch the box.

Now come up using your hips and glutes and stand up while tightening your hip.
Do this 20 times for 3 sets.

If you find this too easy, you can hold a dumbbell of comfortable weight to increase the difficulty.

Swiss Ball Squat

Place the swiss ball between your back and the wall.
Gradually start sitting down so the the ball rolls with your back.

Go as much deep as possible or until your knees are at 90 degrees.
Hold it for 30 secs.
Go back up.

Repeat 3 times.

Use dumbbells to increase difficulty.

Wall Static Squat

Place your back on the wall.
Your legs should be hip-width apart.
Stretch your arms in front. Your palms should be in a fist with thumbs sticking up.

Gradually slide down the wall until your knees are at 90 degrees.
Hold it for 30 secs.
Go back up.

Repeat 3 times.

Use dumbbells or kettlebells to increase difficulty.

Bench Squat

This is similar to box squat. However, instead of a plyometric box, you will be using a bench.
Stand in front of the bench with legs on the side of the wheels. This will give you more stability with the movement.
Extend your arms forward with your palms in a fist and your thumbs sticking up.

Start sitting down until you touch the bench.
Come up in a swift motion with your hip slightly tilted upwards.
Do this 10 times for 3 sets.

Use a dumbbell or a kettlebell to increase difficulty.

Once you have developed sufficient mobility and have a couple of weeks of modified squatting under your belt, try to do a proper squat. However, before doing the squat, you should always do your mobility routine.

Conclusion

Doing squat with poor mobility can be dangerous. It can create a lot of injuries in the lower part of the body like ankles, calf muscles, etc. However, this can be avoided by improving your mobility with some simple exercises and more. If you regularly do mobility routine, you will be able to see the difference in a couple of weeks.

Also, with mobility, if you perform the modified squats then it will help you to perfect the stance while you are improving your mobility.

Madhusree Basu (Author, Admin)

Blogger and a fitness enthusiast. She loves running and Yoga and everything in between. She started running to manage her weight and to eat to her heart’s content. A true foodie at heart she shares whatever knowledge she has gained throughout the years about weight management and fitness.

Sourav Sarkar (Reviewer, CPT)

Certified fitness trainer and an ex-professional bodybuilder, he has trained more than 500 fitness enthusiasts and has more than 15 years of on-the-job experience.