Carryover

Today I noticed something pretty significant in working with my high school athletes at King’s Ridge. We were doing a complex with two cleans followed by five front squats. Where most of us could barely get through four sets of that an 80% they were smoking their work at 85%. Do that calculation and then think about how that would feel after four sets. They will feel fine tomorrow… Wish I still had that kind of natural performance-enhancing HGH in my blood veins.
On another note, I did notice something about how they were performing the front squats that I thought was interesting. We have been doing front squats as part of our strength work for the last 10 weeks. Primarily, their front squats have been coming out of the rack like any normal front squat would. When I switched them today so that the bulk of their front squats came after a clean, their squatting looked different. Many of them squatted much deeper. Many of them also rounded their upper back. Furthermore, their grip on the bar was significantly different and their speed was significantly different. Most of them gripped the bar on their fingertips as opposed to having their whole hand on the bar when they front squat. This obviously was a result of the clean work that came prior to the front squat.
Furthermore, because they had just completed two pretty violent and fast squats out of the bottom of the clean, their speed in the front squats was oddly similar. When they were squatting out of a rack they were much more controlled, used the stretch shortening of their hips and gluts much less, and were buy and large much slower.
The point of the story is that their front squat in the middle of the clean complex as opposed to the rack were two different movements. Oddly, there are elements in each that I wish they would apply 100% of the time. If you are a competitive weightlifter or a competitive exerciser here’s a massive point you need to take to the gym with you based on these high school kids.
Always always always front squat the same regardless of the movement. Your front squat at 80% or 100% or 60% out of the rack should be the exact same as the front squat coming out of the bottom of a clean. Your grip should be the same, your elbows should be the same, your speech should be the same, the erect nature of your torso should be the same. In order to get the greatest amount of carryover from front squat work and clean work to help support each of the lifts, the squatting portion has to be the same. Make sure that you squat the same way that you clean. This is most easily done by examining how you, in an ideal world, stand up from a heavy clean. Examine where your hands are on the bar. Examine where your feet are in the bottom of the clean. Create the ideal torso angle and upper back tightness when you squat. What you will notice is that not only do you get the greatest amount of carryover between the clean and the squat but also, because you are making each movement exactly the same, the repetition will make you stronger. You don’t want your cleans to develop your squat in different ways than your front squats do. You want the same muscle groups developed in them both. Make sure they are exactly the same.