Close Stance Pressing
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While researching this topic recently, I made the mistake of Googl’ing and investing way too much time reading articles about Close vs. Wide stance squatting/presses. In my opinion I already knew the answer I was looking for but wanted to find some scientific evidence to back it up. Like nearly everything else in the fitness and health industry EVERYONE has their own opinion and somehow some scientific evidence to back it up. Does anyone ever really ever check to see if there really is a “Sincinomadian College”? And if so did they actually do a thorough study on squatting? Regardless, here is why I started this topic. Back in 2009 a national level bodybuilder recommended I start doing “close stance squats” to enhance the width of my quads, mainly the Lateralis (outer quad muscle or “sweep”).
This guy had awesome legs, why in the world would I doubt him, so from that point on, I threw in at least one exercise per workout of close stance work. I’d squat under the smith machine if I did close stance because I literally would but feet and knees together, or I’d do close stance leg press, or even as a finisher move I would put my back against the cable machine and slide up and down doing body-weight squats with constant tension using close stance. Now I know 2009 was a long time ago, one would expect great results no matter what since then, but I’ll tell you, about 8 weeks after putting that into my routine, my quads had a noticeably greater sweep to them. It made me a believer and I have been implementing it to this day and into most of my clients routines as well.I did run across a couple studies that did confirm with close stance squats, more of the tension is placed on the quads over the hamstrings and glutes like a traditional or wide stance squat. This would thoroughly explain why it “works”.
As a believer in this technique, I can’t NOT recommend that you implement close stance pressing movements into your routine. Try it, give it 8 weeks, keep your nutrition in line and then judge for yourself!
A great start to this would be to start with regular barbell squats, just like you’re used to using your standard or wide stance, whatever is comfortable. Then hop on the leg press with the back pad placed further back if possible to increase your range of motion and put your feet and knees together. Slowly in a completely controlled motion bring the weight down till your thighs are touching your torso then press the weight back up pressing through your heals. Shoot for a rep range of 10-12 trying to increase the weight of eat set for 3-5 sets. Put your mind into the movement and you tell me if your quads aren’t feeling a majority of that work! That’s proof right there in my opinion, but you be the judge.
Keep pressing friends!
-Jeremy
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Jeremy Reid
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