Single-Leg Squat Exercise

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Amy McCauley, and I'm going to demonstrate how to do a single let squat. It's often called a sissy squat. General squats: chest is open, shoulders down the spine, and you're just sitting back like you're sitting down into a chair. Your knees generally track over your second and third toe, with avoidance of pushing your knees over your toes. So on our more advanced move is your single leg squat. You're sitting back again like you're trying to sit into a chair. Drop back. You don't want to go too deep into the move because it will shift your knee way over your toes, so if you need to balance, you can put your hands on a chair, or take the weights beside you. You don't have to go too heavy with these weights, and you really will feel these. Stay loaded in the glute, and then drive it straight up. Ultimate goal is to sit back, as far back into that hip as you can, and then drive that weight up. It's going to work really good into the hamstring and glute, as well as the quadricep. So keep the chest up, shoulders down the spine, sit back really slow. If you need to balance, again, drop that back toe onto the floor, and then sit back up. So it's a little bit different than our single leg deadlift. The squat sits back into the hips and then drives straight back up. So a couple of things you really want to think about are watching your knees. If you're sitting down and your knees are going over your toes, it's a lot of strain in that knee joint we don't need. Push back into those hips. Think about sitting over a chair, drive that weight down, squeeze it up. Repetition-wise, try to do as many as you can on each leg. Each leg's balance is going to be a little bit different, so try to do 10 to 15 reps on each leg, 2 to 3 sets. That's how we do our single leg squat."