How To Do Front Squat Push Presses

Compound movements and exercises are great ways to work your body especially if you don't have a lot of time. If you really want to work your body and challenge yourself, then you should be doing these types of exercises.

A compound exercise is an exercise that uses two or more muscle groups to complete the exercise.

I like to take it one step further and combine movements to make one exercise work your whole body.

I'll take a compound movement like the front squat and add in a push press to work your upper body.

A push press is just a military press where you use your legs a little to help you push the weight overhead.

How do you a front squat push press?

To practice this exercise...

• Grab an empty barbell or some lightweight dumbbells and hold the weight at your shoulders with your palms facing upwards like in the picture above. You want to hold the weight just like you would if you were going to do shoulder presses overhead.
• Then you'll want to squat down at least until the tops of your thighs are parallel with the ground. Make sure that you keep your back straight and that you don't lean forward as you drop down. If you're using a barbell, you can rest it on your collarbone as you squat down.
• Now you'll want to stand back up explosively and, in a fluid movement, press the weight up overhead until your arms are straight and you're completely standing.
• Then slowly drop the weight back down to your shoulders and now you've completed one repetition.

In the video to the right you can see the complete movement while using a barbell. You'll want to lower the weight back down to your shoulders as you're squatting down.

You won't be squatting as much weight as you would with a normal squat because you have to be able to lift the weight overhead. This gives you an opportunity to practice the correct form for your squats.

And, because you're using your legs, you should be able to press a little more weight overhead than you normally could if you didn't have that extra push from your legs. This will help to work your shoulders a little more on the negative portion of the overhead press; as you're lowering the weight back to your shoulders.

It's a fluid movement that will work your whole body in very little time.

So if you don't have a lot of time to workout or you want to put your body to the test then you should start doing front squat push presses. I hope that you'll try out this exercise and add it to your workout arsenal.