“Everyone” knows that you should always use correct form on every exercise.
And “everyone” knows you should never deviate from correct form.
But, as usual, there’s another side to the story.
If you use perfect form 100% of the time, you’re never really testing yourself. Never pushing yourself to the limit.
A true, gut-busting set of heavy, max-effort squats simply CANNOT be done using perfect form. If your form was absolutely perfect, then your max is higher than you thought.
And once in a while, you need to push yourself to the edge just to see where your limits really are.
A maximum effort deadlift may cause your back to round slightly. Clearly, this is not perfect form. But if you never pushed the weights up and never pushed your limits, you’ll never grow.
But if you let yourself slip away from perfect form just once too often, and you’ll end up injured.
So in reality, maintaining perfect form and achieving new personal records are in direct conflict with each other.
The key to remaining (relatively) injury-free while still notching new personal records on a consistent basis is finding a balance between the two.
Here are some keys to helping you find the perfect balance between perfect form and incredible strength.
#1) Use perfect form 98% of the time.
This point probably doesn’t need much explanation. The vast majority of your training sessions should be done with perfect form.
#2) Use perfect form on 98% of your reps.
The only time it’s acceptable to SLIGHTLY deviate from correct form is when you’re chasing a new personal record or pushing out a gut-busting effort.
Which means on a set of 5, the first four reps should still be done with perfect form. If you’re trying for 315lbs on the bench press and your butt is coming off the bench on the first rep, that’s just asking for trouble.
#3) Fight hard to maintain perfect form on maximum efforts.
Even though it is acceptable to temporarily deviate from perfect form on a maximum effort rep, it should not happen on purpose. Any deviation should occur because you’re so focused on grinding out a heavy weight and gravity is fighting you every centimeter of the way. You should not plan to deviate from perfect form. On the contrary, you should fight hard to maintain perfect form. But every once in a great while, completing that one extra rep with slightly less than perfect form can be beneficial for strength and muscle gains.
#4) Understand that any deviation from perfect form carries a risk of injury.
Let’s be perfectly honest here: If you allow your back to round on a set of heavy deadlifts, or bend over to far on a set of heavy squats, or allow your elbows to flare out on a maximum bench press attempt, you might get hurt.
There’s no way around it. And that’s why you should strive for perfect form 98% of the time — because this minimizes your chance of injury.
#5) Understand that sometimes you can still get injured even using perfect form.
As much as we’d all like to believe that we’re invincible and will never get injured, that’s simply not the case. If you rarely train, or if you never get any stronger, then perhaps you can avoid an injury. But if you train for long enough, and you get significantly stronger, there will be some injuries along the way. If you start out squatting 185lbs and work your way up to 500lbs over the course of 10 years, you better believe there will be an injury or two along the way.
I know this article will be controversial. To be honest, I thought twice about posting it because a few people will probably take this article as an excuse to get lazy.
But here’s a real life training example that should illustrate my point:
Over the past few months, I’ve training hard to bring up my strength in the front squat.
Here’s what the exercise looks like:
For many months, I used perfect form and made steady strength gains. But eventually, the weight started to get extremely heavy. When coming out of the bottom of the exercise, you should keep your elbows high.
I know this.
But on one day, when striving for a new personal record, I came out of the bottom of the squat and started to get stuck. In short, it looked like gravity was winning. I could have simply bailed out on the rep.
But instead I tried to fight through it. My elbows dipped a bit (a form breakdown) and my hips came up, putting more torque than usual on my lower back.
I got the rep.
But as a result, I tweaked my lower back and was in pain for the next few days. But in my opinion it was worth it. Because the injury healed. And a few months down the road I’m now using 50lbs more than I was before on the front squat. If I were to drop down to 50lbs to the weight I was using when I initially had a form breakdown, I would be able to handle the weight easily and with perfect form.
But only because I consistently increased the weight and forced new gains even when that meant a small sacrifice in form on occasion.
Agree? Disagree? Agree to disagree? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Maybe.
My highest concern has become safety. Doing very heavy free weight exercises is extremely dangerous. I would say it would be rare for me to follow your lead. I would prefer to (over)load my maximum lifts using a smith machine or similar, limited range equipment. Having several experienced spotters might cause me to go very heavy with free weights, but that’s not always a luxury I have access to.
If I’m going to go outside what I know I can safely handle, which I have done, I have learned, through injury, to take precautions. Having lifted, very hard at times, for 25 years I like to think I have gained some wisdom. Injuries are THE most costly price I’ve paid for this knowledge.
Nowadays, I try to lift by an old Eastern saying, “To go fast, you must go slow”. I like to think I “own” the weight I attempt to raise. A well maintained lifting log lets me know what I should be attempting. But I will admit, in my younger days, I was not as careful, but I was lucky enough to avoid serious injuries.
Jeff.
I think you should limit your reps to what you can do with reasonably good form. Perfect form? Well, 2-3 reps out of my 5 reps set of heavy squats are probably not ” perfect.” Are they reasonably safe reps? Yes. Perfect? No. It is very hard to do “perfect” form anything when the weight get really heavy and/or the fatigue starts to settle in. This is one reason why I think doing 20 rep squats is a big mistake-especially when you can traditionally only do 10 reps with the weight. A huge breakdown in form is more likely and can end your heavy squating for months. My opinion: Do lower reps with the heavy weights (3-6) and if your form starts to really break down-stop.
One exception to my 20 rep comment-It applies mostly to free weight, complicated, compound moves like the squat, dealift, power clean, etc. I think machines are much better suited for that kind of training if you want to do it.
Thanks for the comments guys.
I didn’t expect anyone to agree 100% on this.
Thomas, your first comment basically summed up the point I was trying to make in the article. You said 2-3 reps of your heavy squats are safe reps but probably not perfect.
And that’s what I was getting at. Because you are actively trying to increase the weight and make steady progression, sometimes not all of your reps are “perfect.”
That’s ok, because that’s the price you pay for trying to get stronger. If you limited the amount of weight you could lift because you were strict about wanting every rep to be “perfect”, it would only limit your strength and development.
Matt: I agree. If your going to lift heavy, it’s not going to be perfect. There is a certain amount of minor “shifting” that goes on when your trying to get those last few reps. In fact, when I’m doing a heavy set of squats and I’m fatigued, my hip will slightly shift to the right-I can’t help it. It happened last night on my third set on rep number 5. Oh well, it’s better than not coming up with the weight at all (or coming half way up and then losing it).
I agree, Matt. In fact, some of the “perfect” forms have led to more injury. Before I was an instructor I didn’t do bicep curls 100% correctly but still gained muscle without injury. When I started keeping my elbow against my sides for the whole motion and starting from a straight arm, I injured by elbow. When I became an instructor I was always quick to correct people’s form until I got injured. Now I only intervene if the cheat is excessive or the back is arching.
@Gary-interesting comment. I noticed that when I did squats according to how Mark Ripetoe prescribes in his book Starting Strength (A great book-well worth the money), my left knee felt “raw”. He teaches very good form and I would tell most people to squat according to his instruction. My problem, however, is my left arch tends to go flat causing slight internal rotation torsion at the knee. This is remedied, however, by turning my feet almost straight ahead (instead of 30 degrees out). Although this tends to put more tension into the hip, my knee feels fine. So, “perfect” form for me is different than for someone else. The point is form can be different based on biomechanical variation -we don’t all fit into the same mold.
@Thomas, @Gary,
I agree with you 100% that individual body structures vary enough that perfect form is relative. I would say that this concept only reinforces the idea that we should always work to reduce injury by striving for our own “perfect” form.
Matt’s idea of pushing the form envelope should be used cautiously to avoid injury. Very heavy, unfamiliar weights naturally force us to deviate from our normal form. It is a slippery slope to accept bad form as a regular lifting technique. Injuries, maybe serious, long-term ones, may result. Only an experienced weight lifter has the ability to determine “bad form” is too bad or happening too often.
JHafer.
Do u need to go to a full range of motion for each exercise?