# Landmine Squat: how to do it

- Main muscles: quads, glutes
- Also works: abs
- Equipment: landmine
- Level: beginner
- 3D demo (side view): https://media.trainaq.com/exercises/landmine_squat/8a98bbc610/side-m-720.mp4

## Steps

1. Hold the end of the bar at your chest with both hands.
2. Stand facing the pivot, feet a little wider than your shoulders.
3. Push your hips back and sit down until your thighs are about level.
4. Keep the bar on your chest and your elbows down.
5. Push through your whole foot to stand up.

## Cues

- Sit back into the bar.
- Chest up, bar on your chest.
- Knees follow your toes.

## Common mistakes

- Pushing the bar away from your chest.
- Rounding your back at the bottom.
- Letting the knees fall inward.

## Starting position

Lift the free end and hold it in front of the chest, just under the chin, with both hands cupped round the end of the sleeve, fingers laced, elbows pointing down. Face the pivot with the feet slightly wider than shoulder-width, toes forward or a little out, the bar running away between the feet. Stand tall, leaning very slightly into the bar, shoulders down and back, spine neutral.

## The movement

Push the hips back and down while the knees bend forward. Because the bar swings on an arc around the pivot, the free end moves down and slightly back towards the body as you sit, so the lifter sits back into it. The bar end stays on the chest and the elbows stay down and inside the knees. The trunk stays fairly upright. Push through the whole foot to stand, the bar end riding back up its arc.

## End position

Bottom: thighs at or near parallel, bar end still at the chest. On a 2.2 m bar that gives angles of asin(1.3/2.2) ≈ 38° and asin(0.9/2.2) ≈ 25°, and the bar end moves from about 1.75 m to about 2.0 m from the pivot: about 25 cm back towards the lifter while it drops about 40 cm.

## Tempo

2 s down, 0.3 s pause, 1.2 s up, 0.5 s standing.

## Form in numbers

| Measure | Target | Good range | Sources |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Stance, heel to heel | 1.1 × shoulder width | 1.0–1.3 × | [1] |
| Toe-out, each foot | 10° | 0–20° | [1] |
| Depth: thighs at the bottom | parallel | within 10° above to 5° below | [1] [3] |
| Heel lift | 0 cm | 0 cm | [1] |

## Sources

1. [ACE, Barbell Jammers](https://www.acefitness.org/resources/everyone/exercise-library/236/barbell-jammers/)
2. [Collins et al. 2021, J Strength Cond Res, "Differences in muscle activity and kinetics between the goblet squat and landmine squat in men and women"](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34341315/)
3. [ACE, Goblet Squat](https://www.acefitness.org/resources/everyone/exercise-library/362/goblet-squat/)

Source: https://trainaq.com/exercises/landmine-squat