Squats
The squat is one of the most basic yet effective athletic movements. In just one exercise, you work your quads, hamstrings, glutes, hips, and inner thighs.
Squat Variations
Prisoner Squat. The traditional prisoner bodyweight squat is performed by placing your hands behind your head. Squat down until your thighs are below parallel. Come up. That’s one rep.
Add Weight. While you might not have access to a barbell, you can find odd objects in your environment that you can hoist up on your shoulders or hold in front of your chest. Once you’ve got your desired weight, simply squat.
Squat Jumps. A plyometric version of the squat to build explosiveness. Perform a prisoner squat as you normally would, but when you reach the bottom of the squat explode up and jump off the ground as high as you can. When your feet are back on the ground, immediately sink into another squat and jump again. Great for HIIT.
Pistol Squat. You’ll have achieved top-dog, alpha-male-prisoner, beast-mode status when you can perform multiple pistol squats. A pistol squat is a one-legged full squat. The leg that you’re not squatting with sticks out right in front of you when you’re in the squat position. When you’re at the bottom of the squat, you sort of look like a pistol, hence the name. It’s a beast to do and will take months to work up to.
There are entire routines to help you accomplish this Herculean feat (and perhaps we’ll hit on it in the future), but one of the best exercises to help you segue into a pistol squat is to perform the assisted variety. Simply grab a pole or some other sturdy object in front of you and lower yourself into a one-legged squat position and use the pole to help pull yourself up. Eventually, you can take off these training wheels and do a free-standing one.
