Squats with Smith Machine

danipat · 05-30-2008, 03:11 PM

I'm a newbie in the weight room, and have been doing squats with dumbells for about a month. I want to squat much heavier. My gym is terrible and it doesn't have a dedicted squat rack, but it does have a smith machine. I have never used one before and I am clueless as to how it even works. I know that it is a different kind of sqaut that you do. Any help would be appreciated as to how much weight to use, especially as basic as how the thing works haha. Thanks so much.

Mindi911 · 05-30-2008, 03:13 PM

you're gonna get a lot of mixed replies from this I can tell you that now.

IMO - I say go for it, try it and see if you like it.

Some people have issues with their back some seem to be fine with it.

The only way to tell it to try it.

TurbulentFluid · 05-30-2008, 03:34 PM

IMHO, Smith machine works so it forces your body into a wrong form. On mine, it meant developing severe hip pains...

If you MUST, I'd suggest the following:
1. do regular squats with as much as you can possibly clean
2. THEN switch to 2-3 sets of heavy squats on the Smith

As for how much weight, I'd really not go with anything heavier than 10-12 reps until you're sure your body isn't responding badly to it.

danipat · 05-30-2008, 04:08 PM

Any imput on what I could do alone to squat heavier w/o the smith machine then. I'm afraid of tipping over backwards, I'm not trying to be funny but that seriously almost happened and everyone just stood there and stared at me. I have bad knees and ankles so If something is going to force me into bad form, I'm not sure I want to take a swing at it. I plan on switching gyms when I move in two months and getting a trainer to learn better form and to become more comfortable/knowledgeable with heavier weights. So basically I just need to keep challenging myself with things I can do on my own until then.

zombieang · 05-30-2008, 08:13 PM

Just use the smith machine for now then if you almost feel over....at least its
something that will keep in you inline. I prefer regular squats but the smith cannot hurt if you're doing it properly. If you lack balance, bad idea to try to clean and squat the weight you'll probably really fall over this time. Good luck.