When It Hurts to Do Squats

I find that when people avoid doing squats, it’s often because their back or knees hurt. The pain could be for a number of reasons, but if you aren’t hurting from an injury, it likely stems from weakness or poor mobility in the body. Your body is trying to tell you that it wants to be stronger! When it hurts to do squats, it’s time to find ways to modify the movement and build your strength; after all, we do squats throughout the day as we sit, stand, or pick things up from the floor. 

Poor Ankle Mobility

Limited ankle mobility is a common reason that it hurts to do squats. To see if this could be bothering you, sit on the floor with your legs extended out in front of you. While sitting up nice and tall, flex your feet and try to pull your toes toward your shins. In an ideal world, you can flex your feet a bit more than ninety degrees. When you have good ankle mobility, it helps you keep your body taller in the squat, which puts less stress on your back. 

If your ankles are limiting your squat depth or causing you to fold forward in your squat, there are a few things you can do: 

Warm Up With Functional Movements

These stretches will help to increase your ankle mobility over time. 

• Ankle mobs at the wall: face the wall and position one foot a short distance from the wall. Place both hands on the wall, and reach your knee forward to touch the wall without letting your heel lift. If it lifts, move your foot a bit closer. This will stretch the calves, warm up the ankles, and increase the range of motion at the ankle. 

• Hip flexor rock: Get down on one knee, with your front knee aligned over your front heel, and your back knee under your back hip. Tuck your back toes under, then rock forward, aiming your front knee over your 2nd and 3rd toe. This warms up the ankle and knee joint, stretches the calf and the hip flexor on the opposite leg.

Elevate Your Heels

Place your heels on a weight plate, a solid mat, or piece of wood, and squat from this position. It will improve your posture and let you go lower in the squat. This isn’t my ideal solution, because it doesn’t improve ankle mobility on its own. But if you  combine the ankle mobility warm ups with a propped-heel squat, you’ll soon be strong and mobile enough to do a full, regular squat. 

Learn to Squat Correctly 

We aren’t always aware of how we’re moving our bodies, or perhaps never learned to do a proper squat in the first place. Using a mirror to see your form can be helpful in perfecting your body position, as can getting help from a trainer or workout partner. I have some other tricks for you, though, that will help teach your body the correct movements. 

• Squat down toward a bench, box, or chair as a target to reach your butt down to. People sometimes assume they should be straight up and down in a squat, when in fact you will hinge slightly forward at the hips as you descend.
• Using equipment such as TRX, dumbbells, barbells, kettlebells, or sandbags can help you find a good squat position. Some examples: hold a kettlebell in front of your body to act as a counterbalance and get you into a deeper squat, or hold a TRX to keep your posture taller. 
• Learn to reach back with your hips and forward with your knees, to keep your body taller and your squats lower. Imagine your knees tracking over your 2nd and 3rd toes, like in the stretch mentioned earlier. 

If it Still Hurts to do Squats…

If it still hurts do do squats after trying the tips above, there’s still hope for you. You didn’t think I’d let you off that easy, did you? (Note: always see a medical professional if pain is persistent, intense, or frequent.)

• Stagger your stance a bit, with one foot slightly forward. This will increase the range of your squat and help your posture. 
• Forgo the squats, but still work on your glute and leg strength. As you get stronger, squats will likely become a possibility for you again. Glute bridges or deadbugs with a mini band will strengthen your core, legs, and glutes. 
• Do Pilates, of course! Pilates will help your ankle mobility, your strength, and get you doing squats with each workout. 

Read More: Build a Strong Foundation with Pilates & Functional Movement

We all do squats every day in our daily lives, so experiencing pain in this common movement is a sign that you need to work on your strength and mobility. Otherwise, you risk more pain or injury due to weakness or overcompensating with other muscles. The tips above will help you modify your squat until you feel comfortable and confident in the movement; then you can work on getting stronger.