The squat clean thruster is an advanced workout that helps to work multiple groups of muscles, including the glutes, hamstring, quads, and lower back.
Other auxiliary muscles that are worked during the exercise are the traps, shoulders, lats, and upper back.
The squat clean thruster is recommended for trainees with considerable experience of training in exercises that involve squats, back or shoulder muscles.
By then, you shall have gained a proper form to enable you to take up the exercise. Otherwise, you will either strain so much and escape with muscle pains at worst or you can trip and injure yourself with the weight.
Squat clean thruster involves taking up the barbell from the floor, placing it on the front rack of your shoulders, descending into a full squat, squatting up with the barbell, thrusting it up explosively over your head then returning it back to the floor.
When you take up this workout seriously, you will gain exponential power, speed, and stability.
HOW TO SQUAT CLEAN THRUSTER
Use the following guide to direct you in doing the Squat clean thruster.
- Load the barbell and have it placed before your feet. Bend over the bar, with your shoulders towering slightly beyond the bar, and make your back straight by lowering your hips below your shoulder level and have your knees bent. With an overhand grip, grab the bar at shoulder width. Inhale and pull the weight through your feet pressed to the floor.
- When the bar reaches your knees, press down on your hips, and engage your lower back and your arms to pull the bar up impulsively. The force with which you pull the bar should drive it to the level of your chest. At that point, you turn your wrists around the bar so that your palms face up and have the bar placed on the front rack of your shoulders. Breathe out.
- Breathe in and allow the momentum with which the bar lands on your shoulders to drive you down into a full squat but make sure you control the motion through resistance. Breathe out.
- To take on the thruster face of the exercise, breathe in and press the floor with your feet, keeping your back firm, and squatting up explosively.
- Thrust the bar off your shoulders by using the momentum created by your squat. Breathe out when the bar is at the top. At that point, your arms should be fully stretched and your elbows locked. The bar is supposed to be positioned behind your head and towering over your shoulders, lower back, hips, and heels.
- Breathe in as you lower the bar back to the floor. Repeat the move much as your form permits.
MUSCLES WORKED
CORE
Your core is greatly involved throughout the exercise. It helps to provide the strength to lift the bar, squat up and down and thrust the bar high above. It provides the power that enhances your stability.
HAMSTRING
The hamstring is engaged at the point you pull the bar from the ground. It hinges on the hips and flexes your knees. This supports the vertical movement of the bar from the floor to your shoulders. It also helps in providing resistance in the down squat motion and strength in the up squat.
GLUTES
The glute muscles work with other stabilizing muscles to provide the needed balance during the exercise. It extends the hip joint in accordance with the strength, resistance, and stability required in the workout.
DELTOIDS
The deltoids of the shoulder are activated to some extent when you pull the bar from the ground, but they are most activated when you thrust the bar off your shoulders.
BENEFITS OF DOING SQUAT CLEAN THRUSTER
IMPROVES CARDIOVASCULAR FUNCTION
One way to keep your heart healthy is by increasing the speed of your heartbeat. The Sprinter clean thruster workout engages many muscle groups, thereby increasing the speed blood flows through your veins hence elevating the heartbeat.
BUILDS STRENGTH
This workout is great at building strength because it engages many muscle groups. It has a long range of motion and makes great use of your core muscles.
IMPROVED BALANCE
Squatting by itself requires a great deal of balance, and when you incorporate the thruster, it means your muscles will have to work harder to keep you stable. So, when you do the exercise efficiently, you will improve your balance.
VARIATIONS OF SQUAT CLEAN THRUSTER
CLEAN AND PRESS
This is a pretty straightforward workout as the name suggests. The clean movement involves lifting the weight from the floor and placing it on the front rack of your shoulders. The press motion involves pushing the weight off your shoulders and holding it at the top. The clean and press activate the lower body muscles and deltoids.
HANG CLEAN AND PRESS
The hang clean and press exercise is a slight modification of the squat clean thruster. You grab the barbell and have it placed on your shoulders then squat down. At the crouch position, you thrust up the barbell and then bring it back to the floor.
MISTAKES TO AVOID WHILE PERFORMING THRUSTERS
- Since the workout requires good stability, you shouldn’t rush. If you rush, you can easily lose control and fall over. It is recommended that you do the workout at a moderate speed that puts your muscles up to the tension that makes you gain.
- The squat clean thruster workout should be done in a continuous motion. You should not take pauses at the top or bottom of the move. Train to inhale when initiating a move and to exhale when completing a move.
- Don’t go for heavy weights first. You’d rather use lighter weights that guarantee continuous motion than use heavy ones that make you struggle. When you are using a lighter weight, you are more likely to complete the full range of motion of the workout.
- Also, when lifting the bar from the floor to your shoulders, you should not only use your shoulders but also your hips, legs, and glutes.
- When you push the bar off your shoulders, hold it up behind your head and align it with your shoulders. Having it hanging right above your head or in front is somewhat unstable, and when you lose balance, you can easily fall back and hurt yourself.
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