Archives for August 2014

She had dialed up a killer leg day, but when she got there all the squat racks were taken.

She told me she had to come up with some alternates to some of the exercises she had wanted to do and didn’t feel like it was necessarily as effective.

I asked “were all the Smith machines being used, too?”

I felt so bad at her reply – “I don’t really know how to use them so I didn’t try.”

Well NO MORE, my friends (at least not with the Smith machine)!

I figured what better way to do this than to introduce these exercises to you in the form of a killer workout you can try the next time you’re in the gym!

Here we go!

The bar goes up and down on guides with intermittent locking points all along the way.

To “unlock” the weight, lift the barbell and rotate the hook away from the pin.

This will allow the bar to slide up and down the guides.

When you’re done with the exercise, rotate the hook back to the pin to “rack” the weight in the locked position.

During most exercises your body not only moves up and down but also slightly forward and back.

The Smith machine eliminates this forward and back motion (most of the guides are on a slant trying to mimic this lateral movement).

Many people argue that this puts your body in unnatural form that can potentially cause injury.

While I agree with this statement, I would further argue that ANY exercise done with improper form has the potential to cause injury.

My recommendation is to start with a lighter weight, perform the exercise until it does feel comfortable to you, and then increase weight as appropriate. If you can’t find a “comfort zone”, don’t do it!

The guides eliminate the activation of the smaller stabilization muscles in the legs and core that would normally kick on during the forward/back movement experienced during a normal barbell exercise.