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Get Your Pistols Out

Posted 19th November 2014 by Josh Schouten

Pistols would have to be one of the toughest bodyweight exercises in CrossFit, besides handstand push-ups and muscle-ups. Pistols, or one-legged squats, are a great demonstration of strength, coordination, balance, and flexibility.

CrossFit movement standard for the pistol squat

“The one-legged squat begins and ends with the athlete standing and the hip and knee fully extended.

The hip crease must be below the top of the knee at the bottom and the opposite foot (non-supporting leg) cannot touch the ground until the repetition is completed. The non-supporting foot must be in front of the supporting foot during the entire repetition. You may hold the foot of the opposite (non-supporting) leg with your hand while performing the one-legged squat.” (2014 CrossFit Regionals Event 3)

Pistols are more than a party trick

Pistol
Pistols are hard! They are a unilateral leg exercise and can also be used to diagnose any difference in the structural balance of the left and right leg.

As T-Nation explains in Breaking Down the Single Leg Squat:

“Single-leg squats help to improve overall balance and proprioception by strengthening some of the smaller stabilizing muscles in the hips and pelvis, namely the adductor magnus, gluteus medius, quadrates lumborum, and the external hip rotators to prevent rotation of the femur and pelvis in a way that doesn’t occur in a bilateral stance.

Single-leg squats allow you to target the legs with greatly reduced shearing force on the spine.”

Performing pistol squats can help develop leg strength that will benefit your other squats and your deadlifts.

Why are pistols so goddam hard?

The pistol squat tests a number of the 10 CrossFit General Physical Skills:

Balance – we are shifting our body’s centre of mass over a narrow base of support, and for an extended range of motion, balance is challenged and trained in a dynamic fashion.

Flexibility – the muscles and joints of the legs, lower back, hips and ankles are required to work at the extreme ranges of motion, both in flexion and extension. If you have tight calves, hamstrings, hip flexors, or quads you are going to struggle.

Strength – have you been skipping legs day? All the primary moving muscles of the legs and the stabilisation muscles need to be strong to lift your entire body weight on one leg.

Coordination- The central nervous system (CNS) is of paramount importance in the exertion? of developing muscular strength, muscular strength is determined not only by the quantity of muscle mass. Maximal force production is a question of intermuscular activation – its not about an individual muscle doing the job, it requires different muscles to work together to achieve the movement.

So how can we improve our pistols?

In the current phase of training at CrossFit Hackney we have been spending a lot of time working on some of the progressions towards pistol squats.

Carl Paoli (www.gymnasticswod.com) demonstrates a number of scaled versions of the pistol squat:

He has also publish a book, Freestyle, where he breaks down a number of the gymnastics movements including the pistol squat. We have been following the progressions for Freestyle this month and making some solid progress.

1. Reverse Kneeling Lunge

2. Box Step-ups

3. Pistol Squats standing on a box

4. Freestanding Pistol with correct movement loading

If mobility is an issue you will need to continue stretching your tight spots. Kelly Starrett (www.mobilitywod.com) and Carl have some more advice on mobility here:

In the short term you can achieve/accomplish complete pistols by:
1. Performing them by sitting back on a box
2. Performing them by standing on a box
3. Using a “counter weight” to help keep you balanced while loading the hip muscles correctly
4. Use a rubber band or gymnastic ring for assistance

Plenty of progressions and useful advice to help you on your pistol squat journey!

If you want to get better at pistol squats you need to keep practicing them. Doing them in a WOD is not the best solution for someone who does not yet have the movement down. Spend time practicing the pistol as a pure skill and strength exercise.