VMO Squats: How Strengthen your VMO Muscle and improve range of motion
The VMO muscle is one of the most important muscles in your leg that can be often weak, leading to knee pain and injuries. In this blog post, we will discuss all there is to know about the VMO muscle and how to use VMO squats (also known as Cyclist Squats) to build strength through a full range of movement for your legs.
What is the VMO muscle, and where is it located?
VMO or vastus medialis oblique is one of the quadriceps muscles located above your knee cap on the inner side of your thighs opposite the vast lateralis. It is also referred to as the tear-drop muscle because of its shape. In terms of its function, VMO is responsible for knee stabilisation and patella (knee cap) tracking.
What happens when your VMO is weak?
When the VMO muscle is weak, it can lead to a condition called “patellar maltracking”. This means that the patella does not track properly in the groove of the femur (thigh bone) or tibia (shin bone) so your knee cap isn’t aligned the way it should be.
What can cause VMO Pain?
Several things can cause VMO pain. Here are some of the most common causes:
Incorrect Squatting Technique:
If you do not squat correctly, it can put unnecessary pressure on your VMO, leading to pain.
Muscular Imbalances:
If you have weak VMO muscles, it can cause imbalances in your legs, leading to pain.
Patellar maltracking:
As we mentioned before, patellar maltracking is when the knee cap does not track properly in the groove of the femur. This can be caused by many things, but weak VMO muscles are one of the most common causes.
Why are VMO squats one of the best knee exercises you can do?
VMO squats are a great way to get right deep down into knee flexion and build strength in that bottom part of the range. When you are doing a traditional bilateral squat, you’re standing on two flat feet, you’ll tend to get to a certain depth, and then you’ll run out of range, and it’s usually caused by the ankles being the limiting factor.
How to do VMO squats the right way.
We suggest using a block or an angled step just to lift the heels. You can also find something else solid around one to two inches thick.
- Start with your feet hip-width apart. The most important thing here is that you want to keep everything stacked neatly on top of your feet.
- Try to keep your arms out in front, horizontally, as you control your hips back and down, coming into a nice deep squat. Try and get as much coverage at the bottom as you can so that the gap between your calf and your hamstrings is as close as possible.
- Then push down into your feet and drive your body upwards, keeping your chest up to complete the repetition.
If you’re not used to squatting low, you will feel a lot of burn through your quads, pushing out from such a lower position. We’re now strengthening a new range of movement that you didn’t have access to before, really unlocking the secrets behind VMO squats. Try to get to about 20 to 25 reps using your bodyweight only.
Once you’re comfortable with that, you can add some weight. You can use a single dumbbell or a small kettlebell and simply hold it in a front rack position performing the same movement. After that you can do them using a barbell in a front or back squat position. Just build up the weight slowly and don’t sacrifice the depth of the squats for the sake of lifting heavier weights.
A couple of essential cues to focus on with your knees.
We want to keep them moving forward and backwards, tracking out over the feet. You want to avoid letting your knees widen at the bottom of the squat, but if this happens it can be a sign of tightness down the sides of your legs in your IT bands. The other common thing we often see is the knees caving inwards towards each other, especially when you want to push up from the bottom, this can be a sign of weak glutes. Remember, you want to try and keep everything stacked above your feet and moving forwards and backwards in the same parallel lines at hip-width.. So that’s your VMO squats; hit these regularly and you are well on the way to getting your legs super strong.