The Project: Kuwait

Powerlifting Phenom Haya Al Qassar Talks about: Women and Barbells, Powerlifting and The Mother of All Exercises Back Squat What to Do and What Not to do!

February 24, 2021 Mahdi Al Oun, Haya AlQassar Season 1 Episode 223
The Project: Kuwait
Powerlifting Phenom Haya Al Qassar Talks about: Women and Barbells, Powerlifting and The Mother of All Exercises Back Squat What to Do and What Not to do!
Show Notes

girls shy away from barbells. A, because they think it just looks scary. Be they don't know, and just roll your eyes. Okay. And finally, it just comes with the stigma of the whole, I get asked this all the time, am I going to get bulky if I do this? So those three things, I think are limiting factors for women to even like go up to a barbell every single one I've talked to has always been like, it's scary. It's scary. It's scary. And I keep getting told, like, oh, but I'm going to hurt this and I'm going to hurt that and I'm going to hurt this and I and I have to explain to them that if you are a beginner, and you're with a coach and you have supervision, and you were taught how to do this movement properly from the beginning, you're not going to get hurt. Sorry, I'm going to blow up. I have one more story. To know I'm really bad at it. Let me just say one thing you have to love me You can't just talk. I will give you your time. Okay. Wait,

 

03:16

are you shushing me? Oh my Oh Cho

 

03:18

Yeah, you asked me on, because you needed material. So here's your material. So what am I first?

 

03:24

Did you just say,

 

03:27

let me get this point across one of my first pts she comes up to me and she's like, Listen, I have never really exercised properly in my life. So I know that I want to get stronger because she had like broken her leg. And I don't really know where to go. So I had this person who literally has never done a lot of like these movements before like a squat or a hinge or single leg or, or rotational push, pull all that fun stuff. And I started her like right at the beginning we worked on balance and stability and posture and then as soon as that was in the clear, I started with very light, just bodyweight movements to correct the hinge we worked so hard on the hinge and on the squat itself. And eventually we progressed to using a barbell and my favorite thing in the world was yesterday at our session, she sees the setup and she goes oh, we're squatting I love squatting. And it was just so cool to see her progression from never even exercising before to squatting 55 kilos for five yesterday

 

04:38

and that's truly amazing. You know a lot of guys are afraid of squatting a lot of guys are afraid of squatting and dead lifting why squatting they think they're gonna blow out their knees and dead lifting they think they're gonna blow off their backs.

 

04:49

Is that the narrative? Because I I'm only aware. I work at female gym. Yeah, and the guys that I do know already have a background in training.

 

04:59

So no A lot of newbies, a lot of new guys will be like, Oh, I don't want to blow my knees or I don't want to blow my back. That's always the first thing they say, when it comes to squatting. Even Rami? Yeah, I mean, you saw Rami Rami. At the beginning, he was terrified. Yeah, to put a barbell on his back or to deadlift he was absolutely terrified. And the fact that he has developed into doing deadlifts, 100 kilos for four, and you saw him before, like he was hunched over and now he's like, upright, you know, feeling great. So a lot of guys did. And look, I have no shame in asking other coaches for help or for input on a client. If I think that I'm stuck, even in baseball for 15 years. You know, Tad right? Tad's like Mr. information, Mister like no at all. Everything. He knows a lot. That's definitely I'm not saying Mr. Know it all in a bad way. But he calls me over sometimes, uh, Hey, can you see anything wrong with this kid swing? Just because maybe he's missed something.

 

06:03

But see, I love coaches like that, that are constantly learning. You're constantly learning and you're building this community where you're confident enough to say,

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