Don't attempt heavy squats alone at home without a proper weight ... place it on your traps (and not on your vertebrae/spine), then push it up, so the whole weight rests on your shoulders.

If you don't wake up your spinal erectors before you go heavy on squats, "it's very easy for one of them to get tight or for one of them to strain," Samuel says. That's where the cat-cow stretch ...

While the squeeze itself isn’t bad, the main problem is that it can lead to overextension of the spine. “A squat should finish with your ribs stacked over your hips. Focusing too much on ...