Why does my squat form look different on video?
Adapted from Dr. Saballa's voice memo and his own edits in review, September 2026.
Summary
- He asks for videos on purpose. The room tells him one thing, the video tells him another.
- Athlete does not mean competitor. A thirty-second clip of how you sit and type counts.
- He starts with the movement you are trying to achieve, then works out which regions should be doing what.
- Then each region on its own: the foot, the knee, the hip, the trunk.
- Then the order things fail in, because the sequence points to neuromuscular control or an old injury.
The video is not lying and neither is the feeling. You feel one part of the movement from the inside, and the camera picks up every region at once, including the ones you were not thinking about.
Why do you want people to send you videos?
Because videos show me something the treatment room cannot.
People bring me videos of themselves lifting, training, or playing their sport all the time, and I find them incredibly valuable. In the office, I can feel how your body moves, examine specific areas, and watch you perform controlled movements. That gives me real information, but it only goes so far.
I also want to see you in the environment where you actually perform. What you do on my table is a small, controlled version of you. What happens under a barbell, on the field, or even at your desk for hours at a time gives me a different piece of the picture.
So the video is not just a bonus. It gives me more context, and more context helps me make a better-informed decision.
Do I have to be an athlete for this?
No, and I mean that more literally than people might expect.
When I talk about an athlete and their sport, I am not only referring to someone competing on a field, court, or track. Your "sport" can simply be the physical demands you repeatedly ask your body to handle.
For an athlete, that might mean sprinting, jumping, throwing, or lifting. For someone else, it might mean how they sit at a desk for eight hours, carry their kids, travel for work, or train a few days a week.
The question is the same: What does your life physically demand from you, and how well is your body prepared to meet those demands?
If they record a thirty-second video of how they sit and type and how they work, it is very, very valuable to me.
Thirty seconds of the ordinary version, not your best set.
For videos, I aim to see them from two angles in their "natural habitat", whether that be a sports or practice environment, or at their place of work. This gives me a three-dimensional understanding of what stress their body is experiencing.
What do you look at first?
I start with the movement, not the joint people expect me to focus on.
First, I ask what movement is actually being performed. Is it a power clean, a deadlift, a squat? That matters because each movement places different demands on the body, so the standard changes depending on the task.
Once I understand the movement, I can work backward. Which regions need to contribute? What should each region be doing? Then I look for where the movement becomes inefficient and identify the specific areas that may be limiting or changing how the task is performed.
What are you looking at in each region?
Each piece on its own before I judge the whole.
I take each regional joint or segment on its own, work out how it should be performing, and then ask whether it is performing that way.
The questions are methodical ones, and they are the same ones every time. "How is the foot maintaining its structure?" "Is the knee collapsing into a valgus position towards the midline?" "Is one hip dropping compared to the other, as we'd identify in Trendelenburg test?" "Is the trunk leaning forward on a squat?"
Foot, knee, hip, trunk. That is four questions on a single rep, and no single one of them is the whole answer.
Why does the order matter so much?
People almost never think about the order, and it is most of what I am reading.
"A lot of times people look at just one specific joint or one part of their body." That is a fair instinct. Something hurts, so you watch that spot. "But I have to look at how all these different pieces are working together and also in what sequence."
So I watch for the order. "Does the knee cave before the foot?" "Does the foot collapse come before the hip drop?" "Does the hip drop come before the trunk lean or any specific order?"
The order is part of what tells me the story.
"Because the sequencing of failed movement patterns or the sequencing of failed regions within a movement pattern also tell me where is there a neuromuscular control issue, or where has there been a previous history of injury."
The same four things going wrong in a different order can mean two different stories. A knee that gives out after the foot went first is a different problem from a knee that goes first on its own.
Then I zoom back out to how everything works together, what the sequence is, what the ideal patterns and ranges of motion should be, and whether you are inside that range.
So what happens with the video once I send it?
It becomes part of the decision I am making with you.
Most people notice one thing: the area that hurts, the part of the movement that looks off, or something a coach or friend pointed out. I am looking at the bigger picture, how different regions move, the sequence of the movement, and how each part of the body influences the others.
Then I put those pieces together with what I find during your examination. The goal is not to grade your squat or tell you that a movement is simply "good" or "bad." It is to gather enough information to make an informed decision about what your body is doing, what may be influencing it, and what we can positively change.
Someone sent me a video of their barbell bench press. From the side, I noticed something they hadn't: the bar was traveling almost straight down toward the clavicle instead of following a slight arc toward the lower chest. That small difference matters. A better bar path keeps the shoulder in a stronger, more mechanically efficient position and allows the pecs to contribute more effectively.
One last thing
Common questions
Why does my squat look different on video than it feels?
You feel one part of the movement from the inside. The video shows every region at once and the order they move in, which is what he is reading.
Do I have to be an athlete to send a video?
No. He is explicit that athlete does not have to mean someone competing. Thirty seconds of how you sit and type at your desk is useful to him.
What does he look at in a squat video?
The movement being attempted first, then each region on its own, the foot, the knee, the hip, the trunk, then how they work together and in what sequence.
Why does the order of the failures matter?
Because the sequence of failed regions is what tells him whether he is looking at a neuromuscular control issue or a previous history of injury.
This is education, not medical advice, and reading it does not make me your doctor. Nothing here is a diagnosis of your squat, and nothing here is a reason to change what you are doing under load based on a paragraph you read online. If your form looks different on video than it feels, that is worth someone looking at properly, with the video and with you in the room.