Whether you want to lift weights in the gym or just get yourself on and off a chair, a good solid squat makes life so much easier. What can you do if yours needs work?

Archimedes, they say, had a revelation in the bath, leaping from the tub to run starkers though the streets of Syracuse. Newton got an apple on the head. My Eureka moment came one morning as I tried to pick up some dog poo from a south London street. I was cold and stiff, and crouching down seemed the hardest thing in the world. Squatting had become a struggle, I realised, and I needed to do something about it.

A good squat, after all, trains and tests everything from balance to coordination to mobility; your hips, your knees and your ankles; your quads, your glutes and your calves; your bones, your tendons and your muscles. If you can’t squat, you’re pretty much stuffed. Laura Kummerle, a Georgia-based physiotherapist and online coach, puts it more politely, but the gist’s the same. “The squat is a fundamental movement pattern,” she says. “It’s foundational for everything we do, from getting off a toilet to standing up from a chair.” And as far as keeping fit goes, “it gives you a good solid base for a lot of lower-body exercises”.