Handling Heavy

Let's get a few things straight:

1) Deadlifting is vital for the development of the complete athlete. Period.
Typically the more you can deadlift, the better you move through the athletic world.

2) Deadlifting is as elemental a movement as exists. We pick things up off the ground all the time. Some of these things are heavy. You have to plan and train for this contingency.

3) Deadlifting packs an enormous neuroendocrine wallop. You brain and pituitary recognize this movement as important and flood your body with hormones and pre-hormones that reinforce this hip extension. And this chemical response makes you a younger, more healthy animal.

4) If you want a sexy, small, rock-hard butt that works you should be deadlifting.
(Who doesn't right?)

5) Deadlifting trains the athlete to maintain a neutral spine under load while extending the hip. This potentially prevents blown out discs and flexion related back injuries.



Handling maximal loads in the Deadlift should approximate sub-maximal loads in terms of body position and movement. Specifically, even if the athlete is approaching their peak lift weight, we shouldn't see deformation of spine or deviation away from intial set up.

For example, both athletes above are about to complete lifts that are withing 5% of their best efforts. Both athletes have a "neutral low back" and are therefore safe.
However, note the upper back rounding that is occurring in Adam. He has left his good/strong/stable set up for a less than ideal pulling finish. Is he safe? Sure. But in deviating from best form, he will ultimately limit his potential to handle an even larger weight safely.

Failing to lift heavy loads happens all the time. We expect our athletes to fail at high weights and to understand that this failure looks the same as deadlifting a very light weight.

How does your deadlifting failure look? Like Coach Diane, or Adam?


Lift on!

Coach kstar