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Other/Mixed Blog - Best Hip Hinge Exercise

Other strength modalities (e.g., Clubs), mixed strength modalities (e.g., combined kettlebell and barbell), other goals (flexibility)
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I was surfing the web on dead lifting some years back and came across the above article. I had previously been resistant to using kettlebells, but Pavel's words piqued my curiosity. It's been a wild ride since. So glad for it.
 
I'll add my personal opinion here. While I agree with Pavel that the swing is the best overall choice for most people, for myself, as a person who had a back injury, I'd still pick the barbell deadlift. I like to be able to exercise control over a movement involving an injury, and one can't do that in the same way with a ballistic. It really took me years, during which I could deadlift just fine, to become comfortable with the kettlebell swing.

Of course, there are plenty of ways around my objection, the main one being simply to use a lighter weight for a longer period of time but, hey, what can I say? I love my deadlifts.

-S-
 
I´m curious about the open ending on the best squat to go with the swings... Would it be swings + heavy low bar back squat?
 
I'll add my personal opinion here. While I agree with Pavel that the swing is the best overall choice for most people, for myself, as a person who had a back injury, I'd still pick the barbell deadlift. I like to be able to exercise control over a movement involving an injury, and one can't do that in the same way with a ballistic. It really took me years, during which I could deadlift just fine, to become comfortable with the kettlebell swing.

Of course, there are plenty of ways around my objection, the main one being simply to use a lighter weight for a longer period of time but, hey, what can I say? I love my deadlifts.

-S-

For myself, also bad lower back, I enjoy doing them with a fair amount of volume. I am still working on upping my weights, but for rehab and overall back health on a somewhat compromised individual (me) I found relatively high volume and lower weight to really get the job done.

I've since come to look at the Swing as a cross of row and DL, when I use lower weight/high volume its more of a row, heavier weight/low volume it feels more like a DL.
 
@rickyw, thanks, but you ruined the mistery of the article for me! I just googled "Pavel zercher squat" and found the article, Im gonna read it now:

The Best Squat Exercise

In any case, before reading the article, the zercher squat is quite an uncommon choice!
 
Yes, I will add the best squat and best press blogs as soon as I can get to them.

-S-
 
The Good Morning is one of my favourite exercises. It forces you to hinge and sit back. You cannot cheat the movement like other exercises. One of the best hip strength and flexibility staples from Tommy Kono was the Wide Stance Good Morning. He had all his lifters do it regularly. Wide Stance similar to a Sumo Stance with out turned feet.

I did tons of Good Mornings and Back Extensions(loaded and unloaded) as part of my torso work almost daily as a Weightlifter. Back Extensions are another favourite I never do anymore.
 
@Geoff Chafe, I have never tried Good Mornings, and your mention of back extensions reminds me why. For whatever reason, my back doesn't like extension exercises - they do something funny to my herniated disc that just bracing my back doesn't do, so although I did try them a number of times, I've basically had to stay away from them.

After my next meet, I may give the GM a try again, though - I've read so many success stories of these having a great carryover to both the SQ and the DL.

-S-
 
Good mornings work the lower portion of the movement and Back Extensions work the final hip extension. We did heavy barbell Back Extensions and holds regularly. Also Barbell Rows in a Back Extension to build tension and stability in the final extension.

I was reminded of this,
Back Training for Weightlifting
Abs/Back: What Does it All Mean?
I used to train the torso very similar to this combined with direct low back and ab work at the end of every Weightlifting practice.
 
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Good Mornings train is the chest up, hips back cues superior to any other exercise in my experience. The Kettlebell Good Morning I learned from Flexible Steel is a fantastic drill also.
 
It is possible to load more weight onto a barbell for a deadlift than you can swing a kettlebell.

I'd like to be corrected on this assumption, but for me the kettlebell is a way to make up for not having huge expensive equipment through using ballistics to increase the virtual weight of the bell.

I just recently compared my S&S programme using a 40kg weight to my friend's deadilfting programme using something like a 200 kg weight!!! Like, who is stronger? I wonder...
 
It is possible to load more weight onto a barbell for a deadlift than you can swing a kettlebell.

I'd like to be corrected on this assumption, but for me the kettlebell is a way to make up for not having huge expensive equipment through using ballistics to increase the virtual weight of the bell.

I just recently compared my S&S programme using a 40kg weight to my friend's deadilfting programme using something like a 200 kg weight!!! Like, who is stronger? I wonder...

The swing is a power movement. The deadlift is a strength movement. No sense comparing apples and oranges, if comparisons even are necessary per se. Apples are better, though.
 
I'm a bit lost here. What can I do being a kettlebell swinger that a deadlifter can't do?
 
I´m curious about the open ending on the best squat to go with the swings... Would it be swings + heavy low bar back squat?
I'd guess Pavel says it's the Zercher Squat ;)

Isn't it a little bit incorrect, to compare directly barbell deadlift vs ketllebell swing?
The swing is a power movement. The deadlift is a strength movement. No sense comparing apples and oranges, if comparisons even are necessary per se. Apples are better, though.
Pavel did those comparisons (IMO) with the general population in mind.
Apples and oranges are not the same, but they are similar (about the same size; both healthy contents in form of vitamins, fiber etc.)

Let's make up an example:
- Apples are swings, oranges are DLs.
- In this made up cenario the orange seeds are more expensive than apple seeds (you get 2-3 or more KBs for the prize of a barbell+plates, even if you go for used stuff).
- Both trees grow at about the same rate, the orange tree bears its fruits just slightly before the apple tree (it takes more time to teach the swing than the DL, but KB DLs are also part of the learning process to perform swings, so the the difference between both is almost not there)
- Both trees are the same size (swings and DLs require the same amount of space)
- You can only eat oranges up to a certain point before you get sick, the amount of apples you can eat before getting sick is much, much higher (there are exceptions, but the general rule is that DLs need more recovery than swings and especially very heavy DLs take more out of you than they give)
You get some kind of cage with limited space (only for one tree), 50 pets in it and a limited amount of money.
Your task is to feed those pets and make their life as enjoyable as possible (by using the spare money after the seed purchase).
Would you go for apples or oranges?
I think the clear answer for most of you would be apples.

In a perfect world you'd have unlimited space to build as much trees as you like (a very big gym) an infinite amount of money (all the tools you can imagine to go into said gym) and the pets enjoy life without spending more money (a body with perfect mobility, flexibility, no health issues, etc.).
In that world you wouldn't need to decide between apples and oranges and go for as much of both as you want.

Sadly our world is not perfect. The general population has to deal with all kinds of limitations - limited money, limited space, limited time, limited body ability. If you're looking for the best possible results with the minimum effective dosis while navigating all those limitations you come up with different "best exercises" than in a perfect world.
I love both the DL and the swing, but in this imperfect world (Earth in the 21th century) I also would chose the swing as the best hip hinge.
And yes in this imperfect world I would also chose the Zercher squat over e.g. the back squat or front squat.
 
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