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Barbell Two Exercises Only

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xagunos

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If you had to choose only two exercises to specialize on for the most gains in return, what would they be?

For myself: DEADLIFTS & 90° PUSH-UPS.

Deadlift develop the pulling musculature alongside powerful hips while 90° Push-ups work the entire shoulder girdle and arms through an immense amount of ROM.
 
Deadlifts- posterior chain, grind, pull,

Power/Split Jerk- anterior chain, power, push, add Clean for extra bonus or if no access to power rack

Both full body, compound exercises. Easy to change implements, grips, stances, and variations to hit weaknesses.
 
Based on work experience and real world needs, I'd say:

1. Farmer's walks - I often need to carry heavy things for distances, and what prepares one best for it? Carrying heavy things for distances. Farmer's walks also seems to somewhat take care of my cardio needs. If I wouldn't have them, I would miss running, for example.

2. Squats - Deadlift is a close second, but more often I find I need to get under something heavy and lift it, or that it's easiest to get something on my shoulder to carry when squatting. Squats are also the #1 hypertrophy movement, so it's a good benefit as well.
 
@xagunos ... are you asking about the two exercises with the most carry over/transferability to everything else physical? Or just what each of us would prefer to do, for enjoyment, specificity, or what have you? The enjoyment factor aside, is this a debate about general v. specific?

@Antti ... what do you mean by this:

Farmer's walks also seems to somewhat take care of my cardio needs. If I wouldn't have them, I would miss running, for example.

... that you would need to run for endurance if you didn't perform farmers walks? How much walking and with how much weight? What is your ht/wt?
 
For me double Kettlebell Clean Squat Press & weighted pullups.

I can shape that to an HIIT style workout (if I was still inclined that way) or a focused power workout or a pure grinding strength routine or a mix of all three

I could drop the pullups and still have a format that I could cycle different weights with and never run out of things to achieve.
 
@Antti ... what do you mean by this:



... that you would need to run for endurance if you didn't perform farmers walks? How much walking and with how much weight? What is your ht/wt?

I picked running as an easy example. It is not something that I do regularly anymore. I do feel that farmers walks help with my cardio. Usually I'm satisfied if I do a lot of walking, which is what I mostly do. I understood the original idea of two exercises, that I would prefer that either one had a cardio part in it, as I couldn't do walking or running outside of them.

Farmers walks vary a lot. Sometimes it's buckets of paint, 20-30kg a piece, one in both hands, some distance and stairs vary. Sometimes it's couple of bags of concrete or gypsum on the shoulder. At home it's two 24kg kettlebells or heavier, sometimes with one hand only.

130kg/183cm.
 
If I had known that the clean and the press weren't separate movements, I might have picked differently.
 
Pttp. Deadlift and sidepress. Both done with a barbell. Covers all bases. Nuff said.
 
That's a tough one. There's more than one good answer. You can't go wrong with a clean and press, clean and push press. and so on.

If I had to pick right now then I would go with a low bar squat because it works the whole body hard, it's less stressful on the CNS than the dead-lift, and carries over to the dead-lift really well.

Then I guess I would go with a bench-press because it works the upper-body so thoroughly. I've learned that over the past few moths. However, I would miss my pull-ups
: (
 
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@xagunos ... are you asking about the two exercises with the most carry over/transferability to everything else physical? Or just what each of us would prefer to do, for enjoyment, specificity, or what have you? The enjoyment factor aside, is this a debate about general v. specific?

@Antti ... what do you mean by this:



... that you would need to run for endurance if you didn't perform farmers walks? How much walking and with how much weight? What is your ht/wt?

Agreed, we need more information. It appears that you are a wrestler. Therefore I would recommend clean & presses. The next exercise may depend on your specific needs. Wrestlers need good pulling strength, so anything that strengthens the lats and bicep would be good, pull ups. Grip strength is also important, kettlebell swings work well for that. Squats would work for lower body strength. Deadlifts are good but for the type of strength a wrestler needs, I'd lean more toward a clean.
 
Agreed, we need more information. It appears that you are a wrestler. Therefore I would recommend clean & presses. The next exercise may depend on your specific needs. Wrestlers need good pulling strength, so anything that strengthens the lats and bicep would be good, pull ups. Grip strength is also important, kettlebell swings work well for that. Squats would work for lower body strength. Deadlifts are good but for the type of strength a wrestler needs, I'd lean more toward a clean.

Agreed..If we are talking about wrestling ( and we are gonna say cleans and presses are the same lift) then I would need a pulling exercise in there. I would definitely use pull-ups myself. Then I would actually say clean and PUSH press or even clean and jerk. Gotta be able to explode for your shots. Not just to start it but to finish too.. I think I would settle on the push press as long as we are seeing progress with it and it's getting heavy.
 
Agreed..If we are talking about wrestling ( and we are gonna say cleans and presses are the same lift) then I would need a pulling exercise in there. I would definitely use pull-ups myself. Then I would actually say clean and PUSH press or even clean and jerk. Gotta be able to explode for your shots. Not just to start it but to finish too.. I think I would settle on the push press as long as we are seeing progress with it and it's getting heavy.

The Clean is a pull, and one of the most powerful strength, and size builders for the whole back, and traps.
Low back the entire lift, lats to pull the bar into you to stay over the bar as long as possible, traps for powerful shrug to explosively finish the second pull, and the upper back to pull yourself under the bar in the third pull.

To build a strong grip I trained the Clean without the hook grip, and that's all the grip training I needed.

If I count the Clean and Power or Split Jerk(which ever works best for you) as two exercises, I would be very strong, powerful, and conditioned by only training those two exercises.
 
90° PUSH-UPS.
...while 90° Push-ups work the entire shoulder girdle and arms through an immense amount of ROM.

You mean THE 90 degree push-up? As in "Handstand drop into bent arm planche, then press back into Handstand"?


From the fact that no one else seems to have made much notice of your choice, I'll go ahead and guess you're referring to something else. Otherwise, hat's off to you sir as that's a tremendously difficult exercise that I've been working towards for many months now. Hard for me to think of any other kind of press that requires as much sheer tension, coordination and multiplanar pushing strength as the 90 degree PU.
 
From what I gather
Long cycle clean and jerk with two kettlebells.
Not very technical
Fairly high carryover
Good strength
Good work capacity
 
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