By Fabio Zonin, StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor
In the last newsletter, I spoke about the common problem of the “hips shooting up” during the deadlift. (If you missed it, click here.)
Today I’m going to introduce a drill that will help you fix it.
When you deadlift, your hips and the bar must start moving at the same time—as opposed to the pelvis moving before the barbell takes off.
In the iron game, the deadlift is often referred to as “the pull,” and this often leads to a misunderstanding of the real nature of the lift. Because a strong and technically proficient deadlift is de facto a “push” rather than a pull.
When you deadlift a bar, if you focus on “pulling” it off the ground, many undesired things may happen: your hips shooting up, your shoulders shrugging, etc.—and this may injure your back and neck.
I suggest that you flip your idea of what a deadlift is and start thinking of it as a “push.” Imagine you are “wedged” between the bar and the earth and, while holding onto the former, you are pushing away the latter.
A great way to drive this home is the leg press analogy. Imagine yourself in a commercial gym with one of those angled leg press machines. Hold tight onto the machine’s handles, breathe into your belly, brace your abs, and press the platform away.
Apply the same visual to your deadlift. Grip the bar tightly, wedge yourself between the bar and the floor, breathe into your belly, brace your abs—then drive your feet hard into the ground and press it away. And since the floor cannot move, the bar will. And all this will happen while your hips stay exactly where they are—as if held in place by the leg press machine’s seat. Your lift will feel very strong and safe.
The only thing that is missing is that, while a leg press doesn’t physically allow your hips to move, during a deadlift your hips may still tend to shoot up, and this may happen without you even realizing it.
A great drill that teaches you how to keep your hips in place is the Glutes on the Bar DL.
- Place a bar in a power rack at the level your pelvis is at once you have set up and wedged for a deadlift from the floor.
- Stand in front of the power rack, facing away from it. Adjust the distance to touch the bar with your glutes once you have set up and wedged.
- Have a bar loaded for deadlift in front of you, right above your midfoot.
- Set up, wedge, and brush your glutes against the bar in the rack.
- Crush grip the loaded bar, breathe into your belly, brace your abs, build up tension, and squeeze the weight off the ground.
- As you lift, make sure your glutes stay in contact with the bar in the rack until the loaded barbell has lifted off.
This drill does magic in teaching the proper deadlift mechanics, but as StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor Emeritus Mark Reifkind once said, “Everything is easy until it gets heavy!”
This means that once your weight becomes challenging, your hips might still shoot up…
In an upcoming newsletter, I will teach you a little known yet very effective deadlift variation that will teach you how to keep your hips in place even when the weight is heavy.
Don’t miss it!
Previous part:
KNOCK ‘EM DEAD
The Ultimate Deadlift Guide for World Class Strength & Skill
By FABIO ZONIN
StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor
The deadlift is the ultimate test of strength. At hardcore gyms, if you are not pulling many wheels, “You ain’t nothin’.”
The “dead” looks deceptively simple: Anyone can pick up a weight from the ground.
True. But not many can pick up a lot of weight—and even fewer can do it without blowing out their backs. “Dead” in the lift’s name is there for a reason.
All top deadlifters are ultimate technicians polishing their skill with as much attention and precision as archers and acrobats. If you are not willing to do this, go find a you-get-what-you-pay-for deadlift tutorial on YouTube and make an appointment with a chiropractor. But if you are ready to join the club of the strong and the skilled, Knock em’ Dead is for you.
At StrongFirst we treat the deadlift as the “health lift,” the name old time strongmen gave to a similar exercise. For us not getting hurt is not enough; our mission is to make you healthier and more resilient! Our deadlift technique has been refined from the best of what top lifters, medical professionals, and spine biomechanists have to offer.
To claim your $50 discount before this introductory offer ends on Friday, May 19,
CLICK HERE NOW!
Let Fabio Zonin, StrongFirst Certified Master Instructor and big puller introduce you to the intricacies of expert deadlifting:
- Disassemble the deadlift down to its tiniest components and put it back together strong and safe.
- If you are coming from a kettlebell background, make an effortless transition to the barbell. The skills you learn at our School of Strength are totally compatible with multiple strength tools.
- Learn the pros and the cons of the conventional and the sumo deadlift styles and pick the right one for you.
- Personalize your stance and grip according to your individual structure.
- Learn StrongFirst gold standard performance cues: the best of Eastern European and Western science, intuitive discoveries of the finest coaches and lifters around the world, plus insights from medical professionals, polished and systematized to help you develop championship technique in record time.
- Learn how to max like a pro—and when to take it easy.
- Get two state-of-the-art training plans—with detailed instructions on how to personalize them—that combine one of the two most successful strength training methodologies in history with StrongFirst innovation. Guaranteed to work.
- Because the deadlift is not only the ultimate lift but also one of the best total body strength exercises, excelling at it will improve your sprinting, jumping, striking, throwing…
Whether it is your first barbell rodeo, or you are an experienced lifter ready to go to the next level, get this course and knock ‘em dead with your strength!
To claim your $50 discount before this introductory offer ends on Friday, May 19,
CLICK HERE NOW!
