Warm Up Outline (10-20min)

Tips to Become A Better Deadlifter

by Ben Tatar

Think back, actually think way back. Do you remember trying to pick up heavy trees, adults and rocks in the woods? Oh yeah, you would grab a tree that looked impossible to lift, and you would find your inner strength to get the tree off of the ground. After lifting the tree you felt like a freak that should be apart of Ripley’s Believe it or not. If you were one of the kids that liked picking up trees and rocks, it shows that you have had the hardcore powerlifting mentality way before the gym and way before you knew what weight lifting was. This mentality of pushing yourself in the woods has stayed with you all of your life and is now being displayed in the gyms up until this day. Maybe you are still using this mentality on the deadlift, but it all started way back as a child, back when you were maxing out in the wilderness.

So then you take this attitude that you learned from the forest into the gym to see how much weight you can deadlift. Unlike the trees, the weights have numbers, so you know what you can lift and what you need to beat for the next time, and then the inevitable happens. One day you set a personal deadlift record and the gym owner comes up to you and says “No deadlifting”! What has just happened? Gyms across the Country say “No deadlifting”! Why? The deadlift is the lift that intimidates members, it’s the lift that turns common men into monsters, it’s the exercise that makes mankind crazier than a gorilla and it’s the lift that smashes the floor so hard that the members feel like an earth quake has just erupted. Oh yeah, the chalk on the bar makes the casual members feel like they have entered a pig pen, giving the recreational crowd no other option but to go back on the couch and get fat again.

You on the other hand are working so hard that you cannot talk after sets are over and you are becoming super strong! What most men fear is the excitement for victory. Deadlifting teaches us that the weak will crumble and that the strong will survive. The deadlift is the lift that separates the strong from the weak and it’s the lift that defines hardcore. Thus, even though deadlifting does wonders for us, it’s also the least popular of all lifts, but it is also the lift that has the most respect. The deadlift has the most respect because nobody wants to deadlift because deadlifting will wear out your whole body, it’s going to blisters your hands, cuts your shins open and drain out the occipital lobe of the brain, so the lifter cannot see anything! It’s also the most nerve wrecking and the most thrilling of all lifts because it’s the main event in powerlifting. It’s like the 4 th quarter in sports, the deadlift is the final test to determine who is victorious in the powerlifting meet.

In addition the deadlift is the lift that can raise someone’s confidence over night. Think about it, take the average guy off of the street and put him on the squat and what happens? His form is off, he is uncomfortable and he needs to build a base. Now put the average beginner on the bench and you will be lucky if he can even bench press one fifth of what you do. Now tell this person to deadlift and what happens? They pick up 315lbs out of now where and all of a sudden they want to train. They are now inspired to become stronger in powerlifting and overcome their fears to make it in real life!

When I was a teenager I deadlifted 405 and before that during my earlier days I was constantly picking up 135s and this gave me my first impression of training. These were the days when I finally knew I could become something. And not only was the deadlift the big starter for me, but it’s the starter for others because it’s the lift that we can use a lot of weight on before all the other exercises. It’s also the exercise that teaches you the mentality to get strong. Deadlifting is also the exercise that teaches you how to eat like an animal and train like one. Instantly deadlifting will turn kids into powerhouses very fast.

Now that we are all naturally strong at the deadlift, let’s discuss what it takes to become scary strong! Let the games begin!

Tips To Become Better At The Deadlift

1) Strengthen your grip- if you have a weak grip perform grip exercises for counts of 15-20 with power rack grips on barbells and dumbbells.

2) Farmers Walk- Take 2 100 or 150lbs dumbbells (depending on your strength level) and walk around with them! This is also a strongman event.

3) Clamp Work- Buy a pair of clamps and start squeezing them together! Not only will this make your forearms huge, but this will also make you an amazing arm wrestler. Many of us can lift a lot with straps, but we cannot do a lot without them. This means that we need to strengthen our grips.

4) Rack pulls- Rack Pulls are important for the intermediate deadlifter and the advanced deadlifter. These will work on the finish! So let’s say you just deadlifted 475lbs and you missed 500 at the lockout. Well rack pulls will allow you to finish that 500lbs deadlift that you were always trying to hit.

In order to perform a rack pull, find where it is that you are weak. Some deadlifters are weak towards the lockout and others are weak at the half way point of the lift. So go into the power/squat rack with the adjustable safety bars and pins and put the pin where your weakness is, or 1 inch below your weak point. Start practicing your pull from the height where you struggle. Use a lower rep range and get ready to pull some massive weights. You should load the 45s and 100s up on the bar when it comes to deadlift rack lockouts.

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Phase 5 – Explosive 2

From CanThrow.com

“Chuck Norris does not sleep. He waits.”

CHUCK NORRIS JOKES AND HUMOUR

THE TOP TEN CHUCK NORRIS FACTS:

100 MORE CHUCK NORRIS FACTS:

Chuck Norris is 1/8th Cherokee. This has nothing to do with ancestry, the man ate a fucking Indian.

There is no chin behind Chuck Norris’ beard. There is only another fist.

In fine print on the last page of the Guinness Book of World Records it notes that all world records are held by Chuck Norris, and those listed in the book are simply the closest anyone else has ever gotten.

The chief export of Chuck Norris is pain.

Chuck Norris is currently suing NBC, claiming Law and Order are trademarked names for his left and right legs.

The Great Wall of China was originally created to keep Chuck Norris out. It failed misserably.

Crop circles are Chuck Norris’ way of telling the world that sometimes corn needs to lie the fuck down.

Chuck Norris once commented, “There are few problems in this world that cannot be solved by a swift roundhouse kick to the face. In fact, there are none.”

Chuck Norris once ate an entire ream of rice paper and shat out origami swans and Mister Miyagi from Karate Kid.

Chuck Norris is ten feet tall, weighs two-tons, breathes fire, and could eat a hammer and take a shotgun blast standing.

Chuck Norris is a man of few words. Chuck Norris is not a man of few roundhouse kicks to the face.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse actually live in Chuck Norris’s nutsack.

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Carl Yngvar Christensen (CYC) shattered the sub-junior IPF SHW world record with a total of 901 kg. He didn’t only crush the total record but he also set new world records in all 3 lifts. In the squat he set a new world record in his second lift with 338.5 kg, in the third lift he improved his record with 350 kg monster world record.

In the bench he set a new world record by 1 kg, lifting 233,5. In the deadlift he set an easy world record in his opener at 290 kg and followed up with improving the new world record two times with a 310 kg second lift and a 317,5 third lift.

In summary he got 9/9 lifts in this meet and set 7 new world records (2 in the squat, 1 in the bench, 3 in the deadlift, and the total record).

Got this from….

The Special Demands of Modern Athletics on Women- a competitor’s perspective.
By Fiona May

Modern athletics by my definition would be athletics that is practised by both sexes at a high level. Now there is the introduction of events: triple jump, pole vault and hammer throw, athletics for women is more complete and an athlete has a choice in what to specialise in.

“It has been researched that the level of women competing or practising sport in general has increased over the past 20 years but also there has been a decline of women practising sport after the age of 21 years.” This is a general view but it can be said that I have noticed that there has been a small significant decline of athletes competing at national levels. At the international level there has been an increase of women competing in Championships. Not only from Europe and Northern America and parts of Oceania but there has been a surge of athletes from African nations such as Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa and also Asia such as China, Japan and even Sri Lanka. Therefore there has been an increase of women competitors.

For example, at the World Championships in Helsinki 1983 it was recorded that 458 women participated. In Athens, more than 10 years later in 1997 there were 709 participants less than a 50% increase. Thus we can conclude that the number of women athletes has increased slowly, but is this enough?

With the aspect of being an individual sport, the problems that occur are more evident, and the introduction of the events that have been mentioned earlier, there are needs  which should be met in order to encourage and to aid athletes to compete from national to international level into the next millennium.What I have noticed is that there are specific demands at different stages of an athlete starting from a young age.

I have noticed that there tends to be a high dropout level over the period of 16 up to 21 years. I have seen coaches that coach athletes and push them just to get results, not necessarily training for the future. This leads to injury and/or burn-out, where the athlete has nothing left psychologically and physically to continue. Coaches must educate the athlete that it doesn’t matter if one wins or loses and provide encouragement to obtain personal success – not only material success. Female athletes tend to feel alienated when they train and compete and if they are successful it can also lead to jealousy from their peers. The athlete feels that they are abnormal or being too masculine, or the believe that they will develop too many muscles and look like a man. What is needed is family and friends who give these athletes help psychologically, reassurance that it is perfectly normal to have talent, being successful and being feminine at the same time. Also at this point the use of role models are needed for them to look up to.

I know that there are differences between the two sexes that we have to consider but it can be seen to have been exaggerated, they either work too hard or too little. But there shouldn’t be too much difference so that the athlete believes they are limited. The coach should always regard the athlete as an individual regardless of their sex. They must consider the athletes’ strengths and weaknesses for the athlete to mature.

An example would be my experiences of training. I usually trained by myself as there were not many athletes doing the same event. But my coach was convinced that I needed someone to train with. Someone to motivate me. In the end I trained with a male athlete which helped me to improve.

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