The other day I watched a few dozen burlesque men participate in a
good ‘ol fashioned Texas Strongman meet. Looking around I saw all types of
bodies and ages. One guy looked like he was about 60 years old and 230 pounds.
He lifted the open heavy weight atlas stone (325 lbs) 5 times, without a shirt
on. Anybody that had an excuse for not lifting just lost it.
Being around these guys I had an opportunity to listen and
learn from what they were saying. The most common problem that everyone was
suffering from seemed to be a core or stability problem. Maybe you don’t want
to do strongman, but anyone that wants to lift heavy needs to pay attention to
this.
Lumbar strength in the lower back comes from heavy pulls. As
for core strength we can say the exact same. What a lot of these guys, and most
gym monsters, lack is the ability to load that area with excessive weights for
prolonged durations. Things like heavy rack pulls below the knee, snatch or
clean pulls, or heavy deadlifts for reps can fill in these gaps.
If you don’t have a strong lumbar/core area, it doesn’t
matter how strong you think you are, you won’t be able to move the weights.
This is where the gap between leg press and squat comes in. In the real world a
strong back is practical, anything else is wasted potential.
My prescription is incorporating heavy pull variations after
your main lift. What I mean is after you do your heavy/explosive sets (which
should always come first), drop it a few pounds and add a couple of reps. For
the guy that can do a set of 2 on deadlift at 500 lbs, do rack pulls for a set
of 5 at 405 afterwards. Another good idea is to pre exhaust with explosive sets on squat,
and then do heavy doubles [sets of 2] or triples [sets of 3] on deadlift. This
will induce some myofibril hypertrophy (dense big muscles) and help with end of
the meet strength.
The last thing that should stop you from showing your best
strengths is a weak back or core. Buckle down and secure your stability before
making huge leaps. I have a motto, if you can’t deadlift within 5% of your max
after squatting, your back needs some work. Okay so it’s not a good saying but
you get the point.
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