Hip Drive and the Overhead Squat

[caseyd123]

Ladies and Gents, those of you who are into Oly lifting, I was wondering what the proper cue is out of the bottom of the snatch for the overhead squat. Is it like the front squat where we aim to drive the chest/elbows/shoulders up out of the bottom or is it like the lowbar backsquat where we initiate the upward travel with hip drive? It seems to me like my back position is more horizontal in a OH squat than a front squat so I was thinking maybe I should be using the hip drive technique..

Thoughts?

[tnumrych]

I've always just focused on pushing up on the bar as I stand up, seeing as losing the bar to the front or back is the main concern of snatch recovery. How you cue it may vary with your anthropometry. I don't necessarily see anything fundamentally wrong with cueing hip drive but I could see a potential problem arising if "hip drive" isn't balanced from the other side by chest up/push up, which tends to be more of a profound issue in an overhead squat than, for example, a back squat, given the longer lever to be controlled in the overhead squat. An equivalent, minute, back angle change in a back squat is much more of an issue in an overhead squat than the back squat.

[Kincain]

I think in the case of the snatch when your at the bottom, your body would be upright (more or less). So that a bit different from the lowback squat where you body has an incline. So I come to the conclusion to treat it like a front squat which has more or less the same upright position. When you focus on hip drive, and that means pushing your ass up (at the same rate as your shoulders), you could push the bar outside the area of balance, and results in taking steps forward in order to get it back in to the area of balance.

To my opinion try to keep your torso as upright as possible (just as a front squat) when getting up from the bottom of the snatch. This is just out of the top of my mind, I'll reread the front squat bit from SS and some other stuff. Later today I might have a better answer :)

[brianb]

Rip's got a video teaching the overhead squat:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCWLs1jTOVE

It's not from a snatch though, just regular overhead squats.

[caseyd123]

thanks guys

[Kincain]

I thought about it and my previous post stated that in the bottom of the overhead squat your body is upright as in the front squat. Well it isn't it is just as inclined as in a normal squat (but this probably depends on anthropometry how much incline). But then you could use the hipdrive cue, just as Rippetoe advocates later on get your ass and shoulders up at the same rate.