Elevated heels

[Baldr]

Hi Mark,

Received the 2nd Edition of SS today... I am set for life. I own the first edition as well and learned many new things. The new illustrations are extremely useful, as well as the assistance exercises. There is no reason why anybody should not own this book. It costs less than a tub of protein powder and lasts a lifetime.

I'm just wondering, in almost every illustration the person demonstrating the exercise is wearing weightlifting shoes, with elevated heels. I remember you saying you yourself wear them in the deadlift (I think it was because it helps you with glute activation?) for whatever reason. Personally, I deadlift barefoot. What are the exercises in which wearing shoes with elevated heels can add difficulty to the movement?

Thanks.

[Mark Rippetoe]

In my opinion, heels don't add difficulty to any movement we do for general strength and conditioning purposes. The purpose of a little heel lift is to throw the knees forward enough that the knee angle is a little more acute, providing more quad range of motion available for use at the start of a pull from the floor. They help in the squat the same way, and in all lifts provide a stable, non-compressible connection to the floor. Modern powerlifting uses flat shoes in the squat and the sumo deadlift because the stance is wide to best use the suit and does not depend heavily on quads. The thinking on not using them for conventional deadlifts is that the heel adds extra distance to the pull -- and it does, true enough, but not enough to offset the benefit of a stronger knee extension off the floor. I deadlifted better in my 5/8"-heeled squat shoes than in wrestling flats.

I don't allow barefoot lifting in my gym, because I don't want your nasty feet all over my place, and in the event that plates get dropped there is no HIV/HepABC/HPV/syphilitic/KJD infected blood to clean up. And Aaron's feet smell so bad that we have to make him change shoes outside; yours probably do too.