Succinctly describe for me the Starting Strength Model for the deadlift.
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Elite deadlifters
I've like to watch lifting vids on youtube and sometimes make observations about technique. I've noticed that alot of really good deadlifters tend to start with their hips quite low indeed, almost like they are squatting into it. Often times, the hips are lower than where they end up when the bar gets moving. This seems contray to the method taught in the starting strength book. A few examples:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm7ZbgjZklE -Mike T
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9SqaseO8e4 -Eric lillibridge, skip to 2:10
Any thoughts on why they do this? It's probably dumb to compare the technqiue of the worlds best deadlifters to the deadlift model in SS:BBT but i'm just curious.
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Succinctly describe for me the Starting Strength Model for the deadlift.
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1. Bar over midfoot, shins around an inch from bar
2. Take grip on bar, push shins to bar, leave hips high
3. Squeeze chest up to set back and pull
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That is a summary of the setup, not a summary of the model, although your first sentence is part of the model. Instead of making you guess, I will take a stab at it.
On a heavy deadlift, the bar comes off the ground when the bar is over the middle of the foot and the shoulders are slightly in front of the bar. At weight, the bar path approximates a straight vertical line.
As you have noted, many people start their pulls with their hips lower, or by rolling the bar around in front of them. As you have also noted, their back angles change until the point that the bar is over the middle of the foot and their shoulders are in front of the bar. This results in a non-vertical arm angle as the lats gain their most mechanically advantageous purchase against the humerus. I would make the argument that elite deadlifters pull in perfect accordance with the Starting Strength Model for the deadlift. They may or may not use the exact setup that Rip advocates in the book, although some do. Brad Gillingham comes to mind. Note his use of the hook grip at 881 in that video. Tuchscherer used to use a setup a lot more like the one Rip would advocate and his current process, while full of a lot more moving around, does not start with the hips a lot lower. The bar still comes off the ground when the shoulders are in front of the bar.
Tuschscherer is a thoughtful dude, but I disagree with at least one of his assertions in his video. On his last set of four deadlifts, he suggests that the lack of tightness in his lats is what causes the bar to drift away from him. I would argue that his new setup, which involves dropping the butt too low, causes him to push the bar forward of the middle of his foot with his shins. You can see it happen more and more with each rep of his set as he begins to fatigue. "Engaging the lats" to pull the bar back is the correction he is forced to make because his setup actually causes deviation from a vertical bar path. This completely agrees with the Starting Strength Model, which would predict that putting the bar forward of the midfoot results in a less efficient and therefore harder pull. Tuschscherer makes the reps because they are light for him. I would love to be able to say that 715x4 were light for me, but that is an aside.
Last edited by Jordan Feigenbaum; 08-30-2015 at 06:17 AM. Reason: Clarifications
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Some Ed Coan deadlift videos are shown at the seminars (or at least they were at the one I attended) to show the point that Tom is making. When you watch them slowed down a bit, it is blatantly obvious that even though he's trying to "squat" the weight up, it doesn't actually move until his hips get up to where the SS model would say that they need to be. Searching some of these out may be helpful if you (or anyone else) is having trouble grasping this point.
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I suppose you are correct that the elite lifters pull in accordance with the model, as it is the only way a heavy deadlift will leave the ground. I confused the setup with model, my mistake. As you mentioned though, Gillingham's setup is qute similar to that taught in the book. As is that of Brandon Cass.
That is an interesting point about Tuschscherer. In other videos, the manner in which his setup causes the bar path to stray slightly from vertical is also clear. I wonder why he does this? Maybe he feels it helps him brace and get tighter which makes up for this small deviation from vertical? Either way, it certainly hasn't stopped him shifting huge weights.
I don't know a whole lot about this but it seems like the "squat-pull" deadlift was perhaps more of an old school thing. Coan does it here. As does [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEfyrhlf8CU"#t=2m30s"] Ernie lilliebridge sr [/url], and has evidently passed on this technique to Eric. Do you think there is a reason they tended to squat so low into a pull? When most people drop their butt too low it is an inefficiency but is that the case here? Maybe there is something more to it.
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Myself? I would accept 715 as a bleeding from the eyes lifetime best, but I'm a humble dude.Originally Posted by Tom Campitelli
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I have wondered this myself.
This is why simply observing the cats that lift the most weight might not result in coming up with a sound model for how to lift weights or coach others. The common example Rip likes to use is throwing sidearm in the major leagues. Is it a good way to teach people how to pitch? Probably not, but that doesn't stop people from doing it at a high level despite the inherent inefficiencies.
Rip has asked this question a number of times. No one has yet provided a compelling answer. Some people would point to a stretch reflex, but it is almost impossible to generate a meaningful stretch reflex prior to a deadlift unless you are doing RDLs. The level of analysis of the movements, even at the highest levels of sport, is not always correct. This applies to what we at Starting Strength say, too. Does what we say make sense? If not, why not?
Could it not simply be part of the mental cues required to get setup for the pull? I'm no elite deadlifter, but I've found for instance that when I set up I need to cue myself to roll my shoulder forward and down. It doesn't mean that I really am relaxing my traps and lats and letting my shoulder drift inwards, but I tend to over-shrug if I'm cued to tighten the lats and traps and it screws up the lift. In this case the setup procedure isn't exactly what is recommended in SS, but I end up in the same position. It seems like a reasonable explanation for why the guys cited above say you should squat the weight up, but end up starting in a perfect SS-model position anyway.
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My theory is that the people who pull like this treat the deadlift as more like a leg press, cataulting themselves away from the floor.
If you asked someone to jump as high as possible, they wouldn't just use a slight knee bend with hips high. They would probably drop their butt quite low prior to the jump. Maybe this is why the squat-pullers do what they do? I don't know if you could call it a stretch reflex but perhaps the increased distance the hips have to travel before the bar can leave the floor allows them to accelerate into the start of the lift.
This is all just my speculation of course, not necessarily correct or even remotely useful.
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