High School Deadlift Injury/The Government Schools

[Jeffrey Hunter]

A coworker of mine had to leave early yesterday to take his daughter to the dr. She is in high school volleyball and they used a computer to input her information and calculate how much she should be able to deadlift. He said she normally deadlifts 180, and the program said 285. When she couldn't lift it off the floor, the coaches got on both ends and lifted it for her to lock out and then released it. Needless to say it went straight down and it hurt her back pretty bad.

I'm sure there are stories like this out there all the time, but it's pretty insane that a coach who should know better would do something that stupid, even someone not well versed in weight training should know how stupid that was.

[Will Morris]

A coworker of mine had to leave early yesterday to take his daughter to the dr. She is in high school volleyball and they used a computer to input her information and calculate how much she should be able to deadlift. He said she normally deadlifts 180, and the program said 285. When she couldn't lift it off the floor, the coaches got on both ends and lifted it for her to lock out and then released it. Needless to say it went straight down and it hurt her back pretty bad.

I'm sure there are stories like this out there all the time, but it's pretty insane that a coach who should know better would do something that stupid, even someone not well versed in weight training should know how stupid that was.

This is one of the worst stories I have ever heard. Sad are the days when we rely on an automated system to take the place of an informed coach.

[Soule]

This is one of the worst stories I have ever heard. Sad are the days when we rely on an automated system to take the place of an informed coach.

And now all parties involved will think that deadlifts are bad for your back. What a shame.

[bjvinson]

This is the third story that I’ve heard like this involving high school girls in less than a year.

Besides injuring this kid this “coach” has probably turned this young lady and everyone in her family away from training forever.

[Gbraddock]

A coworker of mine had to leave early yesterday to take his daughter to the dr. She is in high school volleyball and they used a computer to input her information and calculate how much she should be able to deadlift. He said she normally deadlifts 180, and the program said 285. When she couldn't lift it off the floor, the coaches got on both ends and lifted it for her to lock out and then released it. Needless to say it went straight down and it hurt her back pretty bad.

I'm sure there are stories like this out there all the time, but it's pretty insane that a coach who should know better would do something that stupid, even someone not well versed in weight training should know how stupid that was.

Awful!...and trying to understand how that isn’t criminal! Sorry to hear and hope she feels better soon.

[Yngvi]

It likely is criminal, but the public teacher's unions will try to protect them.

Is it really reasonable to expect high school coaches and teachers to demonstrate higher intelligence than children?

[Mark Rippetoe]

1. It is not reasonable to expect High School Coaches to be any more intelligent than the kids, since if they were they'd have better jobs than as High School Coaches. IOW, there are very few "informed coaches" in the government schools.

2. The parents of the kids on the teams should know this, since they all experienced High School Coaches when they were in school themselves.

3. The responsibility is therefore on the parents for allowing their kids to be subjected to the harmful environment created by High School Coaches. This is just one aspect of the government schools that argues persuasively for home schooling.

[Yngvi]

It sounds like we can reasonably conclude the government will accuse the parents of some sort of criminal negligence in this case.

After all, has the state really done its job if blame was not formally assigned in the form of criminal or civil court proceedings?

[Shea Frazier]

It likely is criminal, but the public teacher's unions will try to protect them.

Is it really reasonable to expect high school coaches and teachers to demonstrate higher intelligence than children?

Yes, it is reasonable to expect teachers to demonstrate greater knowledge than children. If they don't, then they shouldn't be teaching.

I'm not sure how it is in other school systems, but in ours, coaches may or may not be teachers. Quite a few of them are just parents that used to play the sport in question. They're paid a laughable amount of money ($900 for a season starting out) to work a ridiculous number of hours (worked out to about $.32 an hour when I did it). When you offer crap pay, you should expect to hire crap workers. Just my opinion.

[Mark Rippetoe]

Yes, it is reasonable to expect teachers to demonstrate greater knowledge than children. If they don't, then they shouldn't be teaching.

Yet, somehow, they are.

When you offer crap pay, you should expect to hire crap workers. Just my opinion.

They know this -- they don't care. Homeschool your kids.