Power clean fundamentals

[Blyon900]

Is there much of a difference between a power clean and a deadlift to muscle clean? I can see performing a power clean might be more beneficial to an athlete but from a straight strength and mass building perspective is there much of a fundamental difference? The only difference I can come up with is maybe the fluid motion of a power clean with the correct form and the posture of the body would generate more torque and the ability to lift slightly heavier. But with the way yout teach the lift with a jumping shrug motion is it fair to say performing a deadlift to muscle clean motion would be nearly as beneficial as the power clean, if not more effective because the technique would be easier to learn.

[Mark Rippetoe]

How much weight can you "muscle clean"?

[Soule]

Judging from his other post, i think he’s referring to hang cleans. I also think he’s scared to power clean, because I remember feeling the same way over a decade ago when I was trying to transition from hang cleans to power cleans.

My advice, Blyon, is to be humble and take some weight off the bar and learn how to power clean exactly as it’s written in the blue book.

Forget about what you are comfortable with and learn the power clean the correct way. Once you get good at it, you’ll realize it’s far more technical and fun then the cleans your football coach taught you.

[Blyon900]

What is an adequate amount of weight for you to answer my ?. I feel like your just asking me a loaded question but I’ll play ball. I’m almost a month into your program and just recently started incorporating cleans into my workout. Yes when I say muscle cleans I mean hang cleans except I’m not lowering my myself into a a squat position to catch the bar so I felt saying muscle cleans was the more appropriate term for the exercise. I’m very slowly adding weight to the bar to make sure I’m in a linear progression while getting my form down but if I had to “max out” I prob could go 225 for reps. I’m not trying to question your methods just asking a simple question? if you were to tell me there is a huge difference between the two I would say ok and work on getting my power clean form right otherwise I’m seeing progress and just wanted to know if my train of thought had merit. No disrespect I just like being told why opposed to “because”

[Mark Rippetoe]

First, words have definitions. A "muscle clean" and a hang clean are two different things entirely. A muscle clean and a muscle snatch are performed without momentum -- they are not accelerated through the top of the movement, just pulled into lockout slowly for a warmup of the ROM. We don't use them for even that, because the movement pattern is wrong when done this way -- it's a row, not a clean or snatch -- and it's stupid to warm up an incorrect movement pattern.

Second, you asked about a "muscle clean," a movement that cannot be performed with anything much heavier than 95 pounds. Since we are training for strength here, heavy weight is required -- much heavier than you can "muscle clean." Thus, my question.

Third, in order for an exercise to be useful in our system, the weight must move over the longest effective ROM (explained elsewhere), and this is why we don't use the hang clean as an exercise.

I understand that you're not questioning my methods, but this board operates at a higher level than Reddit, so be more careful with your language. Answering "why" is the primary difference between us and everybody else:

Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, 3rd edition (Current Revision, Paperback) – The Aasgaard Company

Practical Programming for Strength Training, 3rd edition – The Aasgaard Company

[Blyon900]

Thank you for taking the time to answer. I apologize if the term I used was wrong. So basically your saying that the power clean has a larger ROM thus more effective for this program. I’m going to perfect my power clean form and use that since thats what the program calls for. I am however curious as to what you think about the idea of performing a deadlift to hang clean motion, since it seems the power clean is essentially a combination of the two. Would using the ques from those lifts be a good way into teaching myself the correct way to power clean.

[Mark Rippetoe]

How about trying the extensively researched and perfected method of learning the clean found in the book?

Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training, 3rd edition (Current Revision, Paperback) – The Aasgaard Company

[IlPrincipeBrutto]

the idea of performing a deadlift to hang clean motion, since it seems the power clean is essentially a combination of the two.

This seems like saying that a J-turn could be trained by learning how to reverse in a straight line, plus being good at putting your car in the garage, arse first.

IPB