A few power clean questions

[jicjac]

Mark,

I've decided to give power cleans a shot despite not having access to bumper plates, which leads to my first question so I'll just get that one out of the way.

1) If I don't have access to bumper plates and will therefore have to manually lower the weight using my thighs as the barbell buffer, does it make sense to incorporate the power clean? Specifically, since the idea of your program to aim for increasing weight won't I be setting myself up for early termination of gains once I get to the point of risking injury lowering the barbell? I figure I could stand in front of a squat rack and rack the weight from the power clean rack position and then get it back down on the floor, but that would seem very inefficient.

2) I'm having some issues with the jumping position. In SS, you emphasize the importance of the barbell being in contact with the upper portion (2/3) of the thigh before the jump. Elsewhere you say, "Don't stop to touch your thigh with the bar. If you slow down to touch, when the bar gets heavy you lose momentum and miss the lift. Just brush your leg on the way up with without slowing down to do it." So is the idea to slide the bar up against your thigh after knee extension from the bottom until you reach the jumping position or just to get the barbell to bang against thigh at the jumping position for the added acceleration?

3) For the shrug portion of the power clean, are we talking similar to the feeling and technique of doing the barbell shrug exercise by squeezing our shoulders back and up during the jump?

[Mark Rippetoe]

1. Read the other posts recently up about this. Bumper plates were invented after the clean, not before.

2. The bar "bangs" the thigh on the way up. This is an artifact of a hard hip extension, and it is built into the movement if you learn it from the jump. Banging harder is a good cue for a harder hip extension.

3. You don't think about the shrug at all. It happens as a function of jumping with the weight in your hands. I specifically avoid saying anything about a shrug during the teaching of the clean -- too much other stuff to think about already, and it's just not necessary.