Anyone else have difficulty doing deadlifts for more than 1 rep?

[Jihoon]

Whenever I deadlift heavy i see stars and the blood rushes to my head after the first rep. I get very dizzy, woozy and it feels like i need to step away from my the bar or i'm going to faint. It doesn't seem to matter whether I'm deadlifting at 200, 225 or 275 (275 is 97% of my 1RM) I just can't seem to pull off more than one repetition without my form going to shit.

I sometimes just try to grit myself through the dizzy spells and blood rush but adrenaline alone doesn't get me anywhere. What usually happens is my form goes awry and my lower back starts to suffer if i push myself more than one rep. Any suggestions? Or is this somewhat normal for some people?

[EliGreen]

I've had it happen before, not while deadlifting though, while pressing. I think it's because of the valsalva manuever, I don't know if it can be avoided. I think you could try to push through your abs more than your head but I don't think it can always be controlled too much

[Brian Harlin]

Whenever I deadlift heavy i see stars and the blood rushes to my head after the first rep. I get very dizzy, woozy and it feels like i need to step away from my the bar or i'm going to faint. It doesn't seem to matter whether I'm deadlifting at 200, 225 or 275 (275 is 97% of my 1RM) I just can't seem to pull off more than one repetition without my form going to shit.

I sometimes just try to grit myself through the dizzy spells and blood rush but adrenaline alone doesn't get me anywhere. What usually happens is my form goes awry and my lower back starts to suffer if i push myself more than one rep. Any suggestions? Or is this somewhat normal for some people?

I get this from deadlifts often. There are several things that contribute to it for me, and I can often keep it from happening.
1. Breath either breathe deeper, squeeze harder, watch when you release the breath if that correlates to your lightheadedness.

2. Diet believe it or not, from my experience, deadlifts on low calorie or low carb diets can contribute to this. If your workouts are very long maybe have a snack during.

3. Standing up unloaded quickly or dropping the load/ lowering it too quickly then standing up.
Going from the loaded state to an unloaded upright state seem to trigger this also, very much like postural orthostatic hypotension.

[DJC416]

Breathe into your stomach and not your chest. Visualize breathing into your lower abs, and squeeze them hard like you're bracing for a punch. You should be so tight that any fecal matter that has been groundhogging would explode out and hit the other side of the room.

[Jihoon]

Yeah I use all the cues and I maintain good form with my DL. Kind of have to if I want to lift 285 lbs off the ground without snapping my spine in half. But in any case I do use the valsalva maneuever and Yes I do tighten my abs. The dizziness comes whether I stand up quickly or slowly and whether it's loaded or not. the dizziness starts to sit in right after i put down the bar. Maybe it has to do with the blood pressure spiking from the valsalva. However, without this breathing technique I doubt i'd be able to DL a heavy weight off the floor in the first place which kind of defeats the purpose of being able to do it 5x in a row.

I'm not starving myself either and this occurs whether i'm at a caloric deficit, at maintenance, or eating like a pig so I'm really lost and confused. For now I've switched to just doing 5-8 heavy singles instead of the set of 5 reps because I just can't handle it. I don't know maybe I'm an exception.

[Les Hahn]

Breathe into your stomach and not your chest. Visualize breathing into your lower abs, and squeeze them hard like you're bracing for a punch. You should be so tight that any fecal matter that has been groundhogging would explode out and hit the other side of the room.

This needs to be in SS 4th ed. :-)

[rashid29]

I have had this happen when I was pulling on little food and when I had no rest between squatting and pulling. Taking even 10 min between squats and pulling, taking longer rests between warm ups, and letting out a bit of air after clearing my knees helped me.

[Philbert]

It sounds like you are relaxing too much between reps. Have you tried taking one breath at the top and not releasing the Valsalva at the bottom? Or taking a very quick breath without letting your abs get loose at the bottom? Can you do multiple reps touch and go without feeling you will pass out in the middle?

[PressesPeople]

Make sure that your head is in alignment with your spine, rather than pointing up like it will want to. This will help.

[algunos hombre]

Search the forums for "syncope" good thread with Sully chiming in. It's your breathing that needs fixing.