Powercleans and presses

[confuzzl3don3]

Ok so i had my attempt at powercleans again yesterday at 47.5kg and i tried to put together all the advice about faster elbows, keeping over the bar as long as possible, etc. But there was just so many dam things to remember. Here's probably what a typical set of 3 would look like:

set of 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnUMk34UPXY

And here's hopefully one of the better reps.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnguXIC6GuA

And also my press is really annoying me.

press - 41.5kg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRt_RCGgWq4

Still too much layback right? Are any of these reps considered ok?

[Raskolnikov]

It's a learning process and I think you've made some good progress, so don't worry about them not being perfect; "good enough" is fine. The "better rep" demonstrates pretty good positioning, IMO -- which is evident by the height you get on the bar: you could have caught that with no knee bend with room to spare. I think it's definitely time to start adding weight. I think you'll find that your form actually improves (e.g., you'll explode more, you'll be faster under the bar, you'll rack quicker, etc.) as the weight gets heavier. I find it impossible to perform a halfway decent looking power clean with anything less than 60kg.

Just a tip about fast elbows that helped me: think of your arms/elbows like whips. As you start to pull under for the catch, snap your arms just like you would a wet towel, and whip your elbows up. (Hopefully the analogy makes sense.)

[simonsky]

from my naked eye positioning on your clean seems fine to me, decent first and second pull, although like Raskolnikov said your arms could be more whippier. i also think that unlike other lifts the clean brings out the best in your form at heavier weights though only at a certain degree.

[confuzzl3don3]

Mm yeh i get ur analogy, i'll see if it helps. it's just i'm being quite conservative with my weight increases (about 1-2kg depending on how confident i was with last time's weight) because if i increase too much, i begin to miss reps. As in to do a set of 3, i might need to do 4 or even 5 reps in order to get 3 'ok' reps. And as you can see from my 'normal' sets, i usually muscle a few of them up because of my slow elbows.

[confuzzl3don3]

Anything about my presses?

[Charles Staley]

Hey I've seen you around here before.

I'd love to see you get your shoulders out in front more as the bar passes your knees- if when you do this you'll need to contract your lats to prevent the bar from drifting away from your thighs. This one tweak will help a lot. Initially you might be better off practicing this idea with clean pulls, and then when it feels consistent, apply it to the clean

Ok so i had my attempt at powercleans again yesterday at 47.5kg and i tried to put together all the advice about faster elbows, keeping over the bar as long as possible, etc. But there was just so many dam things to remember. Here's probably what a typical set of 3 would look like:

set of 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnUMk34UPXY


Still too much layback right? Are any of these reps considered ok?