Previously in Kazakhstan …
Here is a 290kg Front Squat from Ilya Ilyin’s worlds preparation.
I hope he will upload more of his training PRs, he told us that his Front Squat PR is 295kg.
See his Progress Tracker here.
Best of Olympic Weightlifting
Best of Olympic Weightlifting
Previously in Kazakhstan …
Here is a 290kg Front Squat from Ilya Ilyin’s worlds preparation.
I hope he will upload more of his training PRs, he told us that his Front Squat PR is 295kg.
See his Progress Tracker here.
Did he not say he had Front Squatted something like 320 before worlds? I believe i heard you (Gregor) say he had gone around at worlds and shown people a 250 C&J attempt. No clues if he snatched more than the 190 twice? Or what was on the bar in his mystery snatch video?
No Idea about his snatch.
Ilya Ilyin’s strength rivals those of Stefan Botev and Yuri Zakhervich. He is a strong motherfucker that can FS more than many SHWs.
Yuri Zakhervich the man who “makes gravity take a vacation” 😉
“Zakerhervich” – – just looked him up, wow, all the way back in 1988, Olympic champion, snatched a stunning 210kg while lifting at 100kg wt class. What I love about Oly lifting is that some of these guys do NOT look very strong, smooth undefined builds, total opposite of the bodybuilder look. This guy looks SO average concerning his build, then he makes 462 lbs seemingly float from the ground to locked out overhead in one motion as if it were a broomstick. Then calmly exits stage left after a brief nonchalant wave to the crowd.
What was his mas C&J before the worlds?
245
Supposedly he showed a video on his phone of a 250kg C&J to some people.
he only cleaned it. during a test meet of team astana he only made his opener at 240, then tried 247 and 251 or smth.
Did you see the video? I mean I didn’t, but it sounds like it was a training video; most of us know about his 1/3 at that test meet.
ilya said it in an interview to kazah press. that his best trainnig CJ was 245, 250 he lost in front.i think he ll upload those in the near future
Just a middle age novice who never lifted heavy but I’m a fan of Olympic lifters as I find it mind boggling what they can do. They seem so much stronger than the bigger, more built & more muscular bodybuilders. How many 225 lb body builders can launch 500 lbs from shoulder to overhead ? Or klokov exploding 440 lbs in one fast motion from ground to overhead with no stops in between ? AMAZING ! I sit on U-tube watching middle wieght chinese lifters launch almost 2.5X or almost 3X bodyweight overhead. How do they not literallly end up with crushed bones in joints, knee’s, back, etc ? That ‘Lu’ guy in China, saw video of him repping out dips with about 175lbs tied to his back. Lu, Klokov, Ilyn, I can watch these guys for hrs on video !
Welcome to the fascinating world of weightlifting! There’s no way back now 😉
Hey thanks Magneto, I’m 54, started olympic style lifting 2yrs ago. My numbers are so weak I wont post em ! But love the challenge of trying to do better inspite of so many frustrating weaknesses. So after one of my workouts with very light weights I love coming home, pouring a drink (just one !) and watching videos of guys like ilyn or chinese men or women move unbelievable wts
I think that’s part of the beauty of weightlifting. It is the same sport no matter on which level you do it. Enjoy it.
Its kind of silly to compare bodybuilders to weightlifters. Weightlifting we can all agree is a very technically demanding skill set, arguably you have to spend years at it to become any good at it, and to perfect your technique. Therefore comparing someone who doesn’t even practice/learn that skill (bodybuilding) to someone who has devoted 10-20years at the skill in question (weightlifting).
It would be like a figure skater making fun of hockey players for how crudely they skate and that they can’t do all the fancy tricks they do.
Bodybuilders don’t train to be strong, their strength is a by product of their actual goal; muscle size, symmetry, proportions, aesthetics. How many weightlifters have 20-22 inch arms with 54in chest and 32-34in waist? Form follows function.
For the record i’m a powerlifter, but I just don’t get all the hate between these sports (bodybuilding, powerlifting and weightlifting). Personal opinion ilyin is a strong MOFO, if he had gotten into powerlifting we might be seeing records in that sport by him, but at this point if he were to switch over, with all the habits he’s learned and what not, i’m still not sure he’d bench 500 (comp legal) or that he’d deadlift much over 800. Definitely his squat would be really good.
Hey Drew, appreciate your comments. I never intended to disrespect bodybuilders in my comments or infer they are not strong. I realize old timers like Franco Columbo had tremendous strength. A famous picture of him : DL 750# , bw 180#. I do like to compare the max workout lifts of elite pwrLifters vs OlyLfters, not to criticize either but to study both the differences & any similarities between the 2. In my very elementary observation, the 2 only compare similarity in squat strengths but there are wide variables even in that area. I am a huge fan of both power & Oly lifting. At 52yrs old i attended my 1st power lift meet to watch a HS buddy win his wt class, 180lbs. Ironically he was literally the weakest kid in our HS in the ’70s. Now he holds national records ( in the “ply” category. I’m almost 55, 2 yrs into Olympic lifting, very weak but love the challenge and love watching the men and women who are elite pwr or oly competitors. So sometime before Sunday we both will be squatting hvy, but you’ll probably be using 2x more wt than me if not more. This past Monday i did a set of 20x at 250lb. At my age they advise me to keep the reps a bit higher and only rarely go for 3 or 1 rep maxs
Interesting to compare with powerlifter Dan Green’s 292.5 kg front squat. Similar bodyweight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1jygsY0itk
Huge respect to that elite powerlifter. This is fascinating because it shows me that amoung elite top Olympic weightlifters and top powerlifters they do achieve similiar strength in squatting. Obviously a powerlifter will Bench & DL way more than an Oly lifter while the Oly lifter has the tremendous overhead numbers. I have a high level Olympic lifter friend who was once nationally ranked, he can jerk 400# overhead but he begins to struggle deadlifting above 460#. 460# DL for a 185 lb Power-lifter is a light warmup ! My Oly friend cleans almost 400. Probably most 185# powerlifters couldn’t clean 400#. The strength variables between the Oly & Power are great, but their squat strength, approximately equal although the powerlifter will get more in 1-rep back squat. So – – powerlifter can backsquat more, powerlifter & Oly lifter perhaps equal on front squat, Oly lifter can Overhead Squat more. Usually – – –
Good observations. Interesting as well is the form both use. While Dan Green’s cross-armed grip looks absurd to WLers I’m sure, disregarding this, the overall form is very similar between him and Ilya. Similar stance, similar knee travel, similar descent. Also interesting to observe is that Ilya’s is actually not quite as deep as Green’s (though Ilya’s is quite a bit faster). Again, the stereotype is that oly lifters squat much deeper than PLers, but I would argue that we find actually more similarities here than dissimilarities.
Ilya and Green are also both similar in that they are somewhat untouchable in their respective weightclasses and sports.
I’d love to see Ilyas numbers as a powerlifter. He “looks” (build wise) like he’d bench a lot.
I’d guess at 242 he’d be in the (raw) 700/500/700 range maybe more on the squat.
840, 520, 870
guessing, ilya is stronger than the klok, so ilya would be able to outnumber klokov and also dan green.
i’m not so sure that Ilya is “stronger” than klokov…and raw 800lb squats are rare even for super talented athletes. I don’t think Klokov can do an 800lb raw squat.
I very much doubt Ilya would come close to Green in a PL comp. Oly lifters have no reason to bench much: Aramnau once said his best bench was something like 160 kgs x 2 I think? Klokov is much more a brute strength lifter, especially with the upper body. It’s harder to predict what Ilya would lift because his jerk form is so efficient. There isn’t as much correlation to bench press. Also, I would be VERY surprised if Ilya pulled anything like 870 (~395 kgs). I’ve never seen any weightlifter pull even 800 (363 kgs). It just isn’t a lift that is valuable to them, and they don’t train it much. I don’t think Ilya would even come close to Green in a PL comp, except on squats, but Green wouldn’t come close to Ilya in a WL comp. Two different athletes, two different sports.
yeah an 870 pull is Coan level…I think Ilya would bench at least 500. He appears to have good leverages for the bench (to me) and can jerk 500+ I don’t know about his squat but I’m pretty sure he’d do at least 700-750. 800 is a big number for anyone…
If armanau trained bench he’d be good at it too. It would take them a few years to build up. Think about aramnau in his prime: his total is better than Ilya at 105kg by a few Kg and he didn’t struggle at all. He’s freakish.
In some of the seminar videos with Ilya, Klokov and Polovnikov one of the people who attended the seminar said Ilya were doing easy 4 reps for a few sets on 120kg in bench. And this is before he started training for WC again. And about the deadlift i remember that Chingiz Mogushkov said in the interview with Polovnikov that he had a 400kg deadlift. Dont know anyone else with such a high deadlift in weightlifting today.
Found the quote about Ilya benching. https://allthingsgym.com/klokov-ilin-polovnikov-weightlifting-seminars/ “Ilya benches 120kg for a set of 4, wants to build it up to 150kg (set of 4), Dmitry doesn’t bench often anymore because he’s had a shoulder injury which reduced his overhead mobility, and more tightness in his chest wouldn’t help; but he did bench press more often and good weight as he was growing. I’ve seen Vasiliy bench press 200kg, but think he has done more.”
that good for people that don’t really train bench, but watch Greens tales of savagery video where he does 7 working sets with 455×5 (206kg) for 2 sets then x4 for 4 sets and then 470 (213kg) for 5 x1. Most of it paused reps. that’s 330 for a final set vs 455+ for all sets. I’m not saying he cant do more but that’s a large gap. And to echo everyone else there’s no point in benching
Thanks for looking that up. Interesting speculations below regarding WLing strength. I am an amateur powerlifter who competes in the 82.5 and 90 kg classes, and I bench 150 kgs x 6, but I can’t even jerk 130 kgs! The jerk and bench are truly two very different lifts. I am sure Ilya would bench a lot if he trained it, though–really, I think Ilya would do well at any strength sport he chose, just like Koklyaev.
Seriously, check the 3x330kg by Lukanin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJAx12MLkNs
He even had the weightlifting shoes on, with higher heels. His pulls are with extremely good form and easy.
I think any weightlifter who cleans 250 + kg is cabable of deadlifting 350 + kg
Yes, this is excellent, but still very, very far from a 395-400 kg pull! Maybe close to 370. This more proves my assumption that Ilya would not pull anything near 870 lbs (395 kgs). Ilya’s lifts are substantially lower than Lukanin’s because Lukanin is a SHW!
I just checked–in the ATG interview, Lukanin says his best pull is 368 kgs. This is great, but for a SHW in powerlifting, not so much. There are PLers like Belyaev who pulled 391 @ 90 kgs. I don’t think Ilya would be pulling 395 kgs even if he competed at 110 kg class in powerlifting. Again–this is not disrespect to Ilya. It would be silly for him (or Lukanin) to focus on a lift that is not so relevant to weightlifting.
Koklyaev does 900lbs at SHW (former weightlifter)
Well the question is how much would they pull if the focus on the deadlift? It is no secret that some of the best deadlifters focus so intense on the deadlift that they do bench and squats just to keep form and as an assistance exercise. Also Lukanin is doing more of a clean pull than a deadlift, which is much harder.
I think no one will ever know how much would Ilya pull if he focused solely on PL, beacuse he won’t.
What is more interesting, where is the competition tougher – PL or oly? That is, if we take a lifter equally talented at PL and oly, and he spends equal time doing both, where will he succeed more easily? I think weightlifting is a much tougher sport to be the best of the best. That is mainly because lifts are so technical and it is actually an oly sport, and to be a powerlifter you don’t have to start at 12yo. No disrespect to powerlifters.
Pulling strength is very important, 200 kg doesn’t just throw itself overhead.
Koklyaev has pulled 420 I think and Mark Henry had the world record in the deadlift at some point if I remember correctly.
Of course: both Koklyaev and Mark Henry have trained powerlifting for years. Mark Henry was a powerlifter first. He was an OK weightlifter, but a world class powerlifter. Obviously pulling is important, but it’s just simply not as important as in powerlifting.
That’s not a valid comparison. Green is not tested at all, Ilyin has to pass multiple tests per season, the last data we have is 6x in 2012. Green is very unlikely to pass an IWF equal test at any point during the year.
Note that I respect Green’s technique/depth for PL. But an untested strength athlete cannot be compared to a tested one in the same discipline. If there has to be comparison made it should be against Alex-Edward Raus, 105 IPF record holder.
You entirely missed the point. It wasn’t a contest–I was comparing the technique and form of two top level lifters in different disciplines. Obviously, you can’t compare the two–they don’t even compete in the same sport! Most powerlifters don’t even train front squats at all. There are a million variables–the tested/un-tested variable is only one of them.
Agreed, although I think Ilya said he reached 112-115kg bw this past year, whereas DG cuts even to make the 110kg class, so I expect he probably sits closer to 120 in the off-season. For those who haven’t seen, go check out Derek Kendall’s front squats!
Yes, Green is certainly bigger than Ilya! And for the record, if I was judging who was stronger on front squats, I would place my money on Ilya–just in case anyone still thought that I was implying Green was stronger by posting the original video.
I would always bet on a WL for front squat and back squat Hi Bar. 😉
(and for depth, as well)
I mean to say, obviously you can’t compare them as if it is a contest where one wins and the other loses. But that would be silly anyway. It is interesting to me, however, that two lifters who lift in VERY different sports (as you’ve pointed out) use a strikingly similar form on this exercise.
There are multiple rumors that WADA didn’t even test Ilya at World’s…. I wouldn’t compare drug testing as a variable…
Ilya Ilyin has no belt
Ilya wears his belt below the shirt. You can see it often in his longer videos from earlier last year.
He also mentioned in a video that he always wears a belt.
He does, and he wears knee wraps (what a cheater!), while Green doesn’t. 😉
Obviously, you all missed the point. I wasn’t trying to compare the two in a way of saying one was stronger. I was actually thinking–hey look, this is cool, two totally different lifters who have had a lot of success front squatting with very similar technique. I’m a huge fan of both, and it would be silly to try to see who is a better front squatter because it simply doesn’t matter for either of them. Front squat isn’t a competition lift in WL or PL, but what this suggests to me is that it is a valuable training lift for both, and lifters that are doing well in WL and PL are doing front squats, and doing them with very similar form to boot.
it’s surprising that a powerflifter, after all the Louie Simmons propaganda ,works so hard on his quad strength…maybe dem quads are useful after all?
Here is an article where Dan Green watches Pozdeev squat and admires his quads. He then proceeds to adjust his squat to use quads more
http://www.jtsstrength.com/articles/2013/01/25/the-greatest-squat-article-ever/
ctrl+f “pozdeev”
Actually, Dan Green has written a lot about this. He entirely rejects the Westside method. He, and most other Americans who squat a lot, have come to see that actually quads are the most important variable in the equation–not the least. The days of multiply powerlifting and super wide sumo-stance squats caused a focus on the posterior chain. Those days are over. Now that raw powerlifting is the most popular, men like Green are doing a lot of front squats, or at least back squatting in such a way as to emphasize the quads.
I noticed that the Simmons stuff NEVER worked for me–I never used the gear. Thank God real lifting is coming back. Dan and the Lillibridges and all the amazing Russian lifters. It’s ironic that people act like it’s a big deal sometimes when it’s the way it always should have been.
It’s not propaganda its just that their entire template is based around lifting with gear. Most all of the principles behind their system come from Russian sport scientist such as Yuri Verkhoshansky and Mel Siff. Most people don’t understand what the hell he is talking about because they never do the research.
Actually I did a LOT of research. And in truth once Russian powerlifters started dominating the scene their training programs looked nothing like Simmons stuff which I found interesting. They train a lot more like Olympic lifters: multiple heavy squats, benches and deads per week…WAY less assistance work.
I understand that but what I am referring to is that his people compete in geared powerlifting where you wear a squat suit and its more beneficial to squat back more so than down. If you were ever to see one of his guys squat down they would not be using the gear properly and would most likely tear their patella tendons. As for the way they train they have to have extremely strong hamstrings, back and abs because for them for their specific technique these are the muscles that do most of the lifting. The dynamic day is to counter act all the near isometric muscular contractions they get from maxing out.
Oh sure…and there are many strong guys who used and use his system or concepts. It just irritated me how Simmons would write in PLUSA as if his system were the “Best” system for all lifters in all situations and he would tout his lifters geared (and non tested and questionably judged) totals as evidence of their superiority–meanwhile a few years later people start lifting raw again and the training styles COMPLETELY changed- if you have no quad strength you can’t go all the way down and hope to come back up. The concept of just training good mornings for squats does not work for raw lifting. Guys also started training their pecs again: because you can’t bench anything off your chest without chest strength, people started training biceps again…etc….
I also noticed that not one of the Simmons lifters ever won an IPF worlds…so claiming to be “the best” system lacked a lot of merit. Ed Coan used a simple system and applied hard work and won over and over. So did Karwoski, so did John Kuc, Bill Kazmaier etc…
The anecdote that used to make me cringe:at a meet an eyewitness told the story of a lifter who was proud that he couldn’t bench 400 raw in the warm up room but benched 540 in the meet
There is a huge difference between geared lifting as in multiply and IPF geared lifting. IPF single-ply lifting actually looks very similar to raw lifting, except for the bench. Similar technique is used. Multiply is entirely different due to the universally wide-stance squats and use of a monolift.
I agree…I say get rid of everything except belts and an agreed upon length and certain material knee wrap. Test the strength not the trickery.
Again…I’m happy that guys like Green, the Lillebridge and all the insane russians have brought back raw powerlifting. It’s incredible that people are squatting 1000lbs with just belt and knee wraps.
Ilya has the opposite problem of most lifters—he gets pushed deeper by the heavy weights! Fortunately for him he’s so strong he always stands up..with ease. I hate him. (J/K)
I say 290 is awesome already but if he did 300+ that’s phenomenal!
I know this is way off topic but I don’t know who and where else to ask. I was watching the 2000 Sydney Games men’s 69kg and I noticed Galabin Boevski snatched 162.5, clean&jerked 196.5 and totalled 357.5. This was also written on Wiki. But those numbers don’t add up. 162.5+196.5=359. So what is going on there? Thanks
I’m sure someone else will clarify, but I believe that at the time they rounded down to the nearest multiple of 2.5 to calculate totals, though world records were considered separately. Eg., if you lifted 196 for a WR, the WR would be set to 196, but only 195 would count towards your total. Or something like that. It was messed up.
Yes,as Luc says it was the old 2,5 kg raising before 2004. It means that the minimum raise was 2,5 kg so for example 160-162,5-165 or 167.5 could be counted in the total. If you wanted you could break the world record by 0,5 kg but that didn’t count in the total neither in the snatch or cnj. For example: first guy snatched 167,5 second guy 169.5 world record but first guy had a smaller bodyweight – than the smaller lifter won because 167,5 count until you reach the 170 kg. I know it sounds unfair but for me it makes perfect sense. 2,5 kg raising was more fair than the 1 kg. Now if you want to win you just put 1 kg on the bar and you have lot more chance to do it than 2,5 kg more. Especially in lower weight categories. It actually showed who was better in my opinion. It wasn’t messed up. If you were to take the risk and go for record you had to accept that vanity has consequence 😀 😀 😀
Not going to argue whether this is good or bad, but I think if it has negative side. it is for the lighter classes: take a wmoan lifter. Difference between 130 and 132.5 is way more dratic than between 230 and 232.5. It is almost twice as much if you count the percentages. Perhaps it would make more sence to introduce 2.5 step in higher men categories, but not in the lighter ones. Anyway, that is fantasy.
Sorry, but that’s pure nostalgia. Granted, I didn’t follow WL back then but the 2.5kg rule was stupid when it was abolished in 2005 just as much as when it was introduced in prehistoric times.
A guy or girl could lift a full 4kg more than anybody else and still lose on bodyweight. In what conceivable universe is that fair or shows who the best lifter is?
Now you “only” need 1kg, true. But it’s objectively more weight.
Half kilos also had the effect of inflating record counts. It’s a lot easier to break 20 WRs in your career when you have twice as many increments (and fourth attempts).
I’ve actually looked back at the old IWF press release and there was nothing but enthusiasm for this decision. Good riddance to this rule!
Of course no problem everyone has the right to think differently. Although that 4 kg you are talking about probably never happened and is basically just theoretical. I mean have you ever seen a comp where someone lifted for example 169,5-199,5 WR and lost to another lighter lifter who did 167,5-197,5?? Yes it’s possible but nobody did it because if you are in that kind of situation you either choose 170 and 200 or don’t go for the records at all. Yes maybe for small lifters women and men this wasn’t quite fair but they also had 3 minutes time when they had to repeat the attempt. 3 minutes is much more time to rest for a 48 kg woman then a 153 kg man. By the way I think it’s still not fair nowadays with the 2 min break. I don’t have problem with the 1 kg minimum raise for world records.
Thanks a lot, everyone! That’s been bothering me for a while and I’d looked hard to see where the typo was in 162.5+196.5=357.5. Finally clears things up!
Gregor, what did you hear his front squat was?
Because 290 is friggin bananas.
Ilya Ilyin is a very private person. The last two and a half months before the worlds weightlifting is a complete blank on his training and no interview about his performace at the 2014 world championship and only one minute video wishing everyone a merry christmas and happy new year. I wish he was more like Dmitry Klokov in making videos.