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Form Check Friday

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This is the first Form Check Friday.

A chance for all you self coached, garage warriors to post videos of your lifts and get critiqued by other lifters (and hopefully coaches too [Update: Thanks to Glenn Pendlay (yes, it’s the real Glenn)].

Maybe we will focus on specific lifts in the future. For now any lift goes.

  • Post a video of your Olympic / Powerlifts (including Press etc.) in the comments to start a thread
  • Provide some info along with your video (What felt right /wrong, give context etc.)
  • take critique like a man

Update: Thanks to everybody who had the balls to post their videos. I hope it helped a bit. Also thanks to everybody who offered tips.

Plans for Next Time: Next time we will do a missed lifts edition. So record your lifts and keep the misses too.

Videos from the Comments:

Dempsey’s videos, [edit still needs comments]

JG’s Clean and Jerk [edit still needs comments]

Matt’s Clean [edit still needs comments]

Anton makes the start.

Don’s Power Snatch

Tania’s Front Squat

Rebeccas’ Snatch [edit still needs comments]

Tobias’ Snatch

Yates’ Snatches

Falk’s Deadlift

Pas’ Snatch

Mike’s Snatch

About Gregor Winter

Hi, I run ATG.

Follow me on instagram @gregorwinter (and ATG @atginsta).

Comments

    • Dempsey says

      i’m just a beginner but i’ll try to do some observations!

      You have good flexibility, i see you’re keeping your knees flexed in the 2nd pull. This way i dont think you can properly explode the weight up. try to put more tension on your glutes and hamstrings and accelerate more in your second pull

      • CasualLurker says

        On the contrary, he must have his knees bent in order to work with the legs (as with ALL his legs), instead of his back and glutes.
        Anton, in my opinion, the major flaw is that you’re “hipping” the bar (is a term in spanish, “caderear”, which may be translated “using one’s hips”); the bar must ENTER into your hips, but instead you’re SEARCHING the bar with them. This is reflected in three ways; you’re moving the weight to your toes (meaning you lose contact in the heels, which also means you lose power to explode upwards), you’re jumping foward (beacuse you’re swinging the bar foward with your “hipping”), and you lose time trying to get your hips back again, in the catch.
        If I may continue, I think you can revise some other things:
        – You have to thighten up your lower back throughout the whole movement, even during the final extention, but specially during the pulls (during take-off and the second pull).
        – When catching the bar, try to keep your head a little bit straighter; if you lean it foward, you will wind up walking your recovery. It looks as if you’re trying to catch the snatch with your head, instead of your whole body.
        – At the beginning of the first pull (what I called before the “take-off”), you start with your hips down, which is ok. But you fail on keeping them down and, instead, you raise them quite rapidly, and that may mean, in the end, “hipping” the bar and losing explosive power with your legs. The legs are the strongest of all the links in the pull, in sending the bar up. So one should try to keep them in adequate position all the time, which means keeping the hips in adequate position, since that’s where the legs begin.

        And one final comment which applies in most cases: Explosiveness. The movent is kind of slow.

        Thanks for sharing the video with us, Anton, and for letting us comment on it.
        Keep it up!

        • Anton Viberg says

          Thank you so much for the reply, i love the analysis and will break down each pointer and try to work on it one at a time! 🙂

    • glenn pendlay says

      I thought this was a pretty good effort Anton, you are doing a lot of things right. I believe if you can stay on your heels a little further into the lift it will be better. Nice job sweeping the bar back though.

  2. kecks says

    learn to do a static start position not a dynamic one (inconsistent starting point leading to inconsstent first pull); faster replacement of feet needed; also keep sitting in bottom position for 2 or 3 seconds before getting up. don’t rush it, be more patentient with your lifts. no music, no getting aggro. concentrate and focus more. nice job overall.

    • GregorATG says

      Thanks kecks.

      Just one thing, can you reply directly to Anton’s comment, that way every body sees that you referring to Anton’s lift.

    • Anton Viberg says

      Thank you for the reply!
      I actually read an article from Catalyst athletics about not rushing it, so i’m getting used to sitting in the “hole” and waiting.

      Just a side note: the music was added during post processing, felt awkward leaving my moaning when doing a 80kg snatch 😉

  3. Pas says

    v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNTA0NTA3Nzcy.html
    v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNTA0NTA2OTAw.html
    Snatch and Clean and Jerk
    I’m riding it down and the clean crashes on me a bit. I know my power jerk is ugly; I was just trying them out for a bit. Switched back to split jerks again now. And in my clean I start to extend my hips a bit early I think.
    Any other stuff going wrong, and ideas on how to fix the problems?

    • Dempsey says

      Here are some tips from a beginner,

      hey man, i saw that your first pull from the ground in the clean is really fast. i always like to pull a bit more controlled from the ground so i can accelerate later in the lift.
      maybe try thinking of squatting the weight immediately after the second pull, that way you’re already activating your quads to slowly catch the weight instead of crashing down.

  4. Dempsey says

    If would appreciate some tips since i don’t train with a coach and learn everything from youtube. suscribe and comment also on youtube if you like!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQTMO3VoKD0
    Snatch, i’ve been doing snatches for about 6 months now, i like my progress but i’m having problems with getting in the right position after my first pull. Sometimes it feels easier to do a snatch from the hang then from the ground.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtDlrTsYhP4
    Clean, i’ve been cleaning for a longer time now but always did the power version. Since six months started to do the full version. They are improving a lot and i know they can look better but i’m having much more trouble with the jerk at the moment.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ps_W9GuqPII
    Jerk, I switched my splitjerk to a powerjerk because i feel more comfortable lifting “heavier” weights in a powerjerk. i find it really difficult to find a stable and flexible footposition in the jerk and it always feels i’m lifting the weight more upperbody dominant.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPTY2tP_6Kw
    Clean & powerjerk

  5. Guest says

    This is also a good way to get subscribers if you have a YouTube channel, always good to get some extra support from people who have been in similar positions 🙂

    Great idea Gregor!

  6. Don says

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsJ7HTsKwi4

    I was working on snatch form that day. I was performing one from floor and then one from hang.
    I find that when I go up in weight I rush from the floor, miss my pocket, and suck it. Sometimes I will actually skirt out and unintentionally only do a high pull…but to my neck high.

    • MT says

      just my opinion, but probably want to stick with the full snatch until you become proficient with it. also, i prefer to do hang snatch + snatch. not from the floor then hang

    • Leon says

      The problem is simply that the hips rise first. But actually the hips and the the back rise at the same time. Thus, the angle of the back to the floor stays the same.
      To perform variations of the lift is a good idea to work on different parts of the lift.

      • Leon says

        to clarify: The first sentence describes what you do and what follows describes, what you should do. What you do is from a biomechanical stand point highly ineffective.

        • Don says

          Thank you. It is funny, I was focusing on bar path and didn’t really think about the angle. I am scouring allthingsgym right now for tips on correcting this issue. Much appreciated for pointing out the elephant in the living room!

    • theo says

      Whether you set your hips lower or not, try to shove your knees back and push through your heels for much longer. You can see in this video that your weight moves to your toes as the bar crosses the knee and then everything is forward thereafter.

    • glenn pendlay says

      forget the shrug or elbow pull. during the pull you are pulled forward, so that you are completely on the ball of the foot by the time the bar gets to your hip. Stay back on your heels for much, much longer. expect significant increases in the weight you can lift when you learn to do this.

      • Mike Anderson says

        Thanks for the tip coach. Any particular drills you’d recommend over others? Or is it just a “shut up and stay on your heels” situation?

        I appreciate your advice!

        • Leon says

          My coach had me do pulls on the edge of the platform so that the balls of my feet where in the air. That helped me very quickly.

    • CasualLurker says

      Pretty much the same thing that happens to Anton Vinberg (my comment is at the top of this section). Your main problem is searching the bar with your hips; you rush it, you rush the movement, insted of letting the bar to “naturally” enter into the hips… and that’s why you are swinging the bar away from you, and why you are staying on your toes (detaching your heels), and why you have to walk foward your recovery.
      Also, your legs and back are completely wrong; your back is loose, you lift your hips all the way up immediately after the first pull, thus your knees are almost completely extended, etc. It doesn’t help much to get your hips low in the set-up if you don’t keep them like that during the first pull; check this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=koUUJwKtUNw
      Look at how he keeps his hips as down as he can, his knees flexed and pointed out, his back thight, and how he pulls the bar INTO his hips, insted of thrusting them into it.

      Thanks for sharing your video, Mike!

      p.s. Don’t confuse “to rush” with “to explode”.

  8. Tania says

    I’ll play! I don’t like back squatting heavy without a spotter (or two!) because when the weight feels heavy, I feel like my torso collapses. Same with FS, I get stuck not quite halfway up and dump the weight.This video shows it’s mostly in my head! I’m not nearly as stuck or tipped fwd as I think I am. Love to hear tips on how to get past that stuck feeling!
    Not my 1rm but still more than my bodyweight.
    http://www.coachseye.com/RlQ2
    Love to hear tips on how to get past that stuck feeling!
    Not my 1rm but still more than my bodyweight.
    http://www.coachseye.com/RlQ2

    • Leon says

      I guess everyone knows this feeling as a beginner – me too. However, when I made the experience that I just throw the barbell away when I am unable to lift it I lost this “fear”. Maybe you can just try to let the bar go. In the front squat this is very easy. Your reflexes will protect you in the high bar back squat. Either you throw the bar backwards or you duck under. Can be a little more tricky, but this is actually an automatic process.

      On a slidely different note: Unless you are very advanced you don’t need to use weights around your 1RM. Stick around 80 percent. Of course you can go up to 90 from time to time, but it is not necessary to go close to your 1RM. This makes your training efficient and save.

      Good luck!

    • Shamim Miah says

      Your movement pattern is all wrong. You need to strip the weight down and relearn the movement. No amount of cues are going to fix things if you stick to these challenging weights while trying to improve technique.

      Start every session with ample mobility work for hips and ankles, do some squat stretches where you sink your hips between your legs with a totally upright posture (hold onto a rack).

      Put around 5kg on each side of the bar for balast and front squat it focusing on maximum depth staying totally upright just like with your squat stretch, come back up while keeping your hips forward and between your thighs as if there was a wall behind you against your buttocks and back. Go up into half squat position then lower yourself back to bottom. Go up and down ironing out the weak positions IN THE BOTTOM. When I say POSITIONS I mean POSITIONS. This is what you need to work, NOT weights. Adding weights and moving them with different movement patterns, hip dominant that tips you over will be pointless. As it will not develop getting into a deep front squat fast (necessarly to clean) and to recover without tipping over and losing the weight.

      Once you learn the positions they will slowly become natural and you will be able to hit heavy weights without straying from optimal mechanics. If you do start straying, stop adding weight and focus hard on posture and good patterning, in the end it will help you move the bigger weights easily and give you the benefits of greater leg strength too.

    • CasualLurker says

      Three things:
      – If one is planning to train strenght, one should expect to fail, from time to time, a repetition. What this means is that one should learn and PRACTICE how to dump the weight. The most common way to do so is to jump (foward when doing a back squat, and backwards when doing a front squat), and let the bar fall directly to the ground.
      – The crushing feeling on the torso is kind of expected. However, you may want to strenghten your core (your back, your whole abdominal muscules, etc.) in order to be able to keep your torso straight during the squats, and to ease a little this “crushing/collapsing feeling”. There are many ways to do this (from planks to bent presses, from split or power jerks to wrestlers twists), but I may strongly suggest partial squats (quarter), with weights well over your 1RM.
      – You shouldn’t perform a front squat in the same way you perform a back squat; you don’t “sit back” in a front squat in the same manner than in a back squat. Your hips shouldn’t be pushed that far back. You have to start the movement more downwards than backwards, which also means your knees will go further ahead. Yes, yes, your hips will still go a back, and your lower back must be thight and arched, but not in the same way as a back squat.

      Remember this two thing when front squatting: “elbows up and closed”, specially when coming back up: try to push your elbows UP and to put them togheter (to CLOSE them); this will help you a great deal to keep your torso straight when standing from the bottom. UP, and CLOSE them.
      It seems that you are tall; thus, performing a deep squat (long femurs) may be kind of complicated, particularly in the back squat. But you should try anyway to do it a little deeper, as much as your can, as long as it doesn`t become a good morning 😉

      Thanks for sharing the video with us!

    • Dan Murdock says

      Hey Tania,

      In the bottom of any weighted squat the barbell has inertia – it wants to continue it’s path to the earth. If you don’t tighten your core the bar will tend to crush you in one way or another. Looking at your front squat it’s apparent that the bar is crushing you and once your hips rise it only gets worse, giving you that sticking point. In order to overcome the barbells inertia in the rockbottom hole, push your elbows up as hard as you can prior to engaging your legs to stand up. Think “elbows UP!” then stand up. This will keep your torso upright, tighten your thoracic spine, and prevent the bar from crushing you. Great effort, and all the best to you and your training!

    • Lazaros Tzioras says

      considering it is 1.5 x bodyweight technique is good.
      pointers:
      1) 0.20 : keep shoulders behind the bar by sitting further back
      2) 0.22 : keep the bar in contact with your legs

    • Shamim Miah says

      The plates you are using are non standard sized (much smaller) so what you are effectively doing is a deficit deadlift. There are two ways to do a deficit deadlift, one is to drop shoulders lower so it becomes like a stiff leg deadlift; This is what you are doing. The other is to keep hips lower so the first few inches off the ground feel more like a squat; This way is much harder.

      It is also hard to critique a heavy single. If you want a form check to 5 tidy reps at a weight you could squeeze out 7.

      From what I can see you have some moderate kyphosis and you also lose some low back tightness midlift. But these things are expected on a heavy single. So depending on what you were trying to achieve this deadlift could either be all wrong, or perfect.

        • Manuel Buitrago says

          That will be the end result. Stay back longer on the heel and jump off the heels once the bar reaches your hip. Then make sure you land on the heels aggressively (minimize the time they are off the ground).

    • glenn pendlay says

      The biggest thing I see is just speed in the transition to pulling under. Think about this, ideally 3 things would all happen at the exact same time. your elbows locking, your heels returning to the floor, and your butt hitting the bottom position. In you r lift, the heels hit, then some time passes, then the elbows lock, then time passes, then you hit the bottom. If you can make those things happen with less time elapsed in between, you will be a better lifter. They will never happen at the exact same time, but the closer the better. Good luck!

        • Vincent says

          specific exercises I would do to practice what Glenn said:
          In order of difficulty:
          1. push press snatch grip (heels hit the ground and lock elbows should happen at same moment)
          2. push jerk snatch grip (idem, and adds the hip to the movement. All 3 happen at same moment, or as close as possible)
          3. snatch balance (heels hit ground, elbows lock, butt hits lowest position, all at same time (or as close as pos.))
          4. drop snatch (idem snatch balance, but gives you less time)
          (5. drop snatch from semi- (quarter or even less) squat (idem drop snatch but gives you even less time)

          Good luck!

      • Manuel Buitrago says

        From the angle youve given, the hips look fine. There should be a straight line from your shoulder blade, through the arm, and to the bar. Some lifters start with the blade SLIGHTLY behind the bar and thats ok too. Once your shoulders are in that position, the hips will be where they need to be.

    • Rebecca Tiffin says

      Yates – you are mega fast! Yellow t-shirt guy could do with thinking about keeping the bar close, seems like he is ripping it off the floor, it goes out in front and then he has to use his arms to pull it in. This results in the bar going out in front.
      I also catch my snatches soft, I’ve been doing some drop snatches (no use of legs allowed!) with a challenging weight to work on keeping tightness in the bottom of the lift.

      • yatin parasher says

        ty, yea i need to drop sn more but i hate it so much but i suppose that really means i should be doing it!

    • Dempsey says

      damn good weights!
      for what my observations are worth:
      What i see is that your hips stay back for a long time during the clean recovery/front squat, i’m not sure if that’s the most energy efficient way to recover the weight.
      In the slowmo vid you see that you’re really static in your footwork during the jerk and that the weight crashes a bit on your shoulders.

      Both observations are just some points that show you’re really strong overall but maybe you could lift even more with some work in these areas?

      • JG says

        Yeah i totally agree with your observations, i think i could possibly clean 175-180 at the mo but the jerk has recently deteriorated i just need to work harder on it,i came from powerlifting just over a year ago and i have struggled with technique and pulling the weight to high, thank you i appreciate you taking the time Dempsey.

    • Shamim Miah says

      Ha! Jordan I met you once at warley. Decided WL is not for me (at least for the moment) as I need major surgery on my shoulders. Anyhow, for what its worth I like to get geeky over lifting stuff. To me it seems like your jerk could do with some more snappyness. You currently dip and drive slowly but surely like you would for a push press. But for a jerk its more like a small sharp dip and then in less time than you can conciously decipher a violent jerk up (only small but very sharp and precise) which coincides with a razor sharp split under. (You may wonder how someone who can barely lift can know this stuff, just trust me I am good at analysing movement despite my physical shortcomings) You are trying to put too much upward momentum into the bar, you push it higher and more slowly than ideal. You need to work on speed, a small very violent jerk and simultaneous split DOWN and under – like a gunshot. Precise, tight, sharp, movement. I forgot to say, amazing to be moving such big weights in a short time. John said you were destined for some big lifts, he wasnt wrong.

      • JG says

        Aahhh Sham!! Thankyou
        You are defiantly right in all your saying, thankyou for your observations and pointing out “You are trying to put too much upward momentum into the bar, you push it higher” it makes sense and i do really need to work harder on this.Iv got a few weeks left to work on it till the English so fingers crossed for bigger weights.

        Hope your training is ok with your shoulder and when you are ready feel free to come back to warley, we have a lot more new lifters which makes the old place a much more exciting environment to lift in.
        Thanks again

    • Dempsey says

      Nice clean, looks like you’re starting position in the pull changes immediatly after the weight starts moving. Maybe this shifts your weight on your forefoot more thus makes you less explosive in the second pull?
      I haven’t been oly lifting for long so it’s just an observation.