Here is a highlight of the 2015 Youth World Championships.
15 year old (born 05.05.1999) Liu Weijian from China.
He Snatched 140kg (only 4 kg off Youth World Record) and Clean & Jerked 160kg at 69kg!
Remember his name. Future senior world champion right there. I also have some training hall footage of him which I will upload soon (See update below).
Update 21.05.2015: Here are some of his warm up lifts from bar to 100kg.
Video is at original speed. He really is that fast. Watch the 50 FPS version (1080p50).
Update 22.05.2015: Slow Motion Leftovers!
Update 30.04.2015: Here are some clips of him in the training hall (filmed 08.04)
- Clean & Jerk up to 150kg
- Clean Pulls up to 160kg
Fantastic. Very strong lifter. I am looking forward to see him in the senior championships and at Olympia. Strong, fast, precise. Great stuff.
He’s really struggling with his jerk recovery… I thought someone who snatched 140 so convincingly could clean and jerk 160 like a joke but was shocked to see him struggle like that. At least he didn’t struggle with the clean, so maybe that’s just something his coaches can try to fix for him and his clean and jerk would take off. Lifters who struggle with the clean are really painful to watch and difficult to feel confident about.
I disagree. I can’t stand it when lifters clean a big weight like nothing and then fail to jerk it. Why clean it if you can’t jerk it?
The percentage of successful jerks is very low and this weird trend of power jerks or even squat jerks (circus trick?) doesn’t make it better at all.
Well, usually, people who struggle with the clean have trouble with the jerk as well since the clean saps up so much of their power. What you said is another kind of imbalance, but in my opinion, the lifters who fail to jerk but can easily clean just need to improve technique and translate more absolute strength into speed strength. The type of lifter who struggles to stand with the clean may have a more serious leg strength deficit that often cannot be greatly improved because it’s simply a physical limit of theirs. Zhao Chaojun (56), Oleg Chen (62), Li Fabin (56), Wu Jingbiao (56), Ding Jianjun (62) all suffer from this problem and I was SHOCKED to see Wu seemingly conquer it this time, (though he’s done 137+163 before at the 2012 Olympic trials and only got 133+156 in London). Tian Tao is on the other end; he is a lifter who cleans a WR like a lollipop, but has so far failed to jerk it twice. The power’s there, but it’s just the technique. Among all the lifters I mentioned in this post, I think we all know who has the most potential to win Olympic gold and break WRs.
If it were so easy to correct the imbalance why do so many lifters fail to do so? There are so many lifters that clean the weight easily and do a poor jerk and that over years.
I believe Bud Charniga wrote about that topic several articles, but I wonder why is this weakness not corrected. It also seems to me a rather simple problem, but it seems epidemic.
I didn’t say it was outright easy, but it’s much easier to fix a technique problem than to try to improve leg strength by any serious amount in an elite lifter who already probably does everything known to be effective in building leg strength. Although many lifters may never get their jerk up to par, as you said, there are probably even more lifters who can’t get improve their clean as a limiting factor since most of them, you will never even hear about because if they got on that stage and cleaned nothing, who would mention them? They’re just unknown. Even if they had a huge jerk waiting to be seen, no one would know if they never cleaned it? On the other hand, if a lifter cleans a huge weight but fails to jerk it, he may at least garner some attention. People at least know that he’s there and he’s strong.
I think you’re approaching this conversation from the angle of what you like to see but I’m approaching it from the angle of what coaches can work with and can further develop. A kid with massive strength and a great clean like Tian Tao is a coach’s jewel; he knows that his strength is potential and you just need to work on technique and explosion to nail the jerk. But a guy who’s done Smolov 10 effing times but just doesn’t have the leg power to clean well, even if he has an explosive jerk, is a coach’s nightmare.
Well, you are right I am not a coach. It just buffles me every time I see it. Internet sensation Pat Mendes can clean much more than he can jerk. And it doesn’t seem to get better.
And the same seems to hold true for many top lifters as well. If you like I can look up the Charniga article where he looks at the issue more systematically. And there seems to be a trend of much stronger cleans than jerks. And it just weird when a lifter cleans a weight with miminum effort and then does a pathetic jerk attempt. After a hard clean ok, but not so.
“Why clean it if you can’t jerk it?”
This is not good reasoning at all. Obviously, there was a chance he cold jerk it. By that logic, why’d you even call for the weight if you can’t clean it? Why’d you get on that stage and an wriggle like a worm trying to clean it if you wouldn’t have enough strength left to jerk it?
What a badass. I wonder why he looks to his lower right after standing up with the barbell though. Is he looking at the judges?
We see more failed jerks than failed cleans because for the majority of lifters it is impossible to jerk a weight that they have just done a challenging clean with. They would need huge rack jerk numbers. Lifters who can jerk any weight are usually the ones with inferiour leg strength, because max strength contributes more to the clean. Speed strength is difficult to aquire. It’s basically “you have it or you don’t”.
Stop doing squats for a few weeks and your cleans will be harder, the jerk easier. In the end you will see yourself never failing jerks but also lifting less kilos. Whats better: Jerking every weight that you can clean or being able to clean 10% more weight with a chance of jerking it? For world class athletes, there’s an easy answer.
There is also a mental aspect to successful jerks because lifters are exhausted after the clean and are short of breath. A good portion of failed jerks aren’t actual 100% “give it all” jerk attempts. These little things (shortcutted dips, shortcutted drives, not going under, hips going back, jerking forward) are mental, not technical in most cases.
However, I think the ratio of “cleaners vs. jerkers” is different for recreational lifters because their leg strength potential is not fully exploited.
addendum: Any statisticians out there? Do women fail less often in the jerk phase? This would be my guess.
leg strength is a positive factor for both the jerk and the clean. I think what messes up most lifters is not having a “power stance” after the clean. The jerk should feel natural after the clean. Either way more leg strength gives more stability on the dip, lets you dip slower and push harder. and if you cant push fast, accurate or stable off your legs then no matter how strong upper body wise you are your jerk will suck.. in the end the squat remains the answer to almost every problem. Just my opinion, cheers and thanks for the thought..
My reaction:
“He can’t be THAT fast…”
“Oh wow….”