For the longest time I held the belief that the deadlift is the greatest exercise in the world. And I found it difficult to find people who would disagree with me. The ones who did generally ranked easy bar curls as the world's greatest movement so I never paid attention to them. But over the years a lot of observations have lead me to believe that this may not actually be so.
I still do believe, however, that the deadlift is the ultimate test of strength. A person who is good at deadlifting is Strong. He has a great back- Upper, mid and lower. He has great legs, a powerful grip, an iron midsection and strong connective tissues. He is also explosive, because the force curve is such that you cannot complete the conventional deadlift without rounding your spine, unless you were explosive to a degree. Its also a lot harder to exploit support gear during deadlifting (as well as bodyfat and sheer size), something that cannot be said for the Squat or Bench press. That is why before the 80s, most guy's deadlift and squat numbers would be pretty close.
The deadlift is probably the best back builder in existence, as well as the best hamstring drill. It also builds a killer grip if you lift Raw.
But overtime, I found a couple of issues with the deadlift.
1. Its a little too heavy.
Its Surprisingly easy to overtrain. Also, it makes it harder to make progress beyond the initial phase. I am not sure how this works, but in my experience, the bigger the lift, once you reach a pleatue, the harder it gets to progress. This is evidenced by how the west side club is able to build over 4 times bodyweight deadlifts with major emphasis on assistance work, like good mornings and reverse hyperextensions, as well as speed work.
2. There is no proper negative in a good and heavy deadlift.
Heavy deadlifts cannot be controlled properly while lowering. Even the best deadlifters, over 8o% of their maximum, will start basically dropping the weight, or pulling themselves down along with it, specially after the first 1 foot of decent. I found this to be the greatest issue with the dead-lift as it severely limited its value as a hamstring size developer. The back muscle of the torso basically lifted isometrically and therefore would hypertrophy like crazy. the back development of any good deadlifter is evidence of this fact. But the lack of a proper negative, basically restricts the stimulation for the hamstrings.
This is the reason I think the deadlift is a hard to break lift, if all you do is deadlift. Ultimately the weak links cannot be developed by deadlifts alone, due to the lack of a negative. In a squat, for example, you can always modify technique to throw the stress on the weak lnks. You can also do this with deadlifts, but you wont get far, because ultimately those parts dont get a lowering stimulus.
In my mind, I can never dare to question the value of the deadlift as a back developer- the upper back complex, the mid back, the lats, the erectoes and the posterior delts- all are worked crazily during the deadlift. But I feel additional hamstring work is essential, and regular deadlifting is too hard on the body.
Ultimately, I am now inclined to feel that the Power Clean is the ultimate back developer. Olympic weightlifters, specially from the 70s and 80s, have incredible back development. Many people in the 60s swore by it as a back developer. It is certainly a great spine developer, and upper back and mid back developer. It is basically a deadlift initially, but the second pull transfers stress to the upper spine. You can use lesser weight and as there is a minimal strech shortening cycle, the stress is low. I know people who have trained the power clean 3-4 times a week with great results. And it transfers well to the regular deadlift IF your hips are strong too.
Currently I favor the good morning and weighted hyperextension as hip extension exercises. Certain people, I feel, if they are doing power cleans and squats, dont need to do hip extension exercises at all, as their anatomy makes their squatting hip dominant. I am such a person. I feel that anyone over 6 feet with long legs probably needs no other exercise for his lower body than the full ATG back squat. A person with long legs will have to flex more at the hips and the deeper the squat the more the hip activation. A ATG squat is much deeper for a tall lifter than a short one. Overall, a tall lifter will always be hip dominant in his squats. Sure, his squat will be hs weakest lift, but improvements in the squat will improve everything else more for him.
Ultimately I do feel there is no best exercise. I do feel everyone is weak at one movement, and chances are improvement in it will deliver the most returns in everything else. I am a natural deadlifter with long arms, so I used to spend all my time deadlifting. I pleatued very fast and very long at 2.25 times bodyweight. Over time I lost interest in the deadlift and started doing high bar ATG squats, with a pause at the bottom. I was very weak at these, and could barely manage bodyweight. At the time I was doing these squats once a week with power cleans every workout. In about 6 months my squat had slowly climbed to 1.25 bodyweight (in the high bar ATG style of course). I went back for a month to deadlifting and broke 2.8 times bodyweight. A year later I did double bodyweight in the squat for 2 reps (Basically intermediate standards) and my deadlift went up to a 4 times bodyweight. I deadlifted 2.25 times bodyweight for 25 straight reps using a clean grip in a contest.
At this time I was really doing crazy grip work (pinch gripping and towel chins)- along with Bridges, Power Cleans and pull ups. I worked all those exercises very hard. I also achieved my first 30 sec L-Sit. Somewhere, I feel keeping the general movement in place (with the power clean) combined with hard lower body work of an unrelated kind, did more for my deadlifting strength, than my deadlifts did for my lower body strength, though once again, I will never deny the back building benefits.
I guess I have to study a lot more to get a clearer understanding of this.
I still do believe, however, that the deadlift is the ultimate test of strength. A person who is good at deadlifting is Strong. He has a great back- Upper, mid and lower. He has great legs, a powerful grip, an iron midsection and strong connective tissues. He is also explosive, because the force curve is such that you cannot complete the conventional deadlift without rounding your spine, unless you were explosive to a degree. Its also a lot harder to exploit support gear during deadlifting (as well as bodyfat and sheer size), something that cannot be said for the Squat or Bench press. That is why before the 80s, most guy's deadlift and squat numbers would be pretty close.
The deadlift is probably the best back builder in existence, as well as the best hamstring drill. It also builds a killer grip if you lift Raw.
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| The greatest test of strength? |
But overtime, I found a couple of issues with the deadlift.
1. Its a little too heavy.
Its Surprisingly easy to overtrain. Also, it makes it harder to make progress beyond the initial phase. I am not sure how this works, but in my experience, the bigger the lift, once you reach a pleatue, the harder it gets to progress. This is evidenced by how the west side club is able to build over 4 times bodyweight deadlifts with major emphasis on assistance work, like good mornings and reverse hyperextensions, as well as speed work.
2. There is no proper negative in a good and heavy deadlift.
Heavy deadlifts cannot be controlled properly while lowering. Even the best deadlifters, over 8o% of their maximum, will start basically dropping the weight, or pulling themselves down along with it, specially after the first 1 foot of decent. I found this to be the greatest issue with the dead-lift as it severely limited its value as a hamstring size developer. The back muscle of the torso basically lifted isometrically and therefore would hypertrophy like crazy. the back development of any good deadlifter is evidence of this fact. But the lack of a proper negative, basically restricts the stimulation for the hamstrings.
This is the reason I think the deadlift is a hard to break lift, if all you do is deadlift. Ultimately the weak links cannot be developed by deadlifts alone, due to the lack of a negative. In a squat, for example, you can always modify technique to throw the stress on the weak lnks. You can also do this with deadlifts, but you wont get far, because ultimately those parts dont get a lowering stimulus.
In my mind, I can never dare to question the value of the deadlift as a back developer- the upper back complex, the mid back, the lats, the erectoes and the posterior delts- all are worked crazily during the deadlift. But I feel additional hamstring work is essential, and regular deadlifting is too hard on the body.
Ultimately, I am now inclined to feel that the Power Clean is the ultimate back developer. Olympic weightlifters, specially from the 70s and 80s, have incredible back development. Many people in the 60s swore by it as a back developer. It is certainly a great spine developer, and upper back and mid back developer. It is basically a deadlift initially, but the second pull transfers stress to the upper spine. You can use lesser weight and as there is a minimal strech shortening cycle, the stress is low. I know people who have trained the power clean 3-4 times a week with great results. And it transfers well to the regular deadlift IF your hips are strong too.
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| Legendary Weightlifter David Rigert |
Currently I favor the good morning and weighted hyperextension as hip extension exercises. Certain people, I feel, if they are doing power cleans and squats, dont need to do hip extension exercises at all, as their anatomy makes their squatting hip dominant. I am such a person. I feel that anyone over 6 feet with long legs probably needs no other exercise for his lower body than the full ATG back squat. A person with long legs will have to flex more at the hips and the deeper the squat the more the hip activation. A ATG squat is much deeper for a tall lifter than a short one. Overall, a tall lifter will always be hip dominant in his squats. Sure, his squat will be hs weakest lift, but improvements in the squat will improve everything else more for him.
Ultimately I do feel there is no best exercise. I do feel everyone is weak at one movement, and chances are improvement in it will deliver the most returns in everything else. I am a natural deadlifter with long arms, so I used to spend all my time deadlifting. I pleatued very fast and very long at 2.25 times bodyweight. Over time I lost interest in the deadlift and started doing high bar ATG squats, with a pause at the bottom. I was very weak at these, and could barely manage bodyweight. At the time I was doing these squats once a week with power cleans every workout. In about 6 months my squat had slowly climbed to 1.25 bodyweight (in the high bar ATG style of course). I went back for a month to deadlifting and broke 2.8 times bodyweight. A year later I did double bodyweight in the squat for 2 reps (Basically intermediate standards) and my deadlift went up to a 4 times bodyweight. I deadlifted 2.25 times bodyweight for 25 straight reps using a clean grip in a contest.
At this time I was really doing crazy grip work (pinch gripping and towel chins)- along with Bridges, Power Cleans and pull ups. I worked all those exercises very hard. I also achieved my first 30 sec L-Sit. Somewhere, I feel keeping the general movement in place (with the power clean) combined with hard lower body work of an unrelated kind, did more for my deadlifting strength, than my deadlifts did for my lower body strength, though once again, I will never deny the back building benefits.
I guess I have to study a lot more to get a clearer understanding of this.
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