Apples and oranges, Espi. You are PULLING from the floor with a CDL and with an RDL, you aren't. In the case of a CDL, your knees are bent, hips up, and you PULL. You should look like this (third pic). Notice where the bar is hitting in reference to the shins. If you don't have 45's on the bar, the bar is going to be much lower, and you will be reaching further.
That's where I went wrong.. even with a RDL I can go all the way down to the floor, even with the bb staying as close to the skin as possible.
OTOH, I can NOT go to the floor on an RDL. I go just below kneecaps, because, for me, any lower would compromise my flat back. Most people aren't as flexible as Espi!
And there is a major diff between RDL's and stiff-legged (or straight-legged) deadlifts... and neither of those are regular / conventional plain ol' deadlifts!
I guess I am lucky because my gym has one rack that is equipped with weight plates that are all the same diameter no matter how heavy. In other words, even the 5 lb. plates are a good 15ish inches in diameter. Makes it nice for deadlifting .
If you can deadlift from the ground with little plates, go for it, working your way up to 45s.
Jane's right. Most of us just can't do it, so we need some way to boost the small plates up to the height of the 45s until we can lift 135lbs. Buuuut, if you can do it with 25s or 10s, then you're getting more ROM and can feel free to do that.
It's really up to you. That extra few inches makes it easier for most people, so you'll increase to the 45s a bit faster.
Here's an older video of me doing a DL of 65kg x8. This is where I was confusing the RDL & DL. I'd say DL.
What is interesting, is that only after *this* video I realized that my starting point was wrong = keeping the bb too far away from the shins.. they need to brush the shins, meaning that I was putting unduly stress on the back.
Stooopid part was.. I'd been DL-ing for over 6 maybe 8 yrs and yet hadn't had anyone walking me through the various part of a DL
Here's another one where I'm doing a deficit DL (70x11) so as to get more stretch on the hamstrings.
It's 18 months ago when that vid was made, so really no clue. If it is who I think it might be, it doesn't help as I don't know his name.. he's about the only other guy outside my SO who does walking lunges.
I guess I am lucky because my gym has one rack that is equipped with weight plates that are all the same diameter no matter how heavy. In other words, even the 5 lb. plates are a good 15ish inches in diameter. Makes it nice for deadlifting .
As I was reading through these posts I was just thinking, why don't they make plates all the same size but different weights, and there, they have!
I got off on a YouTube tangent this weekend and ended up watching Olympic weightlifting. They have weights that are all the same diameter. They are just narrower. However, I couldn't tell if the lightest plates (i.e. the only ones I'm probably using) were also the same diameter or not.
BTW, it blows my mind that people are strong enough to lift using a bar similar to the one I use and have it flex. That's just craziness.
They have plates as small as 5# that are full diameter... I use them when I'm learning Oly lifts at my gym. They are so thin that they look more like a bike wheel with thick spokes - I call 'em my training wheels!
We don't have those in my Oly gym (the vid was taken in previous 'normal' wellness oriented gym), lowest weight at 'normal' tall size is a green 10kg (22lbs) Eleiko disk. The lower wt disks are all smaller.. and I just start at the shin or knee with a snatch or clean.
Apparently nobody has seen the flaws in the 2 vids I'd posted ?
Tempo is all wrong = too fast on the negatives
Not just if I'd wanted to do this for hypertrophy purposes, but also if this was meant to be a speed lift, since then wt would have needed to be lower yet and concentric part much faster & eccentric (negative) part slower.
Position is all wrong too = bar too far in front of body, shoulders go over the bar instead of staying behind.. shins need to be scraped by the bar etc etc.
It's really weird how all of this becomes suddenly so visible once I see myself on a video , while for all those years I couldn't see what was wrong for myself when doing it..It's easy to look at others in the gym and see where they go wrong, but it's like you're blind to your own flaws. Still can't get over it how strange this is. Not that I'm unwilling to change patterns but it's simply blindness when it comes to 'proprioception' .
If anyone here has access to a camera that can make vids of yourself doing lifts, by all means have it done.. I should learn myself to do it, as it reminded me again how much I need to do this again for at least half of my exercises to get proper feedback.
Can you explain what you exactly mean by leading with the chin instead of chest, if that's initiating the way up without 'puffing up the chest like a baboon' (sorry that's the first image which came up to me to describe it), and pulling shoulders back, yes.. I've corrected this now.
Dead stop , yeah very much touch & go, you can barely see the wt actually touches the floor.
In this article by Lyle, he talks about having the bar at the proper height if you aren't using 45's. Thought it was worth resurrecting this thread in case others are still having DL issues:
Is there some variation of the reverse lunge where you keep the back leg straight and far behind you as you bend the front leg some? I found it very odd to see a lunge with no 90 degree angles in the legs. She did several of these 5lbs, then followed them with step ups combined with bicep curls at the top, again with the 5lbs. I wanted to tell her to use some real weights and stop cheating on the step ups. Her heel wasn't even on the step!
Mostly I was just envious, she had a "perfect" figure (although she was lacking definition) but you know it's more form good genes than her easy work outs. And i was huffing and puffing away with my heart rate hitting 180 on some reps.
I can't find any good video of it but there is something I've seen called a bowler's lunge which you can probably imagine if you picture a bowling motion and make it a lunge exercise. I guess it could have been one of those but shallow. I think I've seen it called a rear crossover lunge as well.
Interesting. I can't believe how many variations, and variations of names of excercises are. I don't recall it exactly now (these stage 2 workouts totally drain me physically), but I think she was putting her leg directly behind her like in a tradional reverse lunge, not crossing it behind her like you would after rolling the bowling ball.
You do NOT want to deadlift from the floor with 5 lb weights on the bar. You can, but you will be doing a deficit deadlift.
ETA: Hazel, see the deadlift thread in the FAQ and watch the video. You will see how the girls raised the bar to the appropriate height using the step risers.
THIS interests me. I did deadlifts today for the first time in my life and I put a 5# plate on each end of the 45 # bar, for a total of 55#
The plates are like mini plates and I did have to bend so far over to do the lift. My form felt so funky and clunky with it. I just figured it was because I am such a newbie to it, and not used to what the proper feel is.
I did the two sets of 15, but it was a struggle. I don't seem to have injured myself, but you can bet my loins are evermore tight and sore.
I look forward to doing the deadlifts but I am worried about them because I dont' want to injure myself, and I know rookie mistakes can really cost you when dealing with things like that.
On the DL, see if you can find the squat rack and set the hooks/pins on the lowest setting - if that is about 8 inches off the ground, justput the bar on there and do your DL from there rather than from the floor - you won't have to bend so far until you are strong enough to use the big plates.
When it actually comes to stupid crap, my SO observed a father bringing in his son (maybe 8-10yrs old?) and ... gasp make him do the same bb-exercises he did: bench presses , pec deck (!) , bicep curls.
My SO was stunned the father hadn't thought of making him do BW exercises like pushups & pullups which are so much more appropriate.. perhaps the little kid just felt better doing the exact same thing as his Dad but yet.. so inappropriate as an exercise for a young kid. Bicep curls? Pec deck machine? Are you kidding me... ?
You guys will love this. I work at a university and often use the gym after work. It's a really nice facility with a decent weight room, but it very much lacks in floor space to do things like lunges, box jumps, step-ups, that kind of thing. There is an aerobics room (where all the boxes, steps, and medicine balls live) but you can only use it when there isn't a class and there is ALWAYS a class between 5-7pm.
Anyway, every time I find a perfect little nugget of space to do my snatches, jumps, whatever, it gets taken away and filled with more machines. My current favorite space was an alcove with a cable machine in it that still had enough floor space to do other things. Last night I showed up to find the cable machine moved, and two treadmills in my alcove.
I saw the facilities director and explained that it would be excellent to have a little floor space to do non-machine exercises. When he asked what kind of exercises I said, "You know, dumbbell snatches, lunges, box jumps..." and he responded, "...What are those?"
wow, this has become the thread that wouldn't die!
Since my gym still hasn't replaced the power cage and the new squat rack doesn't have thingies all the way to the floor, I've found the best way to get the oly bar to the correct height is to use 5 aerobic-step boosters (no step) on each side. The hole in the center of the boosters is perfect for the larger diameter weight stop on the bar as well as the 5 pound weights I add to the bar. Perfect height AND I don't have to worry about it rolling off!
My gym also have Amblus's problem where there's not a lot of space left for all the people that want to do lunges, swiss ball crunches, or pilates mat crap. They have a small day-care area that never has anyone in it that I wish they'd convert to a floor exercise area.
wow, this has become the thread that wouldn't die!
Since my gym still hasn't replaced the power cage and the new squat rack doesn't have thingies all the way to the floor, I've found the best way to get the oly bar to the correct height is to use 5 aerobic-step boosters (no step) on each side. The hole in the center of the boosters is perfect for the larger diameter weight stop on the bar as well as the 5 pound weights I add to the bar. Perfect height AND I don't have to worry about it rolling off!
My gym also have Amblus's problem where there's not a lot of space left for all the people that want to do lunges, swiss ball crunches, or pilates mat crap. They have a small day-care area that never has anyone in it that I wish they'd convert to a floor exercise area.
Yep, I've done that before with the risers. It works great.
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