After buggering up my lower back last Friday, I finally decided to get some help for my back and chronic hip soreness. Calvin did some of his fancy stretching/torture moves on me (SPUMONI!) and lo and behold, I could squat at a decent depth without pain. I had no idea that I had tight quads and calves, and that those problems could screw up my back and hips.

I now have an even better repertoire of stretches for pre- and post-workout to help my flexibility issues. Thank you so much, Calvin!

I wouldn’t go with a 1:1 correlation between bridges and DLs to begin with, only because you’re learning the movement and they have the unfortunate side effect of the bar digging into your hips a little. If you wrap the bar with a towel or have one of those foam pads that go around the bar it will certainly help.

Once you’ve done it a few times and are familiar with it, you can most definitely work up to or beyond your DL numbers. My DL is only 385 for 3 and when doing glute bridges I think I did sets of 275 for 10 or so. Bret Contreras, a T Nation contributor who advocates glute bridges, has clients that do 405 for 5, so the potential to place significant load on the bar is there. The movement is just another way to train hip extension, so it can aid in your other lifts.

Hope this helps.

It seems like there’s a difference, if in no other way, in the angle of resistance. By that I mean in the DL the weight is hanging in front of the hips at full extension with the load distributed through the shoulder girdle and assisted by the skeleton at full extension, but on a bridge the weight is pressing nearly straight down through the hips with much less supporting skeletal structure or distribution through any other joints.

Definitely 50 pounds on the bridge versus 300 on the DL seems too light on the bridge. What might be a good ratio to begin with and then work toward for a beginner to weighted bridges like me?