Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Workout of the Day:
Three sets of:
Shoulder Press x 6-8 reps
Rest 90 seconds
Ring Rows x 10-12 reps
Rest 90 seconds;
and then,
“Brothers in Arms”
Three rounds for time of:
20 Kettlebell Swings (32/24 kg)
17 Box Jumps (30″/24″)
9 Jerks (155/105 lbs.)

Cool Sock Pops and An Approach To Olympic Lifting
Written by Sage Burgener

Tuesdays are absolutely my favorite day of the week because I get the pleasure of working with Pops on his Olympic lifts! I love working with Cool Sock Pop because he is constantly trying to break down the movements and figure out what the heck I’m talking about when I give him 7 million cues to think about. Pops challenges me as a coach and I challenge him as an athlete.  It’s a perfect fit!

After working with Pops for a couple of months, I started to recognize that he performed the best when we REALLY broke down the movements. It is always our goal for him to understand where his body is supposed to be during each part of the lift, and the only way to do that is to segment the lifts.

Lets look at a typical scenerio…shall we?

At the beginning of the workout I always have Pops start with an exercise that allows him to feel where he is going to be receiving the barbell (Overhead Squats or Front Squats).  These movements also get him warmed up and ready to move on to the next exercise.

Second, Pops works on his pull off the ground.  Lifting from the ground is EXTREMELY complex, so we like to slow down the movement and focus on where his body is in conjunction to the bar and where the bar should be when he actually goes to jump the weight overhead.  We focus on where the weight should be on the heels, how the back angle should look and feel, and where the barbell should travel to as it progresses up his leg.  Doing this a couple of times allows Pops to know what he should feel once he finally starts snatching or cleaning at real speed.

Last, we start snatching and cleaning.  He knows where he is receiving the barbell and he knows how to pull it off the ground, so now we just have to add in the “jump.” It’s amazing to see how much more fluid the movement looks after Pops has really dissected it.  He feels more confident and that confidence turns into more consistency with the lifts.

Despite what you might think, I didn’t just write this post to brag about Pops.  I want you all to try and break down the oly lifting before you actually perform them.  You can’t expect the body to just know where to go right away.  These movements are SO foreign and just down right weird.  Allow your body to feel and understand what you want it to do.  Once you do that, you’ll be ready to snatch and clean and jerk a million kilos.