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Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Better Power Moves
Boston may be one of the cradles of international democracy, but it also is a place that gave birth to some bad power moves.
by Charles Poliquin
8/27/2009 1:23:48 PM
What I am saying is “stay away from the ‘Boston Stomp’ when attempting Olympic lifts.” On the East Coast of the USA, athletes are often taught to stomp their feet during the catch phase of power snatches and power cleans. This is a bad idea!
By focusing on this coaching clue, athletes cut their pulls. As a result, they deprive themselves of applied maximum power to the barbell by not doing a complete plantar flexion. Dr. Klaus E. Bartonletz, biomechanist at the German Olympic Center, reckons that this practice robs 10-15% of power applied to the barbell, thus diminishing training gains.
Five to six reps make the bulk of the training process for lifters. Most of what we know about sets and reps comes from experience, not controlled studies. Analysis of training diaries of successful lifters show that sets of 5 reps and sets of 6 reps each make up 24% of the number of sets done by successful lifters. This confirms that there is such a thing as lifting “too heavy too often,” which is one the training principles outlined in the PICP Theory One Book. Single reps account normally for only 3.7% of the number of total sets.
Remember the seven levels of muscle activation. One of the keys in strength training is to choose the right exercise, what I refer as the “most bang for your buck” exercise.
A Better Way
The following is a modification of Dietmar Schmidtbleicher’s chart on levels of activation. A Swedish colleague Riccard Nillson and I added the seventh level. One should devote their training with mostly level 5 and above exercises:
Compound vs isolation exercises (Neuromuscular activity – NMA)
Level 1 – Isolation exercise on variable resistance machine (i.e. Leg extension on cam type machine i.e. Cybex Leg Extension, DAVID Leg curl)
Level 2 – Complex exercise on variable resistance machine (i.e. Leg press on Nautilus machine, LifeFitness Incline Press Machine)
Level 3 – Isolation exercise with constant resistance machine (i.e. Scott pulley curls, Triceps pressdown on pulley machine.)
Level 4 – Complex exercise with constant resistance machine (i.e. Leg press on standard machine)
Level 5 – Isolation exercise with free weights (i.e. Scott barbell curls, lying flyes)
Level 6 – complex exercise with free weights (Snatch pulls, power cleans)
Level 7 – complex exercise with free weights (i.e. Power Snatch, dips on rings, rope climbing)
That’s all for now. Please, enjoy Boston and everything it has to offer, just don’t learn the Boston stomp.
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