Any Oly Lift Coaches etc?

CarlKRobbo

Any Olympic Lift Coaches around here? I'm after help with my Snatch grip Deadlift... It's the Grip... this is what's failing me, so I'm ending up using straps (Power-lifting sin that....). As an example Snatch Grip Deadlifts for my last session (From 4" Pins) - 12 x 130KG, 12 x 130KG (Straps) 3,2,2,3,2 x 130KG (NO Straps). I can find a ton of reasons to DO snatch grip Deadlifts, just not any to help

chubby_checkers

I used this site: powerliftingwatch.com/node/4420 to find a gym in my area. The owner is a former Olympic contender. There's also this site: http://www.teamusa.org/USA-Weightlifting/Clubs-LWC/Find-a-club if you'd rather do face-to-face.

bostonwolf

For almost all of us the grip will be the first thing to go. You're probably just going to have to build up your wrist strength with accessory work. Straps are only going to help so much if you just can't hold the bar.

TR0berts

I'm not sure I fully understand what's going on here.

Snatch-grip DLs aren't any sort of competition lift that I know of. Sure, I guess you could do them in a competition, but not from the pins. They're typically used as upper-back mass builders. As such, why not just use the straps? If incorporating them, I'd still go strapless for my regular DLs, though.

a_stronger_me13

Hook grip or straps. You don't need to pay an Olympic lifting coach to tell you that considering snatch grip deadlifts aren't an Olympic lift. Since you aren't lifting snatch grip in a competition and only using them as an accessory, using straps is not a big deal as they are a back building movement, not a grip building movement.

icrushit

If it was me, I'd tend to stay away from artificial supports like straps, etc, and improve my grip instead. Paul Wade outlines a good program of grip training in his second Convict Conditioning book, which basically involves building up your closed and open grips.

Closed, he suggests a series of dead hangs from something like a pullup bar (no slouching shoulders) until you can do 4 such hangs for 1 min each, then you make it progressively harder next session by hanging from 2 hand towels looped over the bar, and building that up to, moving to progressively harder variations until you are at a point where you can hang single-handedly from one towel over the bar.

Rope climbing he suggests was a great old-school grip builder too, but he says he favours the towels, as it's easier to add more towels, where it's not so easy for most to be have several ropes of different thicknesses to work their way up through.

That's the closed grip, but for balance he suggests such a program of closed grip exercises should be complimented by a program of open grip exercises so you are ensuring your hand strength in both opening and closing is balanced. His tool of choice for working the open grip is fingertip pushups.

I do bodyweight strength workouts myself, and tried some of his grip work suggestions for a little, but in the end found that my own grip was strong enough just from the pullup and horizontal row movements I do, as well as hanging leg raises. Initially my grip was the weak point in such movements, but the more time I put in with these movements the more my grip improved, and if my grip ever needs further improving I shall probably just take up Paul's program above.