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Also, I know this is the stronglifts forum and it's all predicated on sets of 5, but for deadlift that's not really optimal. I'm a strong advocate for singles only for deadlift. To lift maximal weights, you need both strength and skill. Skill comes from practicing a motor pattern consistently and correctly many, many times. Since deadlifts are done for much less volume than the other lifts due to their taxing nature, you get less practice. If you do sets of deadlifts, even if they're not touch-and-go, you still only practice the setup once per set of five or however many you're doing. If you do singles (set up, lift, lower the bar, step away from the bar, repeat) for a "set" of five, you've practiced the entire lift five times instead of once, allowing you to develop skill more effectively than you can doing traditional sets. Additionally, each time you complete a rep and do not fully reset and set up all over again, the bar and your body will be in a slightly different position, which typically leads to form degrading through the set. This means you are practicing that motor pattern inconsistently. Skill development will be slower when you practice form correctly for one rep and slightly differently for 4 subsequent reps than when you practice it as close to the same as possible for 5 reps in a row.

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Thanks for this information. I noticed today that I don't do Deadlifts as 5 x 1, I do them as 1 x 5. I always walk away and have a break between lifts. I think I'm actually now (at 60kg) at my 1RM. I'm glad to know that my wandering around the gym for a little bit is a good thing, not me being a dodgy deadlifter!!

Cheers! :drinker:

Thanks bb, ny natural stance is around hip width or marginally wider, and toes out to 5 to 1 position so not very far out. The pushing of the knees out has some way to go, and monster's description of screwing the feet into the ground was very helpful in feeling all the muscles activate and tighten. Now to put it together in a repeatable way!

"Screwing the feet into the ground" is basically the same thing as "shoving the knees out"--you are externally rotating your femurs inside the hip joints. In order to do this, you use your adductors, and to some extent also hamstrings--especially at the bottom and right out of the hole. This is where most people will have problems, as our quads are usually pretty overdeveloped compared to hamstrings (this is especially the case for women, hence the frequent knee injuries for female athletes compared to males). And adductor strength is even harder to come by.

^This. Which cue you use isn't really what matters -- it's what it cues you to do. For some people, one cue will make things click and they'll figure out what they need to do to make it work, while other people will hear that same cue and think they're doing it but then someone explains it in a different way and suddenly it all makes sense and they're able to improve their form. "Chest up" in the deadlift works perfectly well for plenty of people, but for others they just go into thoracic extension without engaging their lats. "Put your shoulder blades in your back pockets" often helps those people.

Similarly, bumblebums clearly knows what she's doing, and I have enough of a clue to be able to help here and there. But we approach the same issues in different ways... she is frustrated by Starrett's approach, while it has done me a world of good and allowed me to address minor injuries and keep lifting, safely. Meanwhile, while Rippetoe's approaches are sound for most people, his elbows-up approach (internally rotating the shoulders) to squat bar position is what caused my old rotator cuff injury to flare up. This is one of the reasons it's so valuable to post form check videos. Get feedback from multiple people in different ways, and there's a decent chance that one of those ways will be the one that makes things click for you. )

(Edited to fix a typo. Because if you don't fix typos, the errorists win.)

Monster, thank you for the feedback/tips on my deadlift! I like the idea of tucking my shoulder blades into my back pockets. Easy to visualize. :-)

A few videos--feedback appreciated. I tried to get the best shots possible but my home gym is in a small bedroom with less than ideal lighting. Thank you in advance!

Squat--75 pounds. I've actually been working hard on correcting this hip shift that is in the 4th rep. So of course, once I get up the nerve to post about it, I accidentally up my weight (it had been down at 70) and I'm still able to avoid it on almost every set-I only posted the one where it happened. I imagine this may be a regular challenge, so, any advice there is appreciated.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15DmYbOoFmQ

OHP--60 pounds. First time at this weight--it's been a challenge since the bar, so I wasn't surprised that I couldn't complete a set. This one had the best angle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MonO910yGgs

Deadlift--135 pounds. This was my third time at this weight.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15DmYbOoFmQ

What girlie said about OHP, and the frame of the squat video is too close and not at a good angle for me to say anything helpful.

I found the deadift vid in your channel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIWxdIqEij0

There are two big things you will need to fix the next time you attempt this lift--they are major problems that can result in injury. First, your back is rounded, both the thoracic and lumbar areas. This is something that advanced lifters can get away with, but it is not good practice for a beginner to lift with a rounded lumbar spine. Set your back in extension before you lift the bar off the floor by pointing your chest at the wall in front of you.

The other thing is that the bar is not in contact with your legs on the way up or down. The bar should be dragged up your legs for maximum mechanical efficiency. The way it is right now, it is pulling you forward of your center of gravity, and coupled with the rounded back, that can easily result in an injury.

Here is a step-by-step guide for setting up for the deadlift:

The Deadlift: Perfect Every Time

1. Take your stance, feet a little closer than you think it needs to be and with your toes out more than you like. Your shins should be about one inch from the bar, no more. This places the bar over the mid-foot – the whole foot, not the mid-instep.

2. Take your grip on the bar, leaving your hips up. DO NOT MOVE THE BAR.

3. Drop your knees forward and out until your shins touch the bar. DO NOT MOVE THE BAR.

4. Hard part: squeeze your chest up as hard as you can. DO NOT MOVE THE BAR. This establishes a "wave" of extension that goes all the way down to the lumbar, and sets the back angle from the top down. DO NOT LOWER YOUR HIPS – LIFT THE CHEST TO SET THE BACK ANGLE.

5. Squeeze the bar off the floor and drag it up your legs in contact with your skin/sweats until it locks out at the top. If you have done the above sequence precisely as described, the bar will come off the ground in a perfectly vertical path. All the slack will have come out of the arms and hamstrings in step 4, the bar will not jerk off the ground, and your back will be in good extension. You will perceive that your hips are too high, but if you have completed step 4 correctly, the scapulas, bar, and mid-foot will be in vertical alignment and the pull will be perfect. The pull will seem "shorter" this way.

Source: http://startingstrength.com/resources/forum/showthread.php?t=19833&p=182468#post182468

hm, bumbles, you give me pause for my DL. I was setting up like that until I had a session with a PT who also competes. He pointed out that when I set up like that because of my height, my shoulders were way forward of the bar, so got me to just put my toes (about 3") under the bar.. this does mean that it's not dragged up my legs on the way up.. will have to get some more vid!

I would need to see this to offer an opinion, but shoulders are supposed to be forward of the bar at the start. He was probably right about the toes out thing--depending on the length of your legs, you might have to point the toes out more to allow the bar to clear the knees while maintaining a straight bar path. You do need to drag the bar up your legs, though; if he didn't have you do that, he either doesn't know how to coach or he doesn't know how to deadlift (having seen many PTs in action at my gym, I could believe either possibility).

ok.. today's woes...

all advice welcomed! at least my trousers had a helpful stripe down so I could see parallel!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCFJ2SFp_Fs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlQI-5iRjXg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAJne16mqDc

personal observations.. I think I sorted out squat depth, chest looks better than the other day but still think knees are coming forward a bit far. must invest in a TUBOW!

OHP is just a mess..

Deadlift I think legs are coming up before the rest of me, a bit of a scissor motion.

*sigh*

The fourth OHP rep was pretty decent, actually--watch the bar path again. In the other reps, the bar is too far back. I think especially so in the fifth rep. I would lean back slightly at the beginning of each rep and whip your head and shoulders under the bar once it clears your face, instead of allowing your arms to swing up and back to lock out. Does that make sense?

Squats: getting there, I think! Depth looks good. I can't tell what your knees are doing, but I would point the feet out a bit more and shove the knees hard out at the bottom. Right now they look like they are pointing forward, which will allow them to cave in. Once you start focusing on shoving the knees out, you will be forced to use the hamstrings and adductors to come out of the hole, and that is the holy grail of the low bar squat. You can actually do this without TUBOW--just watch your knees out of the corner of your eye when you are at the bottom of the squat; try to almost get them to be slightly outside your toes. You won't manage to do it, but it will be a helpful cue to get the right anatomical focus.

Deads: I'll have to re-watch them a few more times. But I basically agree with Fittreelol's analysis here. Your butt shoots up to the position it should be in at the beginning. You are one long-legged mama! Your butt will be a lot higher in the starting position than that of someone with shorter legs and longer arms.

Here is a useful article about anthropometry and how to diagnose whether your proportions will allow you to use "standard setup". When you bend down to pick up the bar, you look a bit like the long-legged woman on p. 6 to me--it's not so much about the length of legs in this case as about the legs to arms to torso ratio.

http://lonkilgore.com/Measure_of_a_Man.pdf

But to be sure, I would like to see a different angle. Can you get a vid of your deadlift set-up from a side angle and a 45 front angle? I would like to see where your shins are with respect to the bar when you set up.

interesting. I don't think I've got such long legs as her! took a couple of pics (apologies in advance for lack of helpful lighting or clothing) that I think show I may have a longer -torso- (elbow is a good couple of inches above the navel). Not sure about the legs or how to go about measuring them in relation to my head lol..

Yeah, I didn't think so from watching your previous videos, either. I think I imagined this; could be because of the angle of the vid (makes your back look flatter when you grab the bar than it really is). The pic makes it clear that your arms are actually pretty long, based on where your hands are when you stand straight.

It's really more important to watch for the problem that Fittreelol pointed out--when your butt shoots up into the air ahead of the bar, it means that your torso angle is too vertical at the start, and that you are using energy inefficiently so the lift feels heavier than it should. The bar might be too far forward, too--put it closer to your shins at the beginning and try not to roll it when you pick it up.

re the OHPs, I've been trying the 'layback' as per SS (the whole book seems to have downloaded not just the squat chapter!) but not sure I'm succeeding.. the most helpful thing has been shoulders back/chest out to start with, which really helps the bar start in a better place. Lock-out at the top is something I don't think I was really doing before so consciously trying to get that, but that flipping bar path is the first challenge - maybe whip the hips forward would be a better cue for me..?

The press is a mechanical nightmare for tall people. There are two ways to go about fixing it: sweating the details and focusing on the big picture. The big picture is that you want your bar path to be vertical. Watch the vid again and look especially at your third rep--that's the one where the bar just gets away from you once you get under it. Actually, now that I'm rewatching the OHP vid, the first two reps look good to me, too.

I like the idea of trying to push the knees outside the feet at the bottom, that is something that I think my body would make sense of (like 'straight bar path') and make a few things come together. I've gone from a rather wide stance to a shoulder-width one, so will try slightly wider/slightly more turned out toes and see how that helps.

A shoulder-width stance with toes out works for most people, supposedly. Knees out helps with a lot of problems--including the knee slide and the lack of hip drive.

Re deads - I see what you mean! maybe I need to push my butt back up after setting position before the pull.. I'll get some more from different angles too, I was too irritated today to do any more!

Yeah--about those... since you are lifting in new shoes, you might have to re-tweak certain aspects of that lift. Like where the bar needs to be in order to be positioned over your mid-foot. And I struggle with a similar problem with back angle, too. Definitely get some different views--a side view will tell you (among other things) whether you are getting your scapulae over the bar at the beginning, and a front/angle view will answer the question of whether the bar is over your mid-foot.

I think you are pretty much flawless with your form, only thing I would suggest is to lower your head a little more, instead of looking up, from what I have read you want your neck in a more neutral position aligned with the angle of your back. I want to say you want to find a spot on the wall that is a little lower then eye level. If this is incorrect then I apologize, that is the only thing I can advise on.