Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 00:50:08 EST From: RacerX 012 Subject: football coaches and deadlifts <<< i am training a 6'5" 290 lb. 16 year old who wants to play football in college. so i put together a program centered around benching, 20 rep squats and partial deadlifts followed by hang cleans. i divide them into a push, pull and leg workout. the kid is doing great. he has added 40 lbs on his bench, did 20 legal depth reps with 240 and is hang cleaning 235x5. his football coach of course is thrilled that he has a kid that is motivated and making great progress- right. wrong. he want him to stop deadlifting right away. now i want the kid to stay on this program because he is making progress but i dont want to piss off his coach so the kid never gets a chance to play. the coach is a bigger, faster ,stronger proponent. all you football people out there help me convince this coach that deadlifts are great for power. if you can give your credentials so that i can use them as reference i would appreciate it. tim >>>>> hmmmm, i read the BFS book in high school and they encourage deadlifting as well as squatting and cleans. it would probably help if he incorporated power cleans as well, since that is what he will be tested in when he shows up for camp. if the the coach is truly a BFS proponent i dont see the problem. after awhile the kid will have to start cutting back on the frequency he does all these big exercises after his weights start to get up there and his workout intensity increases, i personally cant even recover when squatting and deadlifting the same week with all out intensity. is there any reason why the coach is anti deadlift??? BTW tell this kid to make sure he goes to school for an education, and pick the school which suits his specific interests, and not the school with the best football team. i did , and although i dont play football anymore due to the fact that the program sux and the coaches are idiots, at least ill have a degree in an area that i enjoy and wont hate my job. Also, most HS football coaches know shit about proper training. i wish i had such guidance when i was playing, as i basically taught myself, and probably knew more about training as a junior than any of my coaches. i also probably wouldnt have done as many unsafe and stupid things either. Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 09:50:42 -0500 From: Lorne Goldenberg First of all Tim, I do not think any coach in his right mind will not play a 16 year old who is 6'5" and is 290 pounds. These kids do not come around every day. So I would not worry about him not being played. You seem to have a good general program for this kid. My only recommendation would be to do the explosive lifting first. If you have him do his squats and deadlifts first followed by cleans, he will be trying to do an explosive exercise in a fatigued state. If he is fresh for the cleans he will have greater opportunity for developing power, without any elements of fatigue that may cause and contribute to technique breakdown. As far as bigger, faster, stronger goes, there are parts of it that could be benefit to the kid. i.e. plyometric and agility work. If the coach thinks that the lifting is going to hinder the kids progress he is mistaken. This kid is at a great age to be lifting, and it will only help his future development to a college scholarship. In college he will have to do all these lifts. I have been coaching professional athletes for over 10 years, as well as kids as young as 12. Strength now equals success later. Lorne Goldenberg BPE, CSCS, CFA, ART, CHEK-2 http://www.strengthtek.com Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 09:09:41 -0600 From: "Jeffrey A. Schiffel" Subject: Re: football coaches and deadlifts The only thing I'm not sure about is _partial_ deadlifts. What's wrong with full deadlifts, and for that matter, SLDL? I'm guessing that you are training a young lineman. With all the pushing they do on the line, and from the twisting, the initial charge, and so on, the mid and low back is extremely stressed. If he develops everywhere but there he'll have a weak link in his back. This is the off season, so I assume you are concentrating on mass but will add things like pause squats and similar weighted or not weighted plyometrics later. --Jeff Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 15:01:51 EST From: Swalth 1845 Subject: Football Coaches and Deadlifts Let me just say as a high school and a former college football player, that while I do not agree that deadlifts should be a primary exercise in high school football weight training, they should be in no way taken totally out of the program. I think that if they are done every other week that they can still be effective and the coach may be tolerable to this. My high school coach was also of the bigger faster stronger concept, and the reasoning that I used for him to allow me to deadlift was that not only would it strengthen my torso but that it was also helping my powercleans by my having to explode the weight off of the floor which is a big problem for high school athletes in cleans. At first my coach was skeptical but willing to let me try my idea, and he soon began putting it into practice once I broke my high school power clean record as a senior. Our trainers also noticed that fewer of the players had back strain and the play of us linemen was markably better. Just my thoughts. Good luck! Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 14:29:15 -0600 From: wade baskin Subject: Re: STRENGTH Digest - 3 Feb 1998 to 4 Feb 1998 (#1998-36) Tim, Bill Starr, in his book "The Strongest Shall Survive-Strength Training for Football", said of the deadlift "it has a high casualty rate, especially in trainees who are not adequately prepared for the great stress placed on the lower back. Very Few people, and this includes the top competitive weightlifters, keep a good back position on a heavy deadlift. The football player can build the same power in the lower back through the other suggested exercises without the risk of injury. It's not worth the risk because the trainee can accomplish the same goal by other means." " The author knows of several instances where Olympic weightlifters did powercleans, power pulls, shrugs along with their cleans and snatches. These quicker movements made many of them stronger in the deadlift than their fellow powerlifters who practiced the deadlift 2-3 times a week" The reason for bill dissagreeing with deadlifts is mainly because of the chance of injury. My exfootball coach, and every other coach I've ever met, knew crap about weightlifting, so if your doing your deadlifts right, I personnaly would say go for it, although cleans are certainly a great substitiute,. Besides, cleans will interfere less with your squatting and recovery than heavy partial deadlifts "Drinking and driving don't mix,.......Thats why I ride a bike" Brady Baskin IIII--------IIII Oklahoma Power Date: Thu, 5 Feb 1998 14:09:48 -0500 From: Wade Hanna Subject: Football and DL Tim, if this coach is a proponent of BFS then he should know Deadlifts are an integral part of the program! It is a core exercise. Depending on a three day a week routine or four it is still a core exercise (the floating core motion is Power Cleans added if four days are used). I used this system for three of my four years in High-School. I don't have great credentials but, I have played college football and Deadlifted since day one of my lifting career (13 years worth). Deadlifts will strengthen the hip gridle and erectors like no other exercise. Squats are close but, they hit a little different area. If your guy is a lineman (I am assuming-god save us if he is a tailback ;-)) then he is going to need lower body strength first and foremost. Low man wins and if you cant' function low you WON'T win the battle. I wholeheartedly endorse DL's from a perspective of someone who has utilized them through a football career. I can't give you credentials to throw at him but, if nothing else ask him why he wants to alter a core motion from the program he endorses? Date: Sun, 8 Feb 1998 11:32:40 -0800 From: Matthew Bianchi Subject: deadlifts & football ------------------------------------------- From my point of view deadlifting is a great erxercise for everyone to powerlifters to the average get in shaper. Allthough for football bench presses, squats, and power cleans are probally more specific to fottball. The overall stength that can be obtained from doing deadlifts should not be ignored. Our players perform deadlifts once every other week. They do squats and cleans on Monday. Back and light legs on Thursday. Chest Shoulders and Tri's every tues, and thurs. Without going into much detail They deadlift every other thursday. It is not a tested lift for non-powerlifting athletes; however we realize it's importance and stress it in our program. Matthew Bianchi MS Date: Fri, 6 Feb 1998 18:02:30 -0600 From: tim eichinger Subject: more football and deadlifts first of all thanks for all your help and suggestions. for clarification the partial deadlifts are done from just below the knee, the area where a hang clean begins, they are done with straps, knuckles forward with a clean grip. using a louie simmons philosophy of strength first, explosive movements second and endurance last[in a workout that is]. this mimmicks the hang clean but the weight that is used is much greater. then when you go to the hang cleans 235 feels light and he is more or at least thinks he is more explosive. as far as the fatigue factor, the deadlifts are done with moderate to high intensity with just that thought in mind.not to fatigue and cause injury. i agree that many football coaches are woefully ignorant in strength training areas. it wasnt that many years ago that we were hearing about being muscle bound from being too big. i have broken down his workouts in phases. in the first phase it is a mass cycle basically building foundation and core strength.we grow our boys big in wisconsin [girls too] second phase we will cut back on weightlifting frequency and begin agility drills and some plyometrics.[i am looking for some suggestions here]. for kicks i may even have him do some farmer walk type exercises. kids love that. finally in the preseason we will get more sport specific and try to look at the weight room as a maintenance tool. i may be a powerlifter but this kid is not. so i dont want to turn him into one. i want to give him a program that will help him reach his potential and keep him interested too. thanks for all your help. tim eichinger