What's Better? Olympic Lifts or Strongman?
Published: Thu, 12/06/12
What's Up Diesels?
As you may know from reading my bio on
the site, my initial foray into strength training
was the Olympic Lifts.
I had seen a picture of Vasily Alexeev performing
his training against the rushing water of a stream
and I thought it was so amazing that I wanted to
train the Olympic Lifts too.
The exact image I am referring to is below. If
by chance it is not showing, you may have to change
your image settings...
While I loved this type of training, and still love
portions of it today, I soon transitioned away from
it because the requirement for technical perfection
was just too much for me to continue many of
the more complex lifts, such as the full Squat Clean
and the Snatch.
My flexibility and mobility was not where it needed
to be in order to perform the lifts safely, and I was
not interested in an injury, so I dropped the full
lifts that are contested in Oly competitions.
This is also when I began transitioning into Strongman
Training. You see, I was every bit as interested in
training for a challenge as I was for the sheer strength
numbers.
In a way, the fact that Alexeev was challenging
himself by training in cold, rushing water was
even more alluring to me than the style of lifts
he was doing.
As it turns out, another great strength coach,
Elliott Hulse, feels quite similar to me about
the immense technical requirements of Olympic
Lifts, and leans more toward Strongman style
of training.
I have a guest article from him along these lines,
posted below:
Olympic Lifts or Strongman for Athletes?
by Elliott Hulse, creator of Gridiron Domination
You might disagree, but hear me out on this...
as an ex-college
football player and currently
as a strength coach, I have found the
utilization
and teaching of Olympic lifts to be tedious,
inefficient and
down-right boring.
As a college athlete I hardly found the patience
to learn the correct
lifting technique for the
power clean. Although I held the St. John's
University power clean record my freshman
season, muscling 335 lbs. (152
kg) off the
platform - my technique was completely
flawed and the
attempt looked more like an
Axle C&P in Strongman than the smooth
pull of an Olympic Weightlifter...
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It is always interesting to get another coaches
opinion on things, and this week I was able
to gain a great deal of insight into how
Elliott approaches this issue.
This week I have been reviewing Gridiron Domination.
I have reviewed several of Elliott's programs,
but this was the first one that I remember tailored
completely towards Athletic Training, specifically
football.
There are many programs out there that teach
football specific training, but for me, this is
one of the best that is out there, because in my
opinion, Strongman is the perfect type of
special strength training for Football.
When you consider that Football is all about
creating as much brute force as possible,
Strongman training comes in perfectly.
Think about some of the events in Strongman
for a second, and you can see right away that
it compliments the sport of Football well.
Tire Flip: Mimics the low position and driving
force that Linemen and Running Backs must
take on the field.
Stone Lifting: Trains the posterior chain extremely
well. The glutes, hamstrings, and lower back
must be strong on a football player if he is to
be successful.
Odd Object Lifting: Teaches an athlete not only
to produce forcee, but also to absorb it and
redirect it. Kegs and Sandbags are perfect examples.
I could go on and on about the value of including
Strongman Training in any athlete's program,
but I will stop there.
After all, I don't want to make it sound like
Strongman Training is the only thing that Elliott
covers in Gridiron Domination.
In fact, Gridiron Domination includes 4 separate
full-length modules covering all the aspects
of producing a strong, powerful, and fast
football player.
Module 1: Powerlifting & Strongman
Powerlifting movements serve as the perfect
foundation of strength for any athlete. Strongman
serves as a way to take that strength move
more toward the physical requirements of the
sport of Football.
Module 2: Auxiliary Muscle Building
A necessary part of any complete program
is making the athlete resistant against injury.
This section does just that, providing
training methods for preventing neck injuries,
biceps tears, and other ways to keep the
athlete on the field, producing big numbers.
Module 3: Flexibility and Speed
Naturally, all the strength and power in the
world will be useless if the athlete can move.
This section shows how to keep the athlete
moving with grace and agility while also being
a vicious weapon on the field.
Module 4: The Program
No, not a pirated copy of the awesome early
1990's movie about the ESU Timberwolves.
This is a 72-page PDF Manual that walks
you through the entire process of effectively
training Football Players. This manual ties
everything together for you.
To close, Gridiron Domination is a great
product for you. It is a great combination of
three of Elliott's many strengths.
He is a former college football player, so you
can rest assured he understands what a great
football player needs to do in order to be great.
He was at one time a Professional Strongman
Competitor, so you know his understanding of
the sport is sound, and he is now a professional
Strength Coach, working everyday with
athletes he is taking to the next level.
All the best in your training,
Jedd
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