Everyone laughed at Louie Simmons when he suggested weightlifters make use of bands in their training, but while digging through ATG today I stumbled upon this little gem.
Fernando Reis totaled 400 (180/220) at the 2012 Olympics coming in 12th, 55kg below Salimi. He won the 2011 Pan Am games with a total of 410 (185/225). Obviously he is not an A-Class lifter, but I still found it very interesting that anyone competing on an international level is making use of bands.
Could bands actually be useful for training high pulls?
Everyone laughed at Louie Simmons when he said lifters should use bands and chains on the full lifts. Bands obviously work for pulls considering he has people use them for deadlifts.
[quote]nkklllll wrote:
Everyone laughed at Louie Simmons when he said lifters should use bands and chains on the full lifts. Bands obviously work for pulls considering he has people use them for deadlifts.[/quote]
I would never use bands or chains on the full lifts, having that accommodating resistance at its maximum while you’re trying to catch the bar at the peak of its motion while it has zero velocity doesn’t make sense to me, and if you’re not catching it at that point the bands are just going to make the weight crash on you much harder.
I could see limited utility for bands/chains in high pulls and deadlifts, maybe to attack a specific weakness for a specific athlete with those movements, but generally speaking I can’t get behind adding an external force to the lifter-barbell system during a ballistic movement. It can also be a giant pain in the ass to set up unless you have hooks for the bands built into your platform or something, I know a guy who’s done snatch grip deadlifts with bands and he had to get pretty creative to make it work. He wasn’t an o-lifter though.
A master’s lifter I coach uses bands occasionally on rack jerks and snatch balance exercises. He’s a three time World champion, three time Pan American champ and 5 or 6 time–I forget right now as I type this–National champion. Band usage, obviously, hasn’t hurt him.
Referring to the video: another way is to use those shorter–half-size mini’s I call them–that Elite Fitness sells. Loop one end of a pair of these over the bar; position the two bnads hanging down from the bar inside both legs; step on the ends hanging down like you step into a stirrup which allows you to stand on the bands; grab the bar and pull away.
[quote]nkklllll wrote:
Everyone laughed at Louie Simmons when he said lifters should use bands and chains on the full lifts. Bands obviously work for pulls considering he has people use them for deadlifts.[/quote]
I would never use bands or chains on the full lifts, having that accommodating resistance at its maximum while you’re trying to catch the bar at the peak of its motion while it has zero velocity doesn’t make sense to me, and if you’re not catching it at that point the bands are just going to make the weight crash on you much harder.
I could see limited utility for bands/chains in high pulls and deadlifts, maybe to attack a specific weakness for a specific athlete with those movements, but generally speaking I can’t get behind adding an external force to the lifter-barbell system during a ballistic movement. It can also be a giant pain in the ass to set up unless you have hooks for the bands built into your platform or something, I know a guy who’s done snatch grip deadlifts with bands and he had to get pretty creative to make it work. He wasn’t an o-lifter though.[/quote]
[quote]nkklllll wrote:
Everyone laughed at Louie Simmons when he said lifters should use bands and chains on the full lifts. Bands obviously work for pulls considering he has people use them for deadlifts.[/quote]
I would never use bands or chains on the full lifts, having that accommodating resistance at its maximum while you’re trying to catch the bar at the peak of its motion while it has zero velocity doesn’t make sense to me, and if you’re not catching it at that point the bands are just going to make the weight crash on you much harder.
I could see limited utility for bands/chains in high pulls and deadlifts, maybe to attack a specific weakness for a specific athlete with those movements, but generally speaking I can’t get behind adding an external force to the lifter-barbell system during a ballistic movement. It can also be a giant pain in the ass to set up unless you have hooks for the bands built into your platform or something, I know a guy who’s done snatch grip deadlifts with bands and he had to get pretty creative to make it work. He wasn’t an o-lifter though.[/quote]
Good post.
Our gym installed hook onto two platforms a few weeks ago. My boss kinda dared me to try some 60kg power cleans with the bands. I missed it on the missed try, but got it the second. Its tough, sure. But it completely changes the movement, it didnt feel like a clean at all anymore and I wouldnt use it in regular training.
