CT as someone who has probably tried everything under the sun do you agree with Pat Mendes’ sentiments here?
"7. What is a myth of Olympic lifting that you would like to dispel or clear up?
That’s easy! Assistance exercises such as hang, pause, no feet, no hands, chair, banded, chained lifts, drops, etc will NOT make you better at snatching and cleaning.
The most common question I get asked: What exercise do you do to get better at snatching, cleans or squats? My answer is snatch (or clean or squat) as much as you can and for years, you will improve. I understand that novice lifters look up to competitive weightlifters for tips and advice but they forget these guys started lifting when they were 8 and now they can do whatever they want because the technique to them is like breathing. The real problem is monotony and boredom. Itâ??s hard for people to do the same thing, day in and day out without change, so they come up with goofy exercise and complexes to make it interesting. My belief is until you lifted your lifetime goals; stick with the classic lifts from the floor. Take it from the only American to snatch 200kg/440 lbs in training ever, the only way to snatch 200kg (440lbs) is to snatch 200kg."
The guy has snatched over 200kg so it’s hard to argue with him. However a lot of lifters also have used plenty of lifts from blocks and hang to reach world class level. Ilya Illin do a lot of snatches from blocks, chinese lifters do a lot of work from the hang and blocks as well as pulls and partial lifts. Russians also use a lot of variants of the classic lifts. Salymi just snatched 210 from blocks, so the Iranians must use blocks in their program too. Polish lifters often do pulls… so really while Mendes/the Bulgarian school of thought get great results doing only the competition lifts and squats, it is incorrect of him to say that you can’t get great at snatching by doing variants of the lifts since plenty of lifters around the world are doing it.
Arguably the top olympic lifting countries in the world right now (for the men) are Russia, China, Poland and Korea (with the supers being owned by the Iranians)… all of these countries use plenty of lifts from the hang/blocks and strength movements like pulls.
I think Klokov said it best when he said that as long as something can increase your compettion lifts, it’s fair game. Some people will improve more by focusing most of their energy on training the actual lifts, some will need more assistance work either to strengthen weak links or to solve technique issues.