Two weeks ago i strained my lower back a little bit between setting a pr in deadlift, and 3 weeks of hell in football. i haven’t been able to work my lower body for 2 weeks now due to it but am hoping to start again this weekend (starting the next cycle of 5/3/1). my coach told me not too, but i love deadlifting, what should i do? should i just do 5x10 each time? or should i replace it with something less stressful so when i return i don’t suck at it?
Why would you listen to random people on the internet instead of your coach?
I am not a doctor, but if you are not injured and you are feeling 100%, go back to deadlifting. Also, I wouldnt do higher reps, i would work with 65-85% of your max and pull singles and doubles for speed. With high reps, your form gets worse as the set progresses, i think you are more prone to back injuries doing high rep deadlifts than heavy singles, no science to it, just an opinion. Pulling for speed will also help your form alot which obviously will prevent injury.
+1 on high rep DL.
I’m a coach(football) and we have a “strength coordinator” that apparently was told by and “expert” not to pull anything from the ground up. This person stated that pulling from the ground up is asking for injury. I couldn’t disagree more. But since I am not the “strength coordinator” we no longer Deadlift, or power clean, or Power Pull. We do however do lots of light hang cleans and push presses.
Result = weak ass football players
Point of the story = Deadlift if you are feeling 100%. Like Sully said. Decrease weight and pull for low reps. Increase weight slowly each week and pay attention to your body telling you to slow down.
Do deadlift, zircher squats/squats and leg press will be just fine. If your focused on football in the middle of the season how much stronger do you think your really going to get by the end of the season?.
[quote]jjackkrash wrote:
Why would you listen to random people on the internet instead of your coach? [/quote]
Good logical answer
This is a powerlifting forum, so of course we are going to suggest getting back to deadlifting because to us it’s a necessity. You are a football player, so your goal is to perform well on the field. If I were you I would listen to my coach who has your performance on the field in mind. If you powerlift as well as play football, then I would suggest coming back to deadlifting slowly. Start with some back extensions. Address any muscle tightness, or weakness with stretching, assistance exercises, and foam rolling. The most important thing is to take it slow.
Just because someone is a football coach doesn’t mean they know anything about strength training.
[quote]amayakyrol wrote:
Just because someone is a football coach doesn’t mean they know anything about strength training.[/quote]
I agree 100% with that. My freshmen year my football coach preached squats squats squats. Not like that it is a bad thing but he would say if you deadlift correctly you shouldn’t feel it in your back at all. Well that isn’t right. He ended up retiring and we got a new coach. He used to be a bodybuilder and was a defensive coach at WV previously. He preached squat, deadlift, kettlebell and powerclean. My next three seasons we had much bigger, faster, and stronger players. If you can do it and it isn’t painful then go for it. You don’t see too many people deadlifting over 500 pounds with a bad back.
[quote]Brett295 wrote:
[quote]jjackkrash wrote:
Why would you listen to random people on the internet instead of your coach? [/quote]
Good logical answer
This is a powerlifting forum, so of course we are going to suggest getting back to deadlifting because to us it’s a necessity. You are a football player, so your goal is to perform well on the field. If I were you I would listen to my coach who has your performance on the field in mind. If you powerlift as well as play football, then I would suggest coming back to deadlifting slowly. Start with some back extensions. Address any muscle tightness, or weakness with stretching, assistance exercises, and foam rolling. The most important thing is to take it slow.
[/quote]
I agree with this. If you’re goal is to be good at football, you don’t need to deadlift. There are plenty of other ways to maintain strength through the season. IMO, it just isn’t worth the injury risk in the OP’s particular case. Will the very, very, very slight improvment in performance you gain by choosing deadlifts over some other exercise worth risking several weeks of injury (where you aren’t performing at all)?
I’d recommend avoiding any heavy deadlifts until the season is over. What happens if you try them and it turns out you aren’t better afterall? That is a risk better taken during the offseason IMO.
Of course, if you don’t care about your football season, and just want to get big and strong, then have at it.
[quote]jjackkrash wrote:
Why would you listen to random people on the internet instead of your coach? [/quote]
I was looking for a response from someone who has maybe had the same issue, or a coach like caleb. And while my coach is a good football coach, isn’t the best strength coach. His idea of lifting weights is a set or two of squats and belly bumpers for the remainder of the hour.
Thanks for the advice on the lift, though the strain didn’t necessarily happen from lifting. It was moreover from ball breaking practices the next 3 days and me deciding not to tell my coach that i could barely get down in my stance, let alone block due to the pain in my back.
[quote]T11 wrote:
[quote]amayakyrol wrote:
Just because someone is a football coach doesn’t mean they know anything about strength training.[/quote]
I agree 100% with that. My freshmen year my football coach preached squats squats squats. Not like that it is a bad thing but he would say if you deadlift correctly you shouldn’t feel it in your back at all. Well that isn’t right. He ended up retiring and we got a new coach. He used to be a bodybuilder and was a defensive coach at WV previously. He preached squat, deadlift, kettlebell and powerclean. My next three seasons we had much bigger, faster, and stronger players. If you can do it and it isn’t painful then go for it. You don’t see too many people deadlifting over 500 pounds with a bad back. [/quote]
This is just wrong. You see plenty of people deadlifting huge weight who have fucked up backs of all kinds, discs, compression fractures you name it. Deadlifting with a neutral spine, which all non powerlifting athletes SHOULD be doing, should not make your lower back sore. If you cant get in a good position to pull with a neutral back, elevate the bar, or better yet use a trap bar. it’s about using the lift to make you better on the field, pulling max reps with form breaking down does not fit that bill
[quote]SILVERDAN7 wrote:
[quote]T11 wrote:
[quote]amayakyrol wrote:
Just because someone is a football coach doesn’t mean they know anything about strength training.[/quote]
I agree 100% with that. My freshmen year my football coach preached squats squats squats. Not like that it is a bad thing but he would say if you deadlift correctly you shouldn’t feel it in your back at all. Well that isn’t right. He ended up retiring and we got a new coach. He used to be a bodybuilder and was a defensive coach at WV previously. He preached squat, deadlift, kettlebell and powerclean. My next three seasons we had much bigger, faster, and stronger players. If you can do it and it isn’t painful then go for it. You don’t see too many people deadlifting over 500 pounds with a bad back. [/quote]
This is just wrong. You see plenty of people deadlifting huge weight who have fucked up backs of all kinds, discs, compression fractures you name it. Deadlifting with a neutral spine, which all non powerlifting athletes SHOULD be doing, should not make your lower back sore. If you cant get in a good position to pull with a neutral back, elevate the bar, or better yet use a trap bar. it’s about using the lift to make you better on the field, pulling max reps with form breaking down does not fit that bill[/quote]
…I’m not going to even get into this, not worth it. Let’s agree to disagree so when in ROME!