I think that the high pull isn’t going to help you right now. The main issue stem from the catch.
If you can’t properly front rack the bar with elbows high, you cannot catch the bar with the proper athletic position (chest high, hips BACK, knees bend without shooting forward much).
At your level and experience level with olympic-like movements the high pull is likely going to lead you to pull with your arm and lower back rather than explode with your legs.
A better exercise FOR YOU (which I would not recommend to an olympic lifter) are barbell jumps.
Lower the bar down to the knees as if you were going to do a power clean from the hang (or RDL) then from the bar-at-knees position you jump up vertically as powerfully as possible.
Some keys:
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Don’t arm pull at all, your arms should stay straight, not bent (on this exercise) to program not using your arms and relying on the powerful leg drive only.
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Keep the bar close (even touching the body) at all times ( to proper proper bar path)
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Jump vertically, do not whip you torso backward
Start with light weights and as you become better at displaying explosiveness while stating in balance, you can start to add weight.
A. FOR NOW, I would recommend not doing power cleans, not until you are good at the barbell jump drill (I’d do the barbell jump drills at every workout as part of your warm-up/activation). If you do that 4-5 times a week, it should probably take you 2 weeks.
B. During those two weeks, you should aggressively work on improving your front rack. I’d also doing some mobility work for it daily, either at the beginning or end of your workout. Here are some good drills for the front rack:
C. After those 2 weeks (or when both your barbell jumps and front rack) are good. You switch to power clean from the hang (not from the floor yet. Going from below the knees to above the knees is where the shit hits the fan, most of the time. So we, at least, want to work on the proper explosion and catch before learning the whole movement). Here’s how you do it:
- Do sets of 5 reps
- Reps 1, 2 and 3 are barbell jumps (like you did for 2 weeks)
- Then on reps 4 and 5 you do a power clean from the hang. This is done by doing the same movement as the barbell jump (which will happen naturally) but finish by bringing the bar to a proper front rack. At the same time as you catch it you should be in a quarter squat and punch the hips back (think linebacker position).
*It sounds complicated, but really, the complex format (jumps to hang clean) makes this very easy
D. I recommend doing this for 1 week, daily if you can handle it. Get at least 4 workouts from the hang before moving on to the next step.
E. Then you switch to learning the lift from the floor. It is done this way:
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Start from the floor. The positon is a bit different than in a deadlift; your hips should be as low as possible while still having the shoulders slightly in front of the bar.To be fair, your starting position looks fine to me.
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Lift from the floor to just above the knees (the same position as in your hang cleans). This has to be done is a specific way: the knees should travel backwards so when the bar has to pass the knees, the tibias are pendicular to the floor. That way the knees are not in the way. A lot of technical issues on the power clean, that show up later in the movement, originate from the knees being in the way. This forces you to let the bar move away from your body’s center of mass, making it impossible explode vertically; you have to whip the torso backwards to bring the bar back toward the body’s midline.
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When the bar reaches the “just above the knees” position, hold for 1-2 seconds then explode and clean the bar (it essentially becomes a hang power clean). Make sure that you explode directly from that postion, do not rebend or lower the bar then explode.
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When you are comfortable doing this, you can remove the pause. Start slowly from the floor the above the knees, then explode as you pass the knees.