after 2 years of powerlifting, i’ve decided to jump ship. I have my first oly training session on wednesday, and am really looking forward to it. should be working out a program with my instructor over the next few weeks (feel free to suggest stuff, or to insult me and then explain how the search feature works).
anyway just wanted to say hi to everyone on this part of the site, and say how enthusiastic i am about getting some serious iron overhead!
Inname, I’m going to piggyback on your thread. I also am making a transition from Pl to Oly lifting. I’ll be interested to see what comes of this thread and what advice comes up.
[quote]TheJonty wrote:
Have fun with one of the most frustrating to learn, yet most rewarding sports I know of.[/quote]
I think weightlifting is easy. Even running properly is harder in my opinion.[/quote]
now we find out that his first 181 posts were just cover; all the time he’s spent on this site has been a ruse, an elaborate cover for a troll who hates weightlifting.
First few weeks were somewhat frustrating to say the least. Get ready for a lot of work with a stick and just the bar. I haven’t taught any converted powerlifters, but I think the squat would be the most different feature and re-learning the squat would be the strangest of the transition. You should dig for forum posts and what not from glenn pendlay, since he did the same. Otherwise, just concentrate on the long term and keep in mind you’re not gonna learn the lifts in a day.
[quote]TheJonty wrote:
Have fun with one of the most frustrating to learn, yet most rewarding sports I know of.[/quote]
I think weightlifting is easy. Even running properly is harder in my opinion.[/quote]
now we find out that his first 181 posts were just cover; all the time he’s spent on this site has been a ruse, an elaborate cover for a troll who hates weightlifting.[/quote]
But seriously. How many major components are there in a weightlifting technique? Split jerk can be a technical movement and even that you can skipity skip by squat jerking. Snatch is about bar path and extension of the torso basically, clean is even easier. I wouldn’t even dare to ask someone to list the important aspects of running, which is the most basic way of moving in sports. Lets admit it, weightlifting is alot easier than some people make it out to be.
[quote]TheJonty wrote:
Have fun with one of the most frustrating to learn, yet most rewarding sports I know of.[/quote]
I think weightlifting is easy. Even running properly is harder in my opinion.[/quote]
now we find out that his first 181 posts were just cover; all the time he’s spent on this site has been a ruse, an elaborate cover for a troll who hates weightlifting.[/quote]
But seriously. How many major components are there in a weightlifting technique? Split jerk can be a technical movement and even that you can skipity skip by squat jerking. Snatch is about bar path and extension of the torso basically, clean is even easier. I wouldn’t even dare to ask someone to list the important aspects of running, which is the most basic way of moving in sports. Lets admit it, weightlifting is alot easier than some people make it out to be.[/quote]
[quote]TheJonty wrote:
Have fun with one of the most frustrating to learn, yet most rewarding sports I know of.[/quote]
I think weightlifting is easy. Even running properly is harder in my opinion.[/quote]
now we find out that his first 181 posts were just cover; all the time he’s spent on this site has been a ruse, an elaborate cover for a troll who hates weightlifting.[/quote]
But seriously. How many major components are there in a weightlifting technique? Split jerk can be a technical movement and even that you can skipity skip by squat jerking. Snatch is about bar path and extension of the torso basically, clean is even easier. I wouldn’t even dare to ask someone to list the important aspects of running, which is the most basic way of moving in sports. Lets admit it, weightlifting is alot easier than some people make it out to be.[/quote]
I had a nice long response to this typed out but I don’t think I’m going to post it. This is a troll post, it has to be. It’s ludicrous and makes you sound like someone who either doesn’t do the lifts at all or is terrible at them, seeing as how anyone who’s spent an appreciable amount of time o-lifting will know that there’s a helluva lot more to the lifts than “bar path and extension of the torso.”
be prepared to get your ‘enthusiasm to throw some serious iron overhead’ frustrated. if you want to learn proper technique, that is. you are probably strong enough to toss some iron up there okay, but it will take a while of humility to develop the technique that will enable you to throw some serious iron up there. if you decide to stick with it.
with powerlifting you get strength gains… beginners gains… linear progress initially.
with technique work you get more one step forward, two steps back, two steps forwards, half a step back, two steps forwards kinda progress. for a long time. perhaps forever lol.
really do hope that you enjoy it, though, and stick with it. welcome
Hey Alexus I know what you mean. I just started Oly lifting about 1 month ago, after years of strength training. I think there are 16 year old girls that can snatch more than me! Also the the more I learn about what I’m supposed to do as far as technique, the worse my technique gets. Sort of like golfing…thinking too much and then slicing the ball into the woods. Anyway I finally hooked up with a coach, so I’m hoping for some improvements.
I’m about 6 months into my transition from PL to WL. Came to it with a 600kg raw total which I rapidly discovered meant…fuck all. You HAVE to leave your ego at the door. I had to re-learn how to squat and I still spend hours stretching to improve positions. Coaching is hugely important but SO IS PRACTICING ENOUGH TO MAKE THE COACHING WORTHWHILE.
You have to do 100’s of reps with the bar before you ll moderately ‘get it’ (not claiming that I do, yet). Don’t expect much from the first few weeks…you have to think more in terms of months. It took me 5/6 months to get my full lifts better than my powers, this can be a hugely frustrating process. You’ll get a lot of good advice from people on this board, things said on here continue to help me a lot. My advice would be:
1). Learn with a stick, then a bar.
2). Learn to squat like a weightlifter.
3). Don’t be in a hurry to smash weight on the bar and to lift it badly. It’s all too easy to get into WL, read some John Broz/Bulgarian stuff and go mental thinking that you need to lift max weight willy nilly. You need to lift the heaviest weight that you can lift CORRECTLY.
4). Stick with it. 6 months of WL has been far more rewarding to me than anything I ever did in PL.
for a powerlifter 1st is stretch. I see a lot of them have trouble because of the bench press.
learn to squat and always squat as low as possible. Parallel squats mean nothing in olympic lifting.
don’t do the power variations
Keep arms relaxed.
I wouldn’t say a stick as its too light but keep to just the bar or 40kgs for a while.
train as often as possible. You’ll see a lot faster progress if you do 30-50 sets of technique with 40 kgs every day than every other day.
take videos, analyze your technique, keep reading. You will hear some varying opinions on what is good technique on certain aspects of the lifts. In most of those cases I think its just different for every weightlifter. Try them all out and see what works for you. Keep thinnking too. At my club I sometimes feel like i’m the only person who tries to THINK about my technique and what I’m doing right or wrong. The rest just seem to wait for the coach to tell them what’s wrong. That might work with a coach who pays a lot of attention to you and is really good, but most people don’t have that. Guess who’s lifting more at the club I go.
Once you feel CONFIDENT in your TECHNIQUE(not with how light they feel) with 40 kgs(you’ll know when that is) you can start adding weight and in a couple months you’ll probably be doing more than twice that much.