Thruster exercise opinion

Bigger Stronger Leaner Christian Thibaudeau Coaching
1

@CT I was curious what your though of this exercise is as I know you are a fan of the clean and press.

Cheers :slight_smile:

2

[quote]nickj_777 wrote:
@CT I was curious what your though of this exercise is as I know you are a fan of the clean and press.

Cheers :)[/quote]

I use the thruster extensively for conditioning purposes. It could be an ok exercise to use for strength and power but:

  1. Few have the mobility to do it with perfect form with heavy weights (mobility to keep a perfect, upright, front squat position with a full grip and shoulder mobility to bring the barbell behind the ears line)

  2. For most the “front squat” portion will be significantly under loaded compared to the “overhead” portion

3

I guess 2. can be mitigated a bit by doing a mini-complex of front squat + thruster as a single rep, no?
However, is there a point to doing thrusters as a strength exercise if one is already doing squats and push-presses? Maybe for variety reasons?

4

[quote]SirValeq wrote:
I guess 2. can be mitigated a bit by doing a mini-complex of front squat + thruster as a single rep, no?
However, is there a point to doing thrusters as a strength exercise if one is already doing squats and push-presses? Maybe for variety reasons?[/quote]

That is a good point and is one of the reasons why I do not use thrusters for strength.

Some people will argue that it is sport specific because of the leg drive and arm pushing combination, but I’m of the opinion that you shouldn’t try to be TOO specific with strength exercises.

Furthermore, the fact that no high level strength coach or elite athlete has used heavy thrusters at any point in time is a clue that it isn’t a great solution. If it were that effective, you’d have hundreds of strength coaches using them and they would have been around for decades… when you think of it, until Crossfit began to use them as one of their main movement you rarely heard about thrusters.

BTW I’m sure that some elite athlete use them, but I’m talking about it being a common movement in the arsenal of athlete everywhere.

5

Thanks for the reply. How would use the thruster for conditioning as it seems to be a great form?