Latest Articles, How-to’s, and Guides on Weightlifting

Most women lifters I know wear a sport bra during training. While not absolutely essential, such a bra offers support and tends to flatten the breast tissue somewhat, which most women find comfortable and which can make it easier to keep the bar close to the body during the pull.

Athletic SupportersAlthough there is no evidence that athletic supporters prevent hernia (which, contrary to popular belief, are rare among lifters) or any other injury, many male weightlifters feel more comfortable wearing them or some kind of brief that offers support. Briefs Under Lifting SuitsMost men and women wear some kind of brief under their lifting…

Socks should be worn in training and competition.Instead of a paragraph, you can break the information into three sections to make it easier to read. Comfort & ProtectionLifting shoes are too expensive to be destroyed by sweat, and the lifter will generally be more comfortable with good athletic socks. Training SocksThe socks used in training…

All lifters are required to wear a weightlifting suit (also known as a “singlet”) in competition, The suit looks very much like the one that is used in wrestling competition (see the sequence photos in Chapter 1 for examples of lifting suits). It covers at least a portion of the lifter’s hips and all of…

Weightlifting is not an expensive sport to get started in. You need some basic personal equipment and a gym in which to train. Most people already own, or can very inexpensively obtain, much of the personal equipment they require. When it comes to a training facility, you can either join an appropriately equipped gym or…

From the 1960’s through the mid 1970’s seven Japanese lifters set a total of 30 world snatch records. Two of those lifters, Yoshinobu Miyake and Masashi Ohuchi, astounded the weightlifting world with their prowess in the snatch: Miyake with eleven world records and Ohuchi by snatching a world record in the 82.5 kg. class weighing…

Athletes will often ask about the correct foot stance for the pull. The answer given by most coaches is that the best stance is the one from which the athlete can jump the highest since, they argue, the final explosion in the pull is like a jump. There is a lot to be said for…

Most lifters assume a foot position in the jerk that is similar to the one they use in the pull. The most common position is the so called “jumping” position, the same position that the lifter would assume in order to achieve a maximum standing-jump height (usually about the width of the hips with a…

While not technically part of the subject of weightlifting technique, proper breathing is an important part of weightlifting. Although weightlifting is considered to be an anaerobic activity, it does increase the body’s need for oxygen far more than most activities that are considered to be aerobic. What makes it anaerobic is that the activity of…

The common advice given to the beginning lifter with respect to grip width in the clean is that the grip should be “shoulder width.” This generally means a grip that is wide enough to position the inside of the hand just outside the shoulders when the bar is resting on the lifter’s shoulders. Individual grip…