Topic: Help me improve technique

[Alex Carter]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EERDgNlPTKU

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

Alex,

You are often swinging the bar away and back. Keep it close to the body throughout the entire pull. Also, on your squats you need to consistently squat as low as you can go.

[Alex Carter]

alright thanks a lot ill try and keep it closer..its really hard..and for squats ill start going deeper..

[Paul LaDuke]

Alex,

Thanks for posting your lift for analysis.  I haven't done this in a while but when I do the information I gleen is invaluable.  You have a couple of things wrong with your lift.  First is right off the floor.  The bar moves away from you during the first pull.  It should move into you to a point over your heels when the bar is at mid-thigh.  2nd is what Chris mentioned.  Try pulling your elbows to the ceiling to keep the bar close.  Adding power snatches from the mid-thigh (high hang) should help learn this movement.  3rd, pull a bit longer.  It looks to me like you aren't finishing your pull.  The aforementioned high hang snatch is a good drill to remedy that.  4th, move faster under the bar and work on catching it lower.  Adding fast drop snatches to your warm up routine should help your body learn this movement pattern and get comfortable catching the bar lower.   

Keep working at it and it will come.  It has taken me a long time and my form has made huge improvements, even at 40 years old.  By the way, beautiful facility!  Where are you lifting at? 

[Alex Carter]

Well thanks for the tips buddy, I'm lifting at my schools rec center, not all that glamorous because I cant use chalk and you can't drop weights. But I realize I am slow with these weights, its not that I can't deadlift a lot more than that, I think it has to do with the "oh crap, I really can't lift this as fast as I want to because I don't know the movement that well" sorta thing.. I'm going to drill a lot more with snatch and clean and jerk, if your on tomorrow I will post a video of my training tomorrow so you can tell me what im doing wrong, hopefully what you guys have told me might help me out tomorrow.

[Andy Dick]

Wait so what is the point of having rubber plates and a platform in your rec center if you cannot drop the weights?    just a thought.  But yeah looks like a nice place.

[Dave Almeida]

Telling someone to keep the bar close is pointless. The bar is moving away from the lifter for a reason and its not because they aren't consciously trying to keep it close. When coaches would simply tell me to keep it close when I was swinging would frustrate me to no end until I learned WHY I was swinging.

 Like Paul said, off the floor you are a little messed. Maybe fool around with your start position a little and make sure the bar comes in. Keep the weight on your legs until the top of the pull then jump straight up. Elbows bend a bit early and you are using your arms which may cause some of the swing too. I think you said you are real new to the lifts? It's taken me a year to get comfortable enough with them to start trying to move real fast so dont worry about that yet.

 Also, keep your shoulders over the bar as soon as the bar separates from the floor as smorchkov does in the attached pic. In Rybakou's pic his back is straight and chest up but weight is still on his legs, he proceeds to jump straight up from here and the bar continues in a straight path.

[Chris Ⓐ LeRoux]

My philosophy of coaching is to address the worst issue first. The next tenet of my philosophy is to deal with each thing in the simplest manner possible first and then move on to more complex or time consuming tactics if that fails. Everyone is different as far as what coaching cues will make sense to them, so I find it advantageous to teach the same skills in multiple ways. Hopefully I summed up the problem we all seem to agree is apparent in an understandable way to a beginner via the internet to build on with further refinements. I am happy to see the community chip in to help each other and I thank everyone who posts in the effort.