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Does Olympic weightlifting build strength?

I haven't read much of this thread but will all due respect fadi in what world do we live in were a 250Kg clean and J is a pathetic lift when compared to a 415 deadlift.
The world of weightlifting when 250kg is nothing special anymore. 250kg at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games would not even have given you a second looking. If you have not read what's been going on in this thread and you would like to know, then please do some reading of it. Thank you.


Furthermore, when you read this thread, you'd be able to see why and in what context I said 250kg is pathetic. To give you a hint, it has something to do with the huge weights that are supposed to be carried over from powerlifting into weightlifting. You see, if a weightlifter can only manage to lift big because he's resorting to lifting big in the purely strength movement, then that would be something indeed. However you'd find that that is not the case.


Fadi.
 
Fadi,

No disprect to you sir, you know that we all admire you with all our hearts... but you're wasting your time.
 
I guess it's just a coincidence that the majority of top olympic lifters have massive powerlifts and it doesn't carry over whatsoever then :rolleyes:
 
The world of weightlifting when 250kg is nothing special anymore. 250kg at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games would not even have given you a second looking. If you have not read what's been going on in this thread and you would like to know, then please do some reading of it. Thank you.

Furthermore, when you read this thread, you'd be able to see why and in what context I said 250kg is pathetic. To give you a hint, it has something to do with the huge weights that are supposed to be carried over from powerlifting into weightlifting. You see, if a weightlifter can only manage to lift big because he's resorting to lifting big in the purely strength movement, then that would be something indeed. However you'd find that that is not the case.


Fadi.


Well when we look at it
250 c and J is 94% of all time world record
415 dead is 90% of the raw dead record.

looking at both lifts relatively the deadlift is actually the poorer ( or pathetic as you say) lift. The C and J is the better relative lift.
 
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I guess it's just a coincidence that the majority of top olympic lifters have massive powerlifts and it doesn't carry over whatsoever then :rolleyes:


Like I said earlier, Bill Starr had a pretty good deadlift yet never trained it and got a national record when he entered a powerlifting meet for something different despite being at the time an olympic lifter.

Perhaps its the other way round for these Oly lifters then you think?
 
Like I said earlier, Bill Starr had a pretty good deadlift yet never trained it and got a national record when he entered a powerlifting meet for something different despite being at the time an olympic lifter.

Perhaps its the other way round for these Oly lifters then you think?

He still did max effort squats & good mornings. At Westside they hardly ever deadlift as well
 
Fadi,

No disprect to you sir, you know that we all admire you with all our hearts... but you're wasting your time.
No disrespect taken wingman, on the contrary, I will be taking your comment to heart from this second on...

Much appreciated and needed, thank you kindly my friend.


Fadi.
 
Even if I disagreed with Fadi (which I do not, he is the master!!), I would still treat him with respect that he deserves, not the way Oni has decided to.
I suggest we stop being drawn into the stupid debates with such a pig headed person and just see where our results are in 12 months time. If he believes his methods work, then give him the chance to prove himself wrong or right, results will eventually tell the story.

Fadi, you will always have my respect and I look forward to many more great posts with the kind of advice that you can't even buy these days. Cheers.
 
Even if I disagreed with Fadi (which I do not, he is the master!!), I would still treat him with respect that he deserves, not the way Oni has decided to.
I suggest we stop being drawn into the stupid debates with such a pig headed person and just see where our results are in 12 months time. If he believes his methods work, then give him the chance to prove himself wrong or right, results will eventually tell the story.

Fadi, you will always have my respect and I look forward to many more great posts with the kind of advice that you can't even buy these days. Cheers.
Thank you so much for your consideration, respect, and above all, your humility. That’s a sign of a real man. D1cko, from the very outset I made myself crystal clear that I was not interested in having an argument (let alone a debate) with anyone. I’ve given my side of the story based on my experience and the empirical data that is all around us in the world of Olympic weightlifting. Some may think that things have changed since I was lifting in the early 80s, and that would be a fair point. However I did make a brief comeback in 2010 where I won the NSW Masters championship after few months of training at the Sydney Olympic Sport Centre here in Homebush. From what I’ve seen and experienced, nothing has changed in the way of training. Still no deadlifting but plenty of pulls I can assure you Sir

Again, I sincerely thank you for taking the time to make your contribution.


Fadi.
 
When I look at rip's article it appears that, to me, it's just a hard read.
Once you get past a certain level with rip's methods they are not relevant.
He's got a lot of people lifting, that's for sure.

I've noticed over the years rip is taking more of a; my way or the highway sort of stance.

My take on this is that any man with half a brain should do it all.
Do the power lifts, do the Olympic lifts, do body building exercises, lift kettlebells and do bodyweight exercises.

Just don't try and do them all at once.

I've mentioned dogma many times before, It doesn't ever have to be an either or situation.

The Olympic lifts take a bit of time to learn, more for some, less than others but it's not a waste of time is it?

And you may very well "lose" some strength in the process, so what?
 
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I looked for a while but couldn't find any info on his routine from his Olympic lifting days but I'd imagine that it would be regular heavy sets of 5


From the Bill Starr article 'Program Design':

The very first step in setting up a strength program is deciding exactly what you are trying to accomplish with your training. Are you most interested in establishing a solid strength base for a sport like football or basketball, becoming a better bodybuilder, powerlifter or weightlifter, or getting stronger to enhance your general fitness? It's a key consideration because there are many, many approaches to a strength routine.

Competitive Olympic lifters, for example, must include lots of quick lifts and build their pure strength work around the snatch and clean and jerk. Powerlifters, too, must organize their programs around the three tested lifts. Other athletes have to build agility, run drills and provide sufficient time to practice their chosen sports, while people seeking greater strength so they look and feel better don't have to do any of the previously mentioned exercises.....

.....High-skill movements are those that require a great deal of coordination, timing, speed and athleticism. Pure strength exercises can be done in a more controlled fashion and in most cases that's exactly how they should be done. There are several degrees of high-skill exercises, beginning with the two Olympic lifts, the snatch and the clean and jerk. You should always place them first in any program that includes them. Next come power snatches, power cleans, drop snatches, hang cleans and hang snatches and, finally, snatch and clean high pulls and front squats. All the rest are pure strength movements, including deadlifts, bent-over rows, shrugs, bench presses, inclines, overhead presses, dips, squats, lunges and leg presses.

Any time I've seen Starr mention the Olympic lifts, it was always using sets of triples or doubles with the occasional single in there. Here is an article where he mentions his earlier routine when he was starting out I guess being trained by Sid Henry. A great article :

Sid's workouts consisted of the three Olympic lifts'press, snatch, clean and jerk'and included power cleans, power snatches, snatch-grip high pulls, front and back squats, plus jerks from the rack if that lift was a problem. All of those with the exception of back squats fall into the category of high-skill exercises. You may not think the press qualifies, but it most certainly is a high-skill movement when you do it as a strength event. We did presses at every workout in order to perfect our form as much as our strength.

Workouts always started with the clean and press, mostly because the press was the first lift contested in meets. You did one clean, then five reps for the first three warmup sets, then followed that with five sets of three with the same weight; for example, 115, 135 and 155 for five, then five sets of three reps with 175. Next came either power snatches or power cleans done in the same manner, except you did fewer warmup sets for power cleans, since you'd already done quite a few cleans with the presses. On other days full cleans or full snatches followed the opening presses, performed with the same formula of sets and reps, three sets of five and five sets of three.

Sid's trainees did snatch-grip high pulls at least once a week, right behind the full movements or the power cleans and power snatches, three to five sets, depending on how you felt, with no warmup sets necessary. If you started showing signs of fatigue, you stopped at three sets. You followed the same pattern with front squats and jerks from the rack, and did back squats for sets of fives.

There were no fancy gimmicks'no partials, negatives, rubber bands or chains'just lots of concentrated work on full-range technical exercises. What made the program so effective was the progression. If you were successful with your five work sets at 175 on the press, your next press session would look like this: 115, 135 and 155 for five, then five sets of three with 180.

Maybe you need to do some homework, Oni?
 
I have read some of rippetoe's stuff and quite like it, but i'd have to give him a fail on the article in the OP. He makes quite a few leaps of logic and doesn't have any objective facts to back up his assertions. Worst of all, some of his statements have the distinct whiff of broscience about them.

to me, Rip's biggest leap was assuming that, at the elite level, working on max strength doesn't adversely affect speed at all. As far as I can tell, he didn't address this important aspect at all. Now, if I understand Fadi, elite lifters reach a point where, even though they can lift more weight in say the deadlift, doing so is counter-productive because it negatively affects the speed component, to the point where the loss in speed more than offsets the gain in absolute strength. Thus, there is a fine balancing act between percentage of 1rm and impact on speed - which Fadi tells us is about 10 per cent for pulls.

it's been a while since I had a crack at zatsiorsky's book, but I thought it actually emphasised this point, supporting what Fadi has said. I could be mistaken, though.

one other point about the article I have an issue with is that it mixes and matches between elite and non-elite lifters. I have no doubt that the more junior the lifter, the more they will benefit from increasing absolute strength because they are not near their genetic potential. However, this does not apply to elite lifters and the principles discussed by Fadi apply.

credit to rippetoe for thinking outside the box and he may be onto something - but his article doesn't convince me. Rip was looking for the reason why the mericans aren't competitive in oly lifting. I think he did identify the reason they get their arses handed to them at international meets - oly lifting is a low priority in their country and so the most genetically gifted athletes end up in other sports, unlike the countries which currently dominate.

credit to 0ni for raising this interesting topic. A big thanks to Fadi for his insights (and patience) because I have learnt a lot from his comments.
 
Well done Oni, your amazing talent has even managed to piss off one the most patient and respectful members here.
I shall recommend you to all my friends when they suffer from constipation.

Pure gold - that's champagne comedy right there.
 
From the Bill Starr article 'Program Design':



Any time I've seen Starr mention the Olympic lifts, it was always using sets of triples or doubles with the occasional single in there. Here is an article where he mentions his earlier routine when he was starting out I guess being trained by Sid Henry. A great article :



Maybe you need to do some homework, Oni?

I don't see why I need to do my homework
My point is that Olympic lifters often could often do with more strength work in their programs. Starr has done this from day 1 and the posts you quote explicitly mention him doing lots of squats and presses to build the olympic lifts
 
I have read some of rippetoe's stuff and quite like it, but i'd have to give him a fail on the article in the OP. He makes quite a few leaps of logic and doesn't have any objective facts to back up his assertions. Worst of all, some of his statements have the distinct whiff of broscience about them.

to me, Rip's biggest leap was assuming that, at the elite level, working on max strength doesn't adversely affect speed at all. As far as I can tell, he didn't address this important aspect at all. Now, if I understand Fadi, elite lifters reach a point where, even though they can lift more weight in say the deadlift, doing so is counter-productive because it negatively affects the speed component, to the point where the loss in speed more than offsets the gain in absolute strength. Thus, there is a fine balancing act between percentage of 1rm and impact on speed - which Fadi tells us is about 10 per cent for pulls.

it's been a while since I had a crack at zatsiorsky's book, but I thought it actually emphasised this point, supporting what Fadi has said. I could be mistaken, though.

one other point about the article I have an issue with is that it mixes and matches between elite and non-elite lifters. I have no doubt that the more junior the lifter, the more they will benefit from increasing absolute strength because they are not near their genetic potential. However, this does not apply to elite lifters and the principles discussed by Fadi apply.

credit to rippetoe for thinking outside the box and he may be onto something - but his article doesn't convince me. Rip was looking for the reason why the mericans aren't competitive in oly lifting. I think he did identify the reason they get their arses handed to them at international meets - oly lifting is a low priority in their country and so the most genetically gifted athletes end up in other sports, unlike the countries which currently dominate.

credit to 0ni for raising this interesting topic. A big thanks to Fadi for his insights (and patience) because I have learnt a lot from his comments.

Yes this is correct partially. I mentioned before that many of elite lifters start off building up a strength base before focusing on the Olympic lifts (this is what Rip is suggesting, not that Olympic lifters just train the powerlifts) and keeping the strength training on more of a maintenance schedule. I think I quoted Zatsiorsky and provided a page reference earlier and he recommended strength work if your dynamic work is greater than 50% of your max effort work. So using myself as an example I have max power output on the bench press at ~70% so it is clear that I need to focus more on max effort than dynamic effort
 
Yes this is correct partially. I mentioned before that many of elite lifters start off building up a strength base before focusing on the Olympic lifts (this is what Rip is suggesting, not that Olympic lifters just train the powerlifts) and keeping the strength training on more of a maintenance schedule. I think I quoted Zatsiorsky and provided a page reference earlier and he recommended strength work if your dynamic work is greater than 50% of your max effort work. So using myself as an example I have max power output on the bench press at ~70% so it is clear that I need to focus more on max effort than dynamic effort

You did quote zatsiorsky but I don't recall seeing a page ref - can you pls provide it? I might re-read that section in its entire context.

nevertheless, I still think you are comparing apples and oranges. What are you discussing here - the training methods of elite lifters who are near their genetic potential, or up and commers such as yourself and themost effective/efficient way to reach the elite level?
 
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