Nobody said any of this until Mike Boyle put it in some t-nation article. I’d be interested in seeing these people who learned to snatch before they could clean with such ease, because I’ve never heard of it even from people who oly lift competitively.
Do you think Ed’s training stayed old school because he only uses single ply gear? It’s quite a different world in the IPF compared to the WPO or IPA. Many WPO/IPA guys really have a wide stance and sit way back into their canvas suits…hence the Westside training. That is just a generalization though. I wonder if many of the European IPF guys do westside type stuff…I would doubt it. You put Ed Coan in a Levithan, I bet he does not squat 1200. Conversely put a Westside guy in single ply and they’re not going to squat 1000. I spoke to a judge once several years ago and he said Chuch Vogelpohl entered a single ply meet and only squatted high 700s despite having an IPA 1000lb squat under his belt.
About Ed Coan…my memory tells me that he hit a performance wall many years ago. I’d be interested to hear what he thinks caused the stagnation.
why u couldnt let go of the bar??
I thought his main contention was that there was too much emphasis on technique when he felt the major restriction was sub optimal strength levels. 
Louie once made a fuss because he said he put bands around the bar and asked Leo Totten to power clean like 135 and he couldn’t do it. I don’t know what strength bands he was using. Louie always said if he coached o-lift, he would do o-lifts with bands and chains likening it to Aleexev pulling out of water.
The direction of olympic lifting training in the United States should take another direction, but I am not convinced that it is the direction that Coach Simmons would want. The “Americanized Bulgarian” system employed by Coach Gough and Coach Burgener seems to be closest to developing future success internationally. Time will tell.
For Davan
I’m sorry if I mis-understood what you typed, but on the international stage, as well as what USAW teaches, the snatch is almost always taught first. (We teach it first here as well, but that’s a different post).
Old Soviet/current Russians, Bulgarians, Greek, Turks, etc. all teach the snatch first.
Once even the basics are mastered, teaching the clean is relatively easy.
This way works even better when the athlete has never attempted any kind of olympic lifting before - there’s no bad habits to unlearn!
hey now i think gayle hatch is one the best, i have learned a ton from him.
You are helping out actually. As you say, the clean is easy to learn after the snatch since all the basics are already in place. What I am trying to say is that if you are going to teach one lift, it would be easier to teach cleans. Snatches take more time to learn, from what I have seen. If you learn snatch (a more difficult lift) first, then cleans will be easy. If this is different than what you think, please add some more info. What kind of progression is used? What age is this being taught and is there ANY lifting background at all (ie any squats, etc.)?
my 14yr female athlete who is very athletic played summer bb, fall tennis and now winter bb, i started her out with the clean pull and snatch pull for the whole summer, then when i felt comfortable with her strength and overall ability we progress to hang clean she learned them in 10min, once again when i felt comfortable i taught her the pc which again she learned in 10min, she now can pc 125-135. her progress with the pc went something like this, 3 workouts per week:
wk 1: all sets 15-20sec rest!
8x1x95
wk 2:
10x1x95
wk 3:
12x1x95
wk 4:
8x2x95
wk 5:
10x2x95
wk 6:
12x2x95
wk 7:
8x3x95
wk 8:
10x3x95
wk 9:
12x3x95
wk 10:
8x1x105 etc etc
also note that i decided to go super slow with her and thats why i stayed with the pulls for the summer which was bout 9-12 weeks, it really gave her confidence. her numbers are pc 125-135, bp 115, bsq 185.
teaching progression:
Power Clean
- Free standing Squat
- Front Squat
- Back Squat
- Rdls
- Hang Shrug
- Hang Shrug Jump
- Hang Clean
- Power Shrug
- Power Clean
Power Snatch
- Overhead Squat
- Drop Snatch
- Snatch Hang Shrug
- Snatch Hang Pull
- Hang Snatch
- Power Snatch
I know what article you’re talking about, but I’ve personally never felt comfortable catching the bar in “the rack” during the clean. Catching the bar at arm’s length is much easier, physically and technically speaking, for me.
And I said power snatches are easier to learn. The full snatch is a bitch and I couldn’t do it to save my life. Honestly though, I just don’t see what’s so complicated about the basic power snatch.
Two Steps:
- Bend down and grab the bar.
- Explode up and lift if over head.
- He had been training for about 20 years (He dominated PL from his teens as I recall)? How long can anybody you make continued progress in any activity? Every athlete has a genetic limit, Coan simply hit his.
Edit: and cnoisder what he lifted at his peak. 600 something bench, 1000+ squat (lightest man to do it IIRC), 800 something (?) DL. how much more potential did he have considering the fed he competed in and the gear he was using?
- Isn’t Coan in his 40’s now? So 5 years ago he was in his late 30’s or so. When does human strength peak?
So you bring up WSBB, who ake continued strenght gains, right? Because of Louie’s magical training methods.
Consider that RAW records in general are stagnant despit all of these magical improvemnts in training methods. People aren’t that much stronger without gear as humans are hitting their true genetic physical limits.
In this vein, you might consider that the current WR in the 100m is only .03 faster than what Charlie coached Ben to over 20 years ago. And it might not have even beaten it if Ben had run out that race instead of pulling up at the end.
The apparent improvments in PL results are, IMO, due to changes in gear and rules.
Want a bigger bench: get a better shirt and compete in a fed that doesn’t make you pause and lets you go to your fat belly. Want a bigger squat: get a better suit and compete in a fed with a monolift that passes them high. Like Louie’s guys do. DL’s are just now making huge jumps, as gear is improving.
As well, the big lifts are generally being made by 300-400 lb behemoths. Their 800 lb benches or whatever are still lower, pound for puond, than antyhing Coan did at 242. If nothing else, their man boobs and power bellies (for belly benchers) cut ROM.
Lyle
Sounds fun but also sounds like a wrist or elbow injury waiting to happen.
Thoughts on oly. lifts with “mini bands”.
If you go to the page;
http://methodxsp.org/clips.htm
clip three: things to come
is a clip involving a very good powerlifter who has a ac shoulder injury so he is doing oly lifting and he does them with bands and chains. I think it is a very interesting video.
nikboa--------
I’m going to take a look, but damn I hope this isn’t a virus webpage. I’m on my girlfriend’s laptop.
Questionable. Is this a training methodology or a circus? Maybe I should post videos of my overspeed snatches done from a pool of jello with reverse band tension…
Edit: I guess I shouldn’t make fun of Travis Mash too much as he is a dominant force in powerlifting.
thats funny.
wtf? I didn’t post that… The guy has made a name very similar (notice the accent on the A) and tried to impersonate me.