How do deadlifts work

When performing a deadlift, you can use whatever weight you prefer: dumbbells, a medicine ball, barbell, trap bar, or kettlebell. And you can opt for a conventional stance, or sumo where your feet are wider than hip-width —whatever feels most comfortable to you. There are a few variations on deadlifts to keep in mind, all which affect your body a tad differently:.

How to: Hold your weight down in front of your thighs at arm's length. Stand with your feet hip-width apart and your knees slightly bent. Brace your core. Bend your knees, and hinge at your hips, lowering until your thighs are almost parallel to the floor.

Pause, then squeeze your glutes and raise your torso back to starting position. That's one rep. How to: The difference here is that you don't lower the weight all the way to the ground. It is also the foundation for the many options and variations that we will go over. While it is high reward, it can be high risk if you go too heavy and perform it with bad form. First things first, you'll need a barbell and some plates.

Load up the barbell, but start light. Note: Be sure to warm up first with deadlifts, you never just jump into your working weight.

Plant your feet shoulder-width apart with your hips in line with your knees. Your toes should be just under the barbell. Hinge your hips and bend your knees until you can reach the weight. Grab the bar with your hands just outside of your legs.

Your back should always remain straight. You will want to avoid a round in your back. To do this you need to hinge and drop your butt down when starting. From this position, which is the starting position, lift the bar up by driving your hips forward, keeping the barbell close to the front of your body.

As the bar reaches mid-thigh level, retract your shoulder blades as to maintain a strong and stable torso. Once you reach the standing position, slowly lower the bar back to the ground in a controlled manner, using the same hip hinging movement pattern.

Note: If you are going very heavy, you may drop the weight once the bar passes below your knees, but try to bring it down slowly while keeping your back straight as this is the eccentric phase of the lift, and the eccentric phase is great for building muscle and strength.

When the barbell is back on the ground, pause, make sure your form is good and repeat. It is called a DEADlift. Each rep will be done from a dead stop. Make sure your core is braced at all times, it will help keep your spine safe and your movement strong. Complete the remaining reps in your set, increasing the number of reps or amount of weight as needed.

You can use a overhand grip or a mix grip. A mix grip is one hand over, one hand under. If you use a mix grip, be sure to change which hand is overhand with each set as to avoid muscle imbalances. We get asked this a lot. And really, it depends on you and your fitness goals. Challenge yourself to get the most out of your reps to see gains, but always be safe.

Again, it is a very high risk, high reward exercise when done with heavy weights. Notice how the question says "the most". This is because deadlifts are a total body exercise that will hit damn near every muscle in your body.

Now, be that as it may, the main muscles deadlifts work are your hamstrings, quads, glutes, erector spinae , traps, lats and other deep back muscles Pretty much your entire posterior chain. It will also help you develop a strong core and powerful forearms.

Strengthening all of these muscles with deadlifts will lead to more powerful lifting in squats and other lower body movements as well as upper body pulling exercises. Let's look at the movement a little closer to see how it hits these major muscles The hinging motion is a great glute and hamstring engager.

Building your glutes and hamstrings leads to more athletic strength and raw power. These muscle groups also helps you stabilize your joints and prevent injury. One of the other hard-to-work muscle groups that deadlifts can help you strengthen and tone are the erector spinae and deep back muscles.

Strengthening this helps you protect your spine and increases your overall core strength and stability. As you pull up from the hinge position, your lats, traps and deep back muscles are going to be firing off like crazy.

Deadlifts are also great for building up those quad muscles. Your quads will be fully engaged as you bring the bar up from the ground. Strong quads give you more overall leg strength and power. They also help stabilize knee joints and help to protect them from injury. Deadlifts will help you improve your grip strength too.

After all, you need to hold onto a heavy bar with just your hands! Grip strength is one of the most underrated aspects of training. A strong grip comes with tons of benefits. Change up your grip variations to create the forearms that grip strength is made of.

You can also extend the hold at the top of the movement to really challenge your forearms. By mixing up your deadlifts with variations, you can find a combination that targets various areas for an overall improvement in strength and muscle mass. For example, using a hex bar to deadlift will place more emphasis on your quads and traps. Doing a stiff-legged deadlift will engage the hamstrings to a much greater degree.

Adding a shrug at the end of a standard barbell deadlift will make your traps explode not literally. A wider grip deadlift will engage your hamstrings, traps and upper back more as you need to get deeper.

Some deadlift variations are also better for situations like back pain or mobility issues. Deadlifts can even be modified to fit the confines of the equipment that you have available to you.

As you can imagine, there is a lot to work with. So, let's get into our favorite deadlift variations The barbell deadlift is the standard deadlift we already discussed. This classic go-to compound movement is awesome to activate the glutes and spine. With this, you use a traditional barbell loaded with the appropriate weight load. Place it on the ground in front of you, even with your feet. Then, squat downwards and back reaching your arms straight forward even with your shoulders.

Firmly grab the barbell with an overhand grip and inhale. Move smoothly upward at an even and controlled pace while exhaling. Try to keep the barbell as close to your body as possible. Stand straight up with your core and glutes fully engaged.

Then, with a neutral spine, use the power of your legs to slowly return the barbell to its original position in front of you. Try to hinge at the hips to lower the barbell as much as possible before bending your knees.

This allows you to target your back and hamstrings more at the top of the movement. This is very similar to the traditional barbell deadlift.

However, here you keep your legs straight to really strengthen your glutes and stretch those hamstrings. This is a great option for runners or other athletes that are at a higher risk of a hamstring injury. By lengthening and strengthening the muscle, it can better protect itself.

With straight leg deadlifts, you place the barbell in front of you and hinge from the hips, grasping it firmly. Then, slowly lift the barbell up, running it along the front of your legs. At the top of the movement, inhale and begin to lower the barbell again, keeping it close to your body. As you lower, engage your glutes to control the descending weight. Keep knees a a bit bent to avoid overextension.

Repeat slowly and work your way up to higher reps as you strengthen your legs and back and improve your form. This is exactly what it sounds like. Just as with sumo squats, the stance is widened here to change up the movement.

By moving downwards in a wider stance, you reduce the load on your lower back. This makes it an awesome deadlift option for those with back pain. Place the barbell in front of you on the floor and stand with feet spread wide. Inhale and hinge at the hips and reach downwards to grasp the bar. Pull it slowly to standing in a smooth motion, inhaling as you rise. Then, inhale at the top of the motion and begin to lower the bar back towards the floor.

Return it to its starting position with control. It sounds slow and boring, but you'll get a lot of practice while earning the ability to lift heavy. So, why bother to learn to deadlift? Quite simply, it's one of the most effective exercises for developing the pure strength that leads to bodily size and athleticism. Since it's a full-body movement that uses a lot of muscle mass, the deadlift also builds total-body muscle.

It's one of the few lifts that directly targets the hamstrings, a group of muscles often overlooked in the weight room. This magic lift also improves posture. We live most of our lives focusing on the front of our bodies, ignoring our rears.

In turn, we develop bodily frames without balance, leading to a host of postural issues—hunched shoulders and weak backs, for example. Deadlifting reintroduces us to our body's backside—the hamstrings, glutes, and back. Posterior training balances the body, helping us stand taller and with greater strength. In short, deadlifting will build muscle, improve your posture, give you balanced, full-body strength, and turn you into a total gym badass.

After all, there's nothing quite like ripping heavy weight from the ground. Deadlifting makes the body pay a heavy tax—the nervous system and the musculoskeletal system both work hard. Since it can drain the nervous system, it's best for a beginner to train it at the beginning of a workout. A fresh nervous system means productive reps, because the body more efficiently learns movement and you'll have better form.

It's also safer. As you get tired, your form gets worse and injury is more likely. It's best to plan deadlift training for the time period right after your warm-up. Don't think of this workout like you would a traditional body part, like back or chest. Instead, you'll work a number of important assistance exercises with it.

When you do a deadlift workout, beware of training any of the same muscle groups the day before or the day after. Proper recovery allows for gains in both strength and size. One exception is when training for a powerlifting competition. The deadlift is the last event at a powerlifting meet, meaning that a lifter has already done three maximum squat and bench-press attempts before mounting the platform for a first deadlift attempt.

Use a cable machine with a cable on a low height at a medium resistance. Equipment needed: Kettlebell. Equipment needed: Bosu balance trainer. Deadlifts are a challenging exercise to master. If you belong to a gym, work with a trainer or fitness professional. They can demonstrate the correct technique. Have the trainer watch your form to confirm you are performing the exercise correctly. Once you have the correct form down, you can practice deadlifts regularly as part of your exercise routine.

Always talk to your doctor before starting a new fitness regimen. Lifting weights is about more than burning calories. No squats?