A lot of people are afraid to dead lift. My wife was one of them. Her biggest concern was hurting her back by doing it incorrectly, followed closely by the simple fact that she did not see any other girls doing it at the gym.

These 2 issues were easily alleviated. Proper coaching and instruction ensured that correct form was adhered to at all times, this instilled confidence in the lift and got rid of any worry for injury. Next was the fact that “girls don’t dead lift”. Well that may be true, but they should!

You see all these girls on the elliptical trying to get a “tight butt” when in reality they should be dead lifting heavy to get one. Ok, before I get off on a pro-dead lift rant, lets take a look at what it is.

Here are some everyday events that you might run into that will benefit from learning to deadlift. In the yard, moving a wheelbarrow, pickup up rocks, picking up a bag of mulch, fertilizer, salt, sand, cement… you get the idea. In the house, picking up a child, a bag of groceries, moving furniture, boxes, etc… Any time you band down and pick something up off the ground you are dead lifting. It can be as small as a roll of toilet paper, up to a huge stone in the yard, or moving a boat trailer (with a boat on it!).

Dead lifting is also the easiest lift to learn how to do correctly. I will use a barbell as the object to lift here, as it will be the easiest to learn on. Before we get started we need to get the bar to the ideal height. If you have bumper plates great! They are all the same diameter no matter what the weight and will raise the bar to the appropriate height, if not, 45 pound steel plates will do the job. However that will be too heavy for people to learn on, so stack some plates, get some small boxes, do what it takes to get the bar resting roughly 9” off the ground.

First thing is approaching the bar; step up to the bar (don’t roll it to you) so that the bar is over the middle of your foot, heels about a shoulder width or slightly wider. From here you will set your back posture. Stand up nice and tall, chest high, and you should have an S curve in your back. Don’t exaggerate this but don’t get sloppy here, this is crucial to preventing injury. Once you have your posture set, send your hips back until your chest is over the bar. Make sure you keep your pelvis in line with your spine (imagine pinching your fingers between your hips and thighs). Once your chest is over the bar, bend your knees to lower yourself to the bar while maintaining that back angle.

Take a second to think about this position; this is your starting position. You should have a good lumbar curve in your back, shoulders will be ahead of the bar (shoulder blades directly over the bar) weight is in your heels (not on your toes). That is it. Those are the 3 things to remember, shoulder ahead of the bar, push thru the heels, good lumbar curve. From this correct starting position, squeeze the bar off the ground don’t jerk it! This is a slow, smooth lift. You want to maintain the same back angle relative to the ground until the bar is clear of your knees, it is at this point that your hips will extend to bring you into an upright locked out standing position. To set the bar down simply do it in reverse. Hips go back until the bar is clear of your knees and you retake that back angle, then you lower the bar to the ground with your legs. Make sure you keep correct back posture when lowering the weight! This is where you will most likely hurt yourself by getting sloppy!

And that’s the basics of doing a dead lift. This is without doubt the most fundamentally useful lift to learn. What could be a more practical application of strength then lifting heavy stuff up off the ground? You will most likely feel this in you lower back and possibly your grip. This is due to the fact that these are weak. They will catch up in a hurry. The primary movers are your glutes and hamstrings though. This lift will make you strong, very strong. If you are at a plateau add some dead lifts a couple times a week and you will smash thru it. That’s why the answer to “how do I get a bigger _____?” is always dead lift.

Start out light, and do 5 sets of 3 dead lifts, twice a week. Add 10 pounds to it every week and continue 5 set of 3. These should not be maximum effort weights here, the idea is to keep it “easy” so you don’t burn out your central nervous system. This is a very taxing lift when done at maximum weights and will take a long time and lots of food to recover from if you max out a lot. The idea in doing these sets is to gradually increase the load, before you know it, you’ll be doing 5 sets of 3 at a weight that would have been impossible to lift even once, and you will see improvements everywhere else.

The added benefit of deadlifting is how good your back will feel. If you suffer from back pain I highly recommend deadlifting. Start very light and ease into it. Find a coach who knows what he’s doing to supervise. If it hurts stop immediately. I guarantee this will do more for alleviating back pain in the a few weeks then all the ibuprofen and adjustments you can afford.

Chris Walls is a Personal Trainer at the Crossfit Kelowna training centre. For more information on Crossfit, please visit http://www.crossfitkelowna.com