Are You Planning For Olympic Weight Lifting
INTRODUCTION
Olympic weight lifting is a very unique sport for many reasons. The approach for selecting and developing young Olympic lifters is different than approaches used for most other sports and athletic skills.The typical staged approach for skill progression based on age and development. But developing the Olympic lifter for competition, or to simply use the lifts for athletic development, needs some further consideration.In addition, virtually any developing athlete could play recreational basketball with relative safety, for example,but many would be exposed to substantial risk of injury attempting Olympic weight lifting. Without specific anatomical and biomechanical attributes together with proper coaching, the lifting form needed to minimize injury risk is not possible.
The range of motion needed at the hips and shoulders is at the extreme end of that found within the population. Without this ball-and-socket joint mobility, the athlete would be forced to create the motion in the spine. The spine is better able to safely support the load when it is not moving (i.e., with good lifting form the motion is at the hip joints, not the spine). In other words, spine motion creates stresses that cause tissues like the discs to damage at much lower loads.
If lifting is used as a training tool rather than for preparation to compete,several adaptations in approach and form can be made to enhance athleticism in a safer way.Having stated these special cautions, training the Olympic lifts offers several special opportunities. As we have found during testing and screening, the great athletes are usually more explosive because they are able to contract and relax muscle faster than their colleagues.
Olympic lifts train the speed of contraction during initiation of the movement but then also train the rate of relaxation to be faster. Consider the special case of the snatch: the lifter must quickly drop their entire body to snap under the bar.The bar during this phase of the lift is not being lifted,rather it is dropping down at the rate of 1 G. Here the body must drop under the bar faster than the bar descending at a 1 G rate. Residual muscle tension in the lifter would result in stiffness, slowing their movement causing a failed lift.
Relaxation is absolutely necessary to drop into position to receive or “catch” the bar weight. The mental discipline to relax knowing there is substantial load overhead and to accomplish this with speed is one of the unique opportunities in training the Olympic lifts. developing movement and essential athletic competency; selecting young athletes for the Olympic lifts; whether Olympic lifting is the best choice to achieve goals; and thoughts and techniques on training progressions.