Deadlifts

On my last blog I talked about strength training and explained squats. This time I’m going to talk about my favorite lift, deadlifts. It’s my favorite lift for a couple of reasons, for one I’ve had lots of lower back pain since Junior High. I had a doctor tell me my back was crooked and that stretching and medicine would help ease the pain. It never worked, nothing ever helped the pain! I did cheerleading and dance in High School and I was in great shape. We ran and did plyometrics but my back continued to swell and give out on me.  Now that I do deadlifts regularly my back rarely hurts anymore. This is because it works your lower back and it strengthens it.  Second reason is the technique with all the other lifts was very awkward for me. With deadlifts the technique was easy and straightforward. Rob showed me the form and said to stand up, so I did. It felt so easy I thought I was doing it wrong.  I also loved that I was able to jump up in weight fast. I started out at 45lbs and quickly got up in the 100’s. 135 used to be my working weight and now it’s my warm up. When I started deadlifts my goal was to hit 200lbs, which seemed impossible. My current 1RM is 245. My working weight is between 185-210 depending on how I feel that day. With this lift I was able to see how far I can push myself and see what I am capable of. I also found my confidence in strength training with this lift. 

Like I said in my last blog, compound lifts are exercises that make multiple joints move. With deadlifts you are using your calves, hamstrings, glutes, erectors, QL, abdominals, quads, traps, lats, rotator cuff, and forearm muscles. Having all those muscles contract burns a lot of calories! You work all those muscles from picking the weight up off the ground and lifting it to hip level. Form is really easy with deadlifts. Have your feet shoulders width apart and put the middle of your foot under the bar (entire length of your foot, not just the top).  Bend at the hips and grab the bar just outside of your legs, then bend your knees until your shins touch the bar. Puff your chest up so that your back is straight, look straight ahead, drive through your heels and stand up. As you are standing up, keep the bar as close to your legs as possible. When going down bend your knees and run the bar down your legs and focusing on keeping your back straight. Start out with an over hand grip. Once you get into a heavier weight it is easier to do an over hand under hand grip.

 

 

He is doing the lift very explosively to help not only with strength but with his overall power (strength x speed). There is nothing wrong with it taking you a few seconds to get the bar all the way up. In fact, that means you're using an appropriate weight for maximal testing. Some days I want to just do reps, so I do 5 reps and 3 sets. Some days I want to test how much I can do so I only do 1 or 2 reps. 

My last two posts I talked about leg exercises, my next post I'm going to talk about overhead barbell shoulder press.

Strength Training

All of my workouts are strictly strength training; a progressive exercise that increases strength, builds muscle and burns fat. The only cardio I ever do is a 5 minute warm up for my workouts. No more long hours on the treadmill! Similarly, I don't even remember the last time I did a crunch. All my ab work is from stabilizing my lifts. A big component of strength training that is often neglected is that if you want to increase your strength you need to be increasing the weight. Each workout I increased the weight anywhere from 5lbs to 20lbs depending on how easy it was the time before.

This is how my abs looked from cardio and crunches to post baby to Strength Training with no direct ab work.

             





January 2011 Cardio only











January 2012 Before I started








 

 November 2012








As far as the lifts that I did, I stuck with compound lifts, which are exercises that make multiple joints move. Examples of compound lifts are Deadlifts, Squats, Bench Press, Rows, and Shoulder Press.
The Squat was the first compound lift that Rob started me with. Squats work muscles in the legs, back and core. We started with body weight squats to work on form but it felt really awkward. I started with the 45lb barbell and increased 10lbs each workout. Form is key. It was easier to learn and work on form with a descent weight.

I looked on YouTube, and this was the best form video I found.



For all my lifts, I do warm up sets to work up to my working weight. Your working weight is your goal weight that you want to lift that day. With squats, I started out by doing just the olympic bar (45lbs) for 5 reps then add weight and do a couple other sets before my working weight. For my working weight I would do 3 sets of 5. For example; if I did 85 for my last working weight and I wanted my working weight to be 95, you could do your warm up of 45lbs for 5 reps, then 65lbs 5 times, then 85 lbs 5 times, then do your working weight of 95lbs 5 times for 3 sets. Squats is one of the hardest lifts for me. It felt very awkward and I got very frustrated with them. I'd improve and get better, then I'd get stuck at a weight. When I was stuck on a weight I would add more sets so that it would stress the muscles enough to still improve. After doing that for awhile I would finally be able to add more weight. I was stuck at squatting 115lbs for a long time. Now I'm squatting 135lbs for my working weight. The most I've done is 155lbs once. Sadly, I don't get to the gym as much as I'd like so I don't get to Squat as much as I want, but I'm hoping to start improving with them again. My next post I'll be talking about my favorite lift, Deadlifts.

My story

I'm Stacey. I'm a mother of 4 boys; ages 8, 7, 5, and 1. After having my 4th boy I decided that I wanted my body back but didn't want to be a skinny pole- I wanted the ''toned'' look. I showed my husband a picture of a girl that I wanted to look like and he said I'd have to lift heavy. I didn't believe him; I was stubborn and cried a lot. And now here I sit 10 months later feeling great about myself and saying I should've believed him, because it works!

This is my first progress picture. The picture on the left was a couple of weeks after my 4th baby. It was a picture of me and my sister in law while she held my baby. She posted it on Facebook and I was horrified and embarrassed about how I looked! The picture on the right was after my first official cutting phase (a strict, short-term low-calorie diet usually used to prep for a bodybuilding/figure competition).  I'm finally comfortable with myself but I still have goals that I want to achieve.

If you are like me and you've had kids, you don't need to be stuck with that mom body. It can be a slow process so you have to be patient and stay motivated. Check back and I'll be posting information about the workouts that I did, nutrition, and progress pictures. Thanks!

Foreword by Rob Gibson, husband and lifting partner

It's been an emotional roller-coaster as I've watched my wife take on this transformation. Even though it will appear to be a journey of weight-loss and strength gains; there is a lot more to the story. I am very proud of her physical accomplishments, but I am even more proud of the mental and emotional gains this process has given her. I've watched as her self-esteem and confidence have grown right along with her deadlifting weight. She's overcome barrier after barrier to become strong on the outside and the inside. She's an inspiration to me, and if she hasn't already, she'll become one to you as well as you read her story. I love you honey, I'm so proud of you for your accomplishments. Keep going, it's a never ending process of self-improvement. Have faith in yourself and remember: failure is just the start of a new goal!