Ah sorry for the long delay all. But I believe I have a pretty unique post for you guys. If you follow the fitness world, I’m sure you know who Dr. Stuart McGill is. If you don’t, Dr. McGill is most popularly known for his research on the spine, back saving exercises , and his stance against the typical “sit up”.

With that said, he has a very interesting grip positioning that potentially could be very useful for Olympic weightlifters.

If you watch carefully he has you bend the bar toward the outside (think bend the bar into an upside down “U”), which initially seems counterintuitive because it could cause an early arm bend. Interesting enough, I was taught to bend the bar inward (think bend the bar into a “U”) so that it will help fire your triceps , keep your arm straight during the lift, and curl the wrist in.

Back Strength

The premise of the McGill grip is to get the upper back efficiently engaged during the pull. And in my experience the grip positioning does exactly that. The McGill grip engages the back a great deal and retracts the scapula in a strong position. It’s clear that Olympic weightlifters need to have a strong back to be efficient in the lifts, as you can see in the above and below pics, so in theory this grip positioning could potentially help a weightlifter during the pull.

Even Coach Zygmunt Smalcerz does a pull technique where the weightlifter is focused on “pulling” the bar in with their upper back during an exaggerate pull drill. Which I believe is a specialized exercise to develop a strong upper back during the pull.  Watch Donovan Ford execute the drill here:

In either case the point being is that upper back strength is clearly important for an Olympic weightlifter and the pull position.

To Bend the Bar Out or In?

I’ve been playing around with the grip a bit and testing it out with some of our weightlifters. If I was smart, I would’ve video’d the attempts from the beginning but I’m a jackass that can’t multi-task…SMH… Moving on, in my OWN personal experience I’ve found it to be very helpful during the clean but not so much the snatch. The reviews were mixed with the weightlifters too, as it took them out of their comfort zone so it’s hard to tell. With that said, I’ve found the grip positioning to have an immediate impact on the clean during the pull phase and during the execution of pull variations. For the snatch it threw off my bar pull timing and pull height, I had a constant arm bend or stayed in extension a bit too long but every once and while it would feel ok, so it also could be a comfort issue.

Conclusion

In the end, I was only able to test this on myself and a handful of weightlifters, so it’s hard to say what works and doesn’t. I also wasn’t personally taught this my Dr. McGill but by a few others that have worked with him and the video above, so it’s hard to say if I’m fully executing this correctly or if there are other modifications that could be utilized for my body alignment. In the end, it’s about what works best for the weightlifters, if it happens to work for them great, if not it was worth a shot 🙂  So will we use it or not? We’ll probably keep this cue out for the snatch and leave it in the for the clean for now until after the competition.

Side note: I’d like to make it clear that just because a movement doesn’t work for us, doesn’t mean it will not work for you and vice versa. Cues, techniques, programs etc… are not black and white, they are VERY subjective to the weightlifter and how the lifter interprets your coaching.

Stay strong,

Team Fusion Weightlifting