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Comment by 40acres | Hacker News Reader

A majority of modern day office workers would really benefit from learning the deadlift. Sitting for hundreds of hours a month, mixed with the standard American diet is really bad for your health. The deadlift is a fantastic compound movement that targets so many areas weakend by sitting, it also incorporates a hip hinge which is a quite natural movement.

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I never made progress getting my hands past my toes in a pike (I attribute that to a lot of sitting) until I started strengthening my glutes and hamstrings with the deadlift. The muscle fatigue post-workout paired with stretching finally got my muscles to relax and lengthen.

Plus I have an ass now. So many upsides to doing deadlift.

Yes, you can get an idea of what shape people are in by looking at the 'team lift' threshold for picking up boxes. I recently assembled a weight storage rack which came in a team lift box and had cautions in the instructions that if you wanted to move it around you should use two people.

I snapped a photo of my 16-year-old (not some massive ox of a child either) picking it off the ground with his middle finger.

+1 for deadlifting. Also easier to coach than the squat. Personally I think the hex bar deadlift is the safest movement for untrained people as it reduces the technical issues. I haven't experimented on people with this but I would intuitively suspect that some form of Zercher or strongman influenced move would be another good thing for the sedentary (obvs with lighter weights) as in Real Life, many objects are not conveniently barbell shaped.

Everyone would benefit from learning the deadlift. As you've mentioned, office workers, but also more physical trades -- it's a great way to improve posture and build strength, especially for younger workers.

Plus, once you really get into it, diet improves. When one can feel the effects of the terrible food they ate, people tend to naturally gravitate towards a high protein diet with enough carbs to support their growth. Also helps improve sleep patterns in my experience.

I've met enough powerlifters to know this isn't remotely true. A lot of people stagger out of heavy PL sessions in search of cheeseburgers. Lots of cheeseburgers. Hard powerlifting sessions can awaken a hunger that is grossly out of proportion to calories burned, which may or may not explain why many powerlifters can't see their feet. With a big enough back arch, you can bounce your bench off your giant belly!

I'm being flip - and I've also felt the same effect - i.e. "with all this effort in the gym, let's not act like a f*wit in the kitchen". But it's not guaranteed.

Should have prefaced the whole thing with "in my experience".

I think anyone who begins a statement with "I've met enough..." is kind of sending that signal, don't you?

Deadlifting is my favorite exercise, but squatting is so much more beneficial to sedentary people in my opinon - it targets all the areas of the deadlift, but better and more effectively.

Most importantly though: squatting didn't just make my physically stronger, it made me psychologically stronger. Your main risk in failing a deadlift is making a lot of noise dropping the bar. Failing a squat is much scarier, and the prospect of being at the bottom of a squat and having the choice to give up and figure out a way to get the bar off your back without getting crushed or to just fucking stand up really forces you to toughen up mentally.

I realized I was capable of so much more than what I gave myself credit for, and that is something that every person should feel about themselves.

Failing a squat is much scarier

I agree. After one bad accident where I was lucky to not be injured beyond a strained back, I went out and spent the money on a good power rack so I can safely dump the bar at the bottom of a failed bench press or squat.

I've failed plenty of squats before back when I used to do powerlifting, and it's not scary at all. You just let the bar go (i.e. release your grip and let it roll off your back), and fall backwards after it. You might end up with a bruised ego, but that's pretty much it.

I have seen a newbie fall forwards though, and that can be scary and dangerous. But they fell forwards because their form was horribly wrong.

I have lifted for years, and deadlifts and squats just kill my back every time. I just had to take a week off lifting, having to support myself like an old man every time I had to bend over, after another failed attempt at deadlifting. Putting my socks on was excruciating. I'm not even 30. Right now I just cop out with the leg press machine.

I've had professional instruction, I don't arch my back, I've watched countless videos, and nothing seems to help. It's a big shame, as I've always liked to put a big focus below the waist, but it just doesn't work for me.

Do you have any tips?

Well my guess is that probably your back/hip muscles are weak and not used to working together. You really shouldnt be putting a lot of weight when you start learning a tough movement like deadlift, squat. In deadlift concentrate contracting your lower back muscles as you lift and if you feel they are getting tired and you're starting to compensate with other muscles, lower weights and focus on technique. Also the movement itself can be tricky eg not to hit your shins with the bar.

Then squat is even harder but for me helped to focus on keeping foot pressure midfoot, not heels. Also i realized my hips/glutes were weak and i had never trained them properly, hence my form was bad and overusing quads. It took me a while to be able to go full range of motion with glutes contracted. So i first did like 3/4 squats, then 1/2 and now ass to the grass

But this is just if the problem is about the muscles/technique. If your back is damaged somehow, it won't fix that. But it could be that you just haven't learned to activate your back muscles properly and then do way too much weight, with your body compensating with your spine/other muscles

Thanks for the tips. What hip and glute exercises would you do to supplement the deadlifts, or are deadlifts enough once you’re in shape?

Hmm not really, no. I might do legs too or other back muscles but you can't really train deadlift by doing other than deadlift. You should rather focus on doing a very good warm-up to enable easier contraction of those muscles and then doing a lot of low-weight training sets just to get the muscle memory right. There's a ton of good videos on Youtube about this, so pick whatever works for you and slowly move to doing the lift faster and heavier. With squat the warm-up I'd say is even more important. The ability to even squat low enough with proper movement that keeps the glutes activated takes a long while. But don't give up! I have hurt my back with deadlift too and it took a long time for it to heal. There's no shame using low-weights and you'll be so much happier in the long run having learnt the technique properly so spend time on it.

Thank you.

In addition to eliminating my back problems, the deadlift helped me in one unexpected area: I had a mild RSI and now I don't. I started from not being able to bend over to pick something off the floor without pain, and got to 495lbs for 5 reps. I also eat much better now, another unexpected side benefit, because you can't really make progress at this without eating the right things.

You all have not met the hogs that I've met in PL, then. I've met people with trash diets (plenty of macros, obtained largely through cheeseburgers and the like) who are strong as hell. I love deadlifting (favorite lift of the 3) but the idea that PL is somehow a cure-all for bad lifestyles is pretty laughable.

I really love the deadlift - both for strength building and the "nervous system workout", but I'd have to disagree that the hip hinge is a natural movement. I and most new deadlifters I've seen will intuitively lift incorrectly with the back. It's a fantastic workout for the typical office worker though.

Yeah, I had a huge improvement in my posture from a lifting regimen, it really counteracts the bad habits from sitting all day. Deadlifts and front squats feel like they're the most effective. The great thing about lifting is that it trains your muscles to want to hold correct posture (as in, you don't need to constantly remember to sit up straight). Wish I had gotten introduced to lifting earlier in life, it always seemed like some intimidating thing that was just for the bros club.

It would cause a lot of serious muscle injuries, that's for sure.

Weightlifting, in general, is a pretty safe sport. It has a way lower injury rate per hour spent than soccer or running. The deadlift, specifically, is a very easy lift to learn how to perform. And if you perform it properly and only add 5lbs to your max from workout to workout, you’d have a pretty difficult time injuring yourself.

Not if you do it correctly. In fact, you'll avoid many injuries later in life by maintaining your strength and bone health.

It could, but if they started with a low weight (50% of their bodyweight) and learned proper technique, it would work out.

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