WODdoc Episode 149 Project365: Fight That Muted Hip

November 29, 2014 12:32 am

Spent the morning in my old high school weight room. I love stopping in there to see my good friend Justin Collins. I know… I know… he doesn’t look like much (joking buddy), but don’t let his looks fool you. Justin runs one of the best track programs in the area and he himself was a very accomplished track athlete, 4x all-american in long and triple I believe. To tell you the truth I’m pretty sure he is the most accomplished athlete to come out of my high school. I have great respect for his athletic abilities but even more respect for the knowledge he has brought back and shared with the Western Wayne athletes.

We banter a lot during out workouts, always picking each others brains about athletic development. Today, we got on the the topic of carryover exercises and how olympic lifts can improve athletic performance, specifically different forms of power cleans.

I love cleans as a way to develop explosive hip extension but they are not great for all environments. It’s a technical lift and athletes in group settings, especially kids, need a lot of attention or they will enviably falter someplace. We can reduce the amount of moving parts and thus make the movement safer if we concentrate on performing the it from the hang.

Cleans from the hang are great because they eliminate bar momentum and really make the athlete concentrate on explosively extending there hips (bingo bingo bango) … thats exactly why they are such a great carryover movement. But they are not immune from fault either.

El número uno, fault that I see happen is the “muted hip.” A muted hip is when we the athlete doesn’t fully open their hip angle. Bad bad bad… we loose power and allow the bar to get away from our body. Below is and example of a muted hip.

A great aid for correcting the muted hip is to practice jumping from your knees. I do this with all my athletes as a warm up. By eliminating the ability to generate power through your knee and ankle you’re forced to emphasize hip extension for power. The simplicity of the correction is what makes it great. It doesn’t require a ton of training and its fun so it’s perfect for group settings.

Take a look at the carryover.