You Should Be Olympic Weightlifting!!!
Flex Wheeler • July 9, 2021
FWDS uses Weightlifting with all of our Fighters...should you be doing them too?
Should you, all of you, be doing Olympic Weightlifting (or just Weightlifting)? Regardless of your goals, sport, etc., the answer is an emphatic “YES!” Weightlifting undeniably provides the following benefits:
- Core Stability
- Flexibility
- Lat Strength
- Sprinting Speed
- Body Awareness
- Motor Unit Recruitment
- Explosive Power (in all directions)
- Kinetic Chain Synchronization
- Mobility
- Carryover to Other Sports...including Bodybuilding
Ok, the movements only take a couple of seconds, and you don’t perform a ton of volume (or you shouldn’t be), but the training required to hit challenging weights with good form needs you to use just about every aspect of your fitness prowess...there really is no other modality that delivers so many benefits at once.
Studies even show that Weightlifting (the name for the sport of Olympic Weightlifting) improves resting heart rate, blood pressure, and even VO2 Max (Stone et al. link below).
“If you’re laying on a machine doing a leg press, you’re building some muscle and getting some bone density,” says Mike Gattone. “But you’re not getting that kinesthetic development you get when you have to learn how to punch against the floor, make a bar and your center of gravity go up together, to contract some muscles and relax others at the same time. Those are really important for human function.”
Mike Gattone is the Assistant Technical Director at USA Weightlifting.
Now, keep in mind, these two lifts are a skill, and not an easy one to learn to do correctly. And, training is more than just the two lifts. There are also variations of each that are routinely used by athletes in all sports. Further, “accessory movements” are also a large part of the overall programming. Accessory movements include all types of squats and deadlifts, pull-ups, presses, and more!
There are some that will argue this type of training is all you need. The FWDS team won’t go that far. But we will take the position statement that EVERYONE should have at least a mesocycle in your season consist of weightlifting programming. The benefit carry-over for all is just too juicy. Just look at the power national Muay Thai champion Neely Nagaye get’s in her strikes!
Cardiovascular responses to short-term olympic style weight-training in young men Stone et al. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/6640815/ontent of your post goes here.
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