Explosive Lifts for Extreme Growth By Jeb Roberts, MA

1. Front Squat

Setup: Load a barbell at sternum height — if you’re new to the front squat, start considerably lighter — and step beneath it with your palms facing up, your elbows pointing forward and the bar resting on your front delts and fingertips. (In Olympic lifting, this position is called the “rack.”) Step back and place your feet slightly outside of hip-width apart with your toes angled outward about 20–35 degrees.

Execution: With an upright torso, push your hips backward as you lower to a full-depth position between your heels. Be sure to maintain an exaggerated lordotic (lower spine) arch to combat the natural lumbar flexion (rounding) that occurs in the bottom of a deep squat. From the bottom position, simultaneously extend your knees and hips to rise back to the starting position. Your torso should remain erect throughout.

Expert’s Advice: To ensure that your thighs run parallel to the angle of your feet, force your knees outward as you squat. An overly wide stance will make this thigh angle difficult, and will place unnecessary strain on the inflexible tendons and tissues of the knees.

2. Overhead Squat

Setup: Place the barbell on your traps as though you’re setting up for a back squat, and take an extremely wide grip, wrapping your thumbs around the bar. If you lack shoulder flexibility, a wider grip will make the move easier, but it will further limit the weight you can use. As with the front squat, your feet should be slightly outside hip width and your toes should be angled slightly outward. Press the bar to an arms-locked position — dip your knees and use some hip drive if the weight’s too heavy — and shrug your shoulders toward your ears.

Execution: Maintaining “active” (shrugged) shoulders and locked elbows throughout the motion, push your hips back and down toward your heels while keeping your thighs in-line with the angle of your feet. Keep an exaggerated spinal arch in the bottom to prevent your back from curving, and press back out of the hole by simultaneously extending your knees and hips. Your torso should remain upright throughout the motion, and the bar should travel in a vertical path directly above the middle of your foot.

Expert’s Advice: If you’re new to the overhead squat, start with a naked bar until you’ve nailed the form. Given the control and mobility needed to complete the movement, even a 45-pound bar will place significant strain on your muscles.

3. Power Clean

Setup: To start from the ground, take a fairly close stance with your heels almost directly beneath your hips and your toes angled outward 5–15 degrees. The bar should be over the balls of your feet and in contact with your shins. Take an overhand grip half a fist width (or slightly more) outside of your shoulders. Maintain an upright torso and straight arms, and lower your hips until they’re parallel to your knees.

Execution: With your torso as erect as possible, explode upward, driving from your quads and hips and keeping the bar as close to your legs as possible. When the bar reaches mid-thigh, violently extend your hips forward and jump from the balls of your feet, propelling the bar to chest level. Once the bar reaches its peak height, receive it by dipping slightly at the knees to get under it, landing in a slightly wider bent-leg stance and catching the bar on your front delts with your palms turned upward. Your gaze should remain straight forward throughout the movement.

Expert’s Advice: Keep the bar’s path as close to your body as possible, and lead with your elbows once it passes your waist. Once the bar reaches its peak, be sure to quickly rotate your elbows forward as you force yourself beneath it.

4. Muscle Snatch (from Mid-Hang)

Setup: Stand tall with your feet slightly outside of hip-width apart and your toes angled slightly outward. Hold the bar with a wide-enough overhand grip that it rests at the crease of your thighs when your arms are straight. Keep your arms loose and your elbows turned out from your sides.

Execution: With an arched back, bend slightly forward at your hips before exploding upward onto the balls of your feet, using the drive from your hips to propel the bar above your head. Lead with your elbows, keeping the bar’s path close to your body. As the bar nears your face, flip your writs and rotate your forearms to turn your palms upward. At the top of the motion, retract your shoulder blades, shrug your shoulders and lock out your elbows to secure the bar in the top position.

Expert’s Advice: To use a heavier load and increase the stress on your traps and shoulders, turn the muscle snatch into a “power snatch” by starting with a knee bend and adding more hip drive to propel the bar upward.

5. Push Press

Setup: Stand tall with your heels directly beneath your hips and your feet rotated slightly outward. With a grip just outside shoulder width, hold a barbell across your front delts in the same “rack” position as the front squat, but ensure that it’s firmer in your palms rather than resting in your fingertips. Make sure your shoulder blades are fully retracted.

Execution: While maintaining an erect torso and a forward gaze, dip slightly at your knees and then explode upward, forcefully pressing the bar in a perfectly straight path above your head. Quickly move your head out of the bar’s path and then push it through the “window” created by your locked-out arms in the top position so that the bar is in perfect alignment with your head, shoulders, hips and the center of your feet.

Expert’s Advice: Don’t push your hips back or lean your torso forward as you dip — it’s not a squat. Instead, bend slightly at your knees so that your hips and shoulders travel straight down before you drive upward.

6. High Pull (from Mid-Hang)

Setup: Stand with an upright torso and take the same heels-under-hips, toes-angled-outward stance as the power clean and muscle snatch. Hold the bar with an overhand grip slightly outside of shoulder width. Like the clean and snatch, this movement can be performed from the floor, the low-hang (shins) or mid-hang (thighs).

Execution: With an arched back, lean slightly forward and dip slightly at your knees before exploding through your hips onto the balls of your feet, brushing your hips with the bar as it travels. Shrug your shoulders forcefully toward your ears as you pull the bar upward along your body to chest height, leading with your elbows.

Expert’s Advice: Don’t jerk your head back to exaggerate the pull. To maintain spinal alignment, stare straight forward throughout each rep.

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