Powerlifting is an evolutionary process. Not in the clichéd sense of “only the strong survive,” but rather, natural selection. The longer you lift, the more your technique will change out of necessity. You’ll get to a certain level of strength with your current approach, but as they say, what got you HERE won’t get THERE. That is, some sort of limitation in your leverage or musculature will necessitate a change if you want to keep getting stronger.
So we tinker with technique, as I discussed at length in a recent post. This article is less about what changes to make (e.g., high bar to low bar squats, conventional to sumo deadlifts, etc.), but rather HOW to implement the changes so you can determine if you’re on the right track.
Start in a Pivot Block
Pivot blocks are short periods of non-specific training used to add variety and give a physical and mental break from heavy barbell training. Powerlifting programming pioneer Mike Tuchscherer of Reactive Training Systems recommends that the length of a pivot block be 25 percent of the previous block, so if you just came off a 12-week training block, your pivot should be 3 weeks long. I generally run them for 2-4 weeks and let the lifter help decide when they’re ready to resume more traditional training.
Implementing a significant technical change during a pivot block hedges your bets because there’s typically nothing looming on the horizon in terms of a competition, so there are no negative consequences if it’s a failed experiment. If you try something new and it doesn’t work, so what? Nothing gained, but nothing lost either. The lack of pressure to perform to any sort of competition standard during a pivot block makes it the perfect time to try new things like bar positions, stance and grip changes, footwear, etc.
Maintain or Increase Frequency
When making a technical change, make sure you maintain the current frequency with which you perform the lift, and even consider increasing your frequency. For example, if you typically squat twice a week and want to try low-bar squatting instead of high-bar squatting, continue to squat twice a week or even increase to three times per week. The reasons for this are twofold.
First, more frequency equals more practice. If you want to get good at any skill-based activity, you need to do it often. If you wanted to shred like Jimi Hendrix, you’d play guitar every day, not just once or twice a week. Changing your technique essentially requires relearning a deeply-engrained skill so frequent practice is a must.
Secondly, I’ve found it useful to keep at least one training session per week where you perform the lift the “old” way so you can get a side-by-side comparison. If you’re a conventional deadlifter and want to give sumo a try, consider deadlifting twice a week, once in a sumo stance and once in your conventional stance. This lets you compare and contrast, letting you make a more objective decision on if the new approach is working.
Make One Change at a Time
It can be tempting to make radical changes to your technique, especially if you’ve recently been in a training rut or performed poorly at a meet. I’ve certainly had periods of unsuccessful training that have made me want to blow everything up and start over again with a completely new approach. However, if you change everything all at once, you won’t be able to pinpoint WHICH change is the most beneficial. Just like a well-designed research study, you have to have tight control over your variables.
For example, if you switch from a wide grip to a narrow grip on bench press, make sure you keep your foot placement the same (and harking back to the last point, continue to train your wide grip on another day during the week). If you go to both a close grip AND switch from flat feet to on your toes, you won’t be able to determine which change is responsible for any strength fluctuations, positive or negative.
Also, if you make multiple technical changes, you’ll likely take such a significant step back in the amount of weight that you can handle that you won’t be able to objectively determine if the change is good or not.
Make one change at a time: bar placement, stance width, grip width, torso angle, etc. Don’t change everything all at once.
Stick with it Long Enough to Load it Heavy
Anybody can make a new technique look great when the weight is light. The real test is if your new approach will hold up when the weights get heavy. And that requires patience and diligence.
Common sense says to start light when trying something new. Just don’t stay light forever. Or bail on those changes after four weeks because the pivot block is over. Challenge yourself to implement your technical changes under heavier weights once the time is right, and that will give you strong evidence for or against sticking with that change.
It can take a while to return to your previous levels of strength when you try something new. If switching from narrow-stance squats to wide-stance squats knocks 5-10 percent of your 1-rep max, it can be tempting to say “screw this” and go back to your old ways. But with enough time and hard work, it could be exactly the change you need to break through to new PRs. It may take several weeks or even months for the benefits to take hold, but you’ve gotta be willing to stay the course.
Adjust Your Accessory Work Accordingly
As I said, technical changes are often made out of necessity. You can’t keep your chest up when you squat, elbows tucked when you bench press, back flat when you deadlift… these things build a low ceiling on your strength and technical changes can raise the roof. However, technical changes can shift some of the load to different joints and muscle groups, which may require adding some extra bulk to those areas to carry the burden.
Here are just a few examples of how the muscular demands change when you implement technical changes:
- High-Bar Squat/Narrow-Stance Squat: More quads
- Low-Bar Squat/Wide-Stance Squat: More adductors
- Wide-Grip Bench Press: More chest and shoulders
- Narrow-Grip Bench Press: More triceps
- Conventional deadlift: More spinal erectors
- Sumo deadlift: More quads and adductors
You can argue over the minutia of how much the emphasis truly shifts when you make these changes, but you can smooth out the learning curve by adding muscle mass to these areas. Make sure you’re adding in the right hypertrophy-based accessory work to support your new approach to your main lifts.