It is time to dive into a few more reasons why everybody should deadlift.

If you haven’t started incorporating the deadlift or some other bend patterns in your movement plan, then stop right now, give me 20 bodyweight bends and then resume reading please!…Now that you are warmed up we can begin.

#4 You Have Probably Picked up a Thing or Two in Your Life

That is right. It is time to practice the movements you do. Doing this during your movement practice is just like it sounds. Practice for picking up your kids, practice for picking up the groceries, practice for picking up and moving a piece of furniture. When you practice in as part of your movement program it is setting you up to do this (and other movements as well) properly throughout your everyday activities. This way you will already be using proper form, know what is light and heavy and feel confident in doing a movement pattern long before you HAVE to do it. Just remember back to the introduction in part 1. Picking up a pencil will not blow your back out, but not practicing picking things up proper during a lifetime of bending over will injure you. Since you are also more likely to pick something up even today after reading this, make sure that you continue to practice the deadlift.

#5 Develop an Inner Weightlifting Belt

Being a physical therapist I should thank whoever invented the external weightlifting belt and back brace as they alone could keep me in practice forever. At the same time, this also makes my job extremely challenging as it doesn’t allow people to recruit muscles effectively as well as sets up hinge points in the spine that lead to breakdown. That is right, it will actually make you more susceptible to injury now and give you a feeling of being stronger, but in reality will be making your inner unit musculature weaker. That is why you must learn how to train the deep abdominal wall and develop your inner weightlifting belt. As you are able to do this effectively you can now start putting the deadlift into play and really accessing your spinal stabilizers!

Moral of the story is do not wear a weightlifting belt when you workout or a back brace at other times (talk to your healthcare practitioner about special circumstances where you have an acute injury). This is because there will come a time when you do not have a belt or brace and go to lift something that is probably much lighter than you are used to and will now have a false sense of security. I would hate to see you become injured from this when you can be walking around with the world’s greatest weightlifting belt around your waist at all times when training properly.

#6 The Deadlift is the Coolest Lift Ever

This is a pretty simple, but important reason. The more weight you can pick up off the ground the cooler you are. Okay, that is probably just my ego, but I really do love to deadlift. There is something about it that gets me fired up and feeling strong. The best part is that it is a very important movement to keep strong with age and the benefits as you can see are well worth adding it to your program. I encourage you to dabble in the bend pattern and try out a few different style deadlifts to see what works for you and your body.

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Have a Great Day!

Nick Horowski