Comment on my clean please!

[anotherbutters]

I posted this in my journal, but I thought I'd repost in a new thread to get a bit more feedback. I've finally managed to get a vid of one of my sets of cleans. I've only been doing these for 3 weeks and I know the weight's crap (55kg/120lb), but here goes.

ab-cleans-55kg and in slow motion: ab-cleans-55kg-slow.

Looking at the slow motion one, I can tell I'm lifting the bar far too high for a clean, which is probably because I'm not getting under the bar fast enough. Even if I was doing a powerclean, the bar path isn't vertical. It gets further away from my body as it reaches my chest, so if I really wanted to do a powerclean, I should be pulling it in closer. But I don't want to do a powerclean, I want to do a full squat clean.

Here's another vid of the way I've been practising getting under the bar and into the rack from the hang (also in slow motion). I've been trying to whip my elbows round quickly, but I still feel slow and don't know what to do about it.

Looking at this cool gif: Kahki.gif, I can see that the guy moves his upper body back in order to swing his elbows under the bar, so the path of the bar stays vertical.

I'm not sure what to focus on to get better, so any comments will be appreciated!

 

[Introspective]

Maybe a bit to much forward lean ?
Are you pulling with your shoulders ?
Have you seen the clean and hang clean vids from crossfit ?
http://www.crossfit.com/cf-info/excercise.html

 

[coolcolj]

arms kinda look a bit stiff, keep em loose like ropes

shoulders in front of the bar or at least over them. So hips may have to come up a bit for that to happen. You can see your body moving into that position when you lift off

they always say to have the weight on your mid foot/heel when you start, so wriggle your toes to get that happening. It helps keep the tension on the hammies, and makes the back lock up tighter with an arch - for me anyway

try doing cleans from the high hang to get the timing down as far as getting down fast, just dip about 2-3 inches, and then pop the bar up a few inches with a straight arm shrug and down fast and get under it

 

[anotherbutters]

Thanks col. I hadn't thought about my arms, so thanks for pointing that out. I'll give the hang cleans a go next time.

I forgot that I've just bought Dreschler, so I'll have to give that a read too.

 

[glennpendlay]

i would comment, but i cant get the vid to play on my computer. which sucks.

Thanks col. I hadn't thought about my arms, so thanks for pointing that out. I'll give the hang cleans a go next time.

I forgot that I've just bought Dreschler, so I'll have to give that a read too.

 

[Protobuilder]

Yeah, I didn't mention it but I can't get it to work either AB. not that I have anything helpful to add . . .

 

[anotherbutters]

You can't download it or you can't play it once it's downloaded? I have the original .mov file that I could put on putfile, but it's larger (about 10Mb).

 

[BiggT]

I couldn't watch it either......I am a little technically challenged with computer stuff, I will try it on the CPU at work tomorrow and see if I can view them.

 

[anotherbutters]

I didn't realise. It took me a while to encode it into a smaller format, but I'm kinda new to this too (video stuff - I've been programming computers for about 15 years!).

I'm just uploading the original movie file to putfile now, so if you could bear with me for a few mins I'd really appreciate the advice.

EDIT: Ok, here's the original .mov file, which you should be able to play. Right click and 'save as' (10Mb):

http://uploadfile.putfile.com/videos/13316515329.mov

 

[BiggT]

Got it perfectly now.

Not bad overall. Like CCJ said, the shoulders need to be out in front of the bar more at the start.

Really, just be more explosive, the feet should stomp when you catch. The start looked good, nice and smooth, on the final pull, you need to explode more and then pull your body under the bar and whip the elbows around as fast as possible. Again, this was pretty good and it 'looked like a clean'.....just more speed getting under and whipping the elbows, and more explosion. Speed, speed, speed. And if you can get the elbows higher, then do it.

 

[BiggT]

Just wanted to add, good job of self-teaching. Really, I thought the pull was good, everything was good, just explode more and get under and whip the elbows faster, and then watch the poundages climb.

 

[anotherbutters]

I'll try with my shoulders further forward when I work out tomorrow. Since there isn't anything completely out of whack with my form, I guess I just need to practise getting under the bar quicker. Like I said, I've only been doing the full cleans for about 3 weeks. It was PC's before that, and only on and off.

I've noticed my elbows aren't as high as they could be in the rack, but the bar feels snug on my shoulders and I haven't had any problems yet. I'll work on it to get them higher though.

Thanks.

 

[silver_shadow]

i don't have anything that will play .mov files... can you post the link to the streaming file?

 

[anotherbutters]

It's a good job posting up links doesn't cost me karma

Here you go, this is the same as above, but displayed within the page: http://media.putfile.com/ab-cleans-55kgmov