Tips and Tricks for the New Lifter

An additional use for your wrist wraps

(This article is a Blast from the Past article originally posted on 03/19/21.)

When you’re new to some task, like lifting, there are always a few tips and tricks that will seem rather obvious to you years later, so in an effort to speed things up a bit, here are several that might prove useful to you:

Deadlifting on a Non-level Floor
If you must deadlift on a slightly non-level floor (hopefully very slightly!), and you find that the barbell always wants to roll a bit, you can simply place your wrist wraps on the floor in front of the plates. You can, of course, use any other soft, thin items like socks, lifting straps, even sponges, but don’t use a hard item like a 2.5-lb plate. If you set the bar down, and it glances off that item, it will come back at your shins, and shins and horizontally moving barbells don’t get along well (hint: the barbell always wins). In addition, the contact between the plate(s) on the bar and the 2.5-lb plate on the floor may cause one or both of them to chip. Wrist wraps are thick enough to immobilize the bar but soft and compressible enough that setting the bar down on top of the wrist wraps won’t cause any problems.

Quit Using 2.5-lb Plates . . . Sometimes
Stop using 2.5-lb plates in your warm-ups. As you get stronger, you’ll find that you can round most - if not all - of your warm-up weights to numbers that end in “5.” This will allow you to stop using 2.5-lb plates in your warm-ups. If you’d like to use 2.5-lb plates in your final warm-up in an effort to be a bit more precise, that’s fine, but most of your warm-up weight selections won’t require this level of precision. (If your work sets on a given lift are less than 100 lbs, you might decide to use 2.5-lb plates more often in your warm-ups, but you can apply a similar exclusionary logic to the 1.25-lb plates instead.)

Stop Resting . . . Sort-of
Stop resting between your warm-ups sets. We mention this on a regular basis, but it still blows people’s minds that they don’t need to rest 5 minutes between every single set. Do your empty bar sets (alright, you can rest 15 seconds between your two empty bar sets of five reps), then add weight and go. Then add weight and go again. Repeat until it’s time for your first work set, before which you should probably rest a few minutes. Remember - the act of changing the weight on the bar gives you enough rest to do the next warm-up set. This will save you a lot of time in the gym.

Write Out Your Next Workout
Write out your next workout before leaving the gym. As you gain experience, you may ditch this habit, and that’s perfectly fine, but when you’re new, it’s a very productive use of your rest periods to start writing out your next workout in your training journal - especially the warm-ups. You’re already in “training mode,” and the warm-ups you performed today will inform and influence the warm-ups you do next time, so now is as good a time as any to write out your next training session (and you won’t have to think too hard when you come in the gym next time).

As always, we hope these tips and tricks help you get stronger and live better.

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The Best Way to Put On a Lifting Belt! (and a secret weapon)

A lifting belt is an extremely useful tool for your strength training, and within a month or two of starting to train, you should be using one regularly. Putting on a lifting belt, however, can be a bit tricky, so let’s sort this out.

How to Do It
There is one way - that’s right, just one - to put on a belt correctly, and it involves the upright of your squat rack. The photos here show a double-prong belt in use, but the method works just as well for single prong belts (in fact, it’s slightly easier). The steps are below, and to learn it even quicker and better, watch the included video.

1. Put the nose of your belt through the buckle and wrap the nose of the belt around the upright.

2. Lean away from the upright. Be sure to lean away so that your hips move away from the rack as well (Figure 1); don’t lean away like you’re trying to avoid a punch (Figure 2).

3. Twist your body away from the rack. For example, if the nose of the belt came around the right side of your body, twist to your left (Figure 3). This will tighten up the belt.

4. Put the prong(s) through the appropriate hole(s).

Taking off the belt is much the same as putting it on - wrap the nose around the rack, lean away, twist to loosen, and then remove the prong(s).

Squat Stands vs Squat Racks
If you have a squat stand (free-standing, two uprights) instead of a squat rack (anchored to the floor, four uprights), it may tip toward you when you lean away. This is bad. However, it’s an easy problem to solve. Simply place your foot down on the far side of the floor support, and you’ll be able to keep the squat stand anchored in place.

Secret Weapon
I told you there’s only one way to put on a belt, and this is true . . . mostly. If you’re at a meet, you might not have a squat rack handy when you’re about to step on the competition platform. Oh, you’ll have plenty of racks in the warm-up room, but there will quite possibly be none near the competition platform. Here’s what you do (and again, watch the video above to see this in action):

1. Put the nose of your belt through the buckle.

2. Place the sharp end of the screwdriver through one of the holes of the belt (Figure 4).

3. Grab that end of the screwdriver (don’t impale yourself), and pull back, treating the screwdriver as a lever (Figure 5). This will get the belt as tight as you like.

How Tight Should Your Belt Be?
When you’re new to wearing a lifting belt, it should be uncomfortably tight. If it’s comfortable to wear and easy to wiggle around, it’s merely a fashion accessory. Don’t let your belt be a fashion accessory. With practice, what was uncomfortably tight at the beginning will simply feel correct.

Need to Buy a Belt? Watch This First.
If you’re getting ready to buy a lifting belt, I’d recommend watching the included video here to get a good sense of what to look for when purchasing one. You’ll also find some links below to a few belts we recommend to our members.

Belts
My belt is from Best Belts, and I’d love to recommend them to you, but as of May 2023, they're backlogged and aren't taking orders, so with that in mind, here are the belt options we typically recommend:

• Pioneer Cut Leather Powerlifting Prong Belt 10mm

• Pioneer 10mm Lever Powerlifting Belt PAL V2 (if you’re looking for a lever belt)

• Dominion Strength Training Leather Weight Lifting Belt - 3 inch wide x 10 mm thick

• Dominion Strength Training Leather Weight Lifting Belt - 4 inch wide x 10 mm thick

(Some links may be affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Testify earns from qualifying purchases.)

As always, we hope this helps you get stronger and live better.

If you found this helpful, you’ll love our weekly email. It’s got useful videos, articles, and training tips just like the one in this article. Sign up below, and of course, if you don’t love it, you can unsubscribe at any time.

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How to Start Lifting | General Equipment

What equipment do you need to start lifting weights and getting stronger? In this first video of the "How to Start Lifting" series, Phil covers the basic equipment that you'll need, and he also covers what equipment to avoid as well.

(This video is a Blast from the Past video originally published on 10/04/21.)

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At Testify, we offer small group training, private coaching (in-person or remotely via Zoom), online coaching, and form checks. Click the button below to get quality coaching from a Starting Strength Coach and start getting stronger TODAY.

Mistakes New Lifters Make - Part III

Can you see what Dawson is doing wrong here? Hint - Dawson can’t.

(This article is a Blast from the Past article originally posted on 04/09/21.)

In Part I and Part II of our series on common mistakes new lifters make (as well as how to avoid them), we’ve discussed everything from misloading your bar to breathing at the wrong time when lifting. Today, in Part III, we’ll continue by looking at a few other errors you might make when starting out and talk about how to correct them as well.

Unloading the bar by more than one 45 pound plate difference (squat, bench, press)
If you’ve ever seen an unevenly loaded barbell cartwheel off the rack, you’ll know what we’re talking about here, and if you haven’t, well, that’s a good thing. When you load or unload the bar, there will be differences in weight from from one side to the other as you load weight on one side of the bar and then repeat the process on the opposite side of the bar. A little asymmetry won’t cause the barbell to tip over, but the key is to keep that asymmetry within limits. A good rule of thumb is to never load or unload the bar by more than one 45 lb plate difference between sides of the bar. For example, if you have one plate (i.e., a 45 lb plate) on the left side of the bar, you can have zero, one, or two plates on the right side of the bar, but don’t load three plates on the right side (i.e., since three plates compared to one plate is more than a one plate difference). A cartwheeling bar is a loud and potentially dangerous event, and this practice will help you avoid this situation.

Letting go of the bar between reps on the deadlift
New lifters will often let go of the bar between reps on the deadlift. Easy fix here - don’t. Remember, it’s only considered a set of five (or three, four, etc.) when you do all five reps without letting go of the bar (otherwise, you’re just performing singles). Do not give yourself permission to let go of the bar between reps. The deadlift will be hard, the hook grip will be uncomfortable, and you’ll want to stop, but you’ll be fine. You might not feel fine while you’re doing it, but that’s normal when doing hard things, and this way, you finish the set sooner than you otherwise would, and then you get to the best part of lifting that much faster as well . . . resting.

Allowing your gaze to wander or closing your eyes during the set
Do you tend to look all over the place while you lift, or do you close your eyes when lifting? Pick one focal point before you start your first rep and remind yourself to look there until you are done with your last rep. Use your warm-ups for practice. Don’t look somewhere else while performing a rep, and don’t even look somewhere else between reps. If necessary, put a mark on the wall in front of you while pressing, or put a small plate on the floor in front of you while squatting. One focal point.

As always, we hope these tips help your training.

(Some links may be affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, Testify earns from qualifying purchases.)

If you found this helpful, you’ll love our weekly email. It’s got useful videos, articles, and training tips just like the one in this article. Sign up below, and of course, if you don’t love it, you can unsubscribe at any time.

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At Testify, we offer small group training, private coaching (in-person or remotely via Zoom), online coaching, and form checks. Click the button below to get quality coaching from a Starting Strength Coach and start getting stronger TODAY.

Mistakes New Lifters Make - Part II

Parker and Milo make all kinds of mistakes - mistakes only redeemable because the two furballs are moderately cute.

(This article is a Blast from the Past article originally posted on 03/26/21.)

In Part I of this series - Common Mistakes New Lifters Make (and how to avoid them!) - we discussed the common errors of misloading your bar, forgetting to wear your belt, and forgetting to use chalk or a hook/switch grip for your deadlift. In Part II, we’re going to examine a few other mistakes that new lifters are likely to make, and hopefully, we can help you avoid them or at least quickly correct them. Most of this list is inspired by conversations we have at the gym with new (and sometimes experienced!) lifters, and the mistakes are not listed in any particular order.

Setting the j-hooks too high for the squat (or press/bench press)
For some reason, new lifters often set their j-hooks too high for their squat. You should never be at risk of catching the edge of a hook with the barbell when either unracking the bar at the beginning of your set or racking the bar at the end of your set, so err on the conservative side and set the hooks a bit lower than you think you should. Mid-sternum is a good height to start with, and remember, too low is better than too high - nobody should have to do a calf raise to rack the bar - and you can always raise the hooks later if you’ve set them too low.

Looking for the j-hooks when racking the squat (or press/bench press)
It can be tempting to look at the j-hooks as you’re racking the bar after your last rep. Don’t. Unless you have an exceptionally sneaky and cruel training partner, the hooks didn’t go anywhere while you were squatting, so stop treating them like they have legs. When you’re finished with your last rep, look straight ahead and walk forward until the bar makes (and keeps) solid contact with both uprights. At this point, you’ll know the bar is over the hooks (assuming you set the hooks at a reasonable height - see the previous paragraph), and you can then safely lower the bar down to the hooks. Looking at one hook makes it very likely that you will miss the other, and this tends to be a rather disastrous event - it might not happen today, but it will happen. Don’t look at the hooks.

Breathing in or out while the bar is moving
New lifters often breathe out when the bar is moving upward - we have years of fitness magazines to thank for this inane idea. Again, don’t. Remember: if the bar is moving, you’re not breathing. Instead, inhale before the rep starts and exhale after the rep ends. In other words, all breathing takes place between reps - not during - and for crying in the beer cheese soup, don’t blow your air out at the top of your deadlift. Wait the quarter of a second it takes to lower it to the ground and release your breath when the bar is back on the floor. Watch the video below for more on how to correctly breathe and perform the Valsalva maneuver.

We hope these tips help you in your training, and we anticipate a “Part III” in the near future.

If you found this helpful, you’ll love our weekly email. It’s got useful videos, articles, and training tips just like the one in this article. Sign up below, and of course, if you don’t love it, you can unsubscribe at any time.

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At Testify, we offer small group training, private coaching (in-person or remotely via Zoom), online coaching, and form checks. Click the button below to get quality coaching from a Starting Strength Coach and start getting stronger TODAY.

DISASTROUS Weight Lifting Accident | Don't Let This Happen!

It's easy to make mistakes in the weight room, but some are more disastrous than others. Phil explains and discusses how to avoid one particularly nasty error.

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At Testify, we offer small group training, private coaching (in-person or remotely via Zoom), online coaching, and form checks. Click the button below to get quality coaching from a Starting Strength Coach and start getting stronger TODAY.