Can Olympic Lifts Make You Jump Higher?
Welcome everybody to the THP Strength podcast. Today, we are going to be answering the question, do Olympic lifts help you to jump higher? But before we do that, first I want to thank our sponsors, our kind and gracious sponsors, THP Strength online coaching. If you want to jump higher, they have a guarantee where you can gain at least three inches of work going six months and if not, they'll train you for free until you do. And for a limit limited time only, it's only $99 a month as opposed to $700 a month.
Isaiah:The price will be going up once they reach capacity. So take advantage of that while you still can, and yeah, I'll give you guys a discount too. If you want 10% off your first month, use the code THP at checkout. Having said that, let's answer the question. John, do Olympic lifts help you to jump higher?
John:Sorry guys. We're trying to dial in the audio here so it sounds beautifully crisp for you boys. Also, we're in
Isaiah:a car because it's raining and we didn't feel like doing the podcast indoors. Yeah. So that's why.
John:That's why we're gonna car today. So the question, do they do they help? You want my my lens on this? Is that like what what my opinion is?
Isaiah:Yeah. Actually Should we do our experiences first?
John:There's so many ways we could approach this. I guess yeah. Actually, yeah. Let's do that. I like that.
John:Alright. So have has Olympic lifting helped me in my vertical increase? Okay. And have I seen it increase with other athletes? Me personally, yes.
John:I absolutely think it has. Without them, I don't think I would be near the one foot jumper that I am. And as a two foot jumper, I very, very concretely think that they have helped a lot. When I have jumped the highest and then also some of the athletes that I've coached, when they've jumped the highest is when their power cleans have gone up. Right?
John:And it's not like, oh, I just learned the lift and they see a big jump. It's like as their power clean goes up, they jump higher, both off vert and approach vertical. They are very strongly correlated in my opinion. I I think that if you're doing regular two foot jumping, then even one foot jumping. I see I see it probably correlate better.
John:Hang power clean correlates better with one foot jumping, I think, especially high jump than maybe other any other metric I've seen personally for me. Maybe just getting really, really strong. High jump's a little bit different, but power clean for sure. And then, in terms of coaching athletes, again, I I see that all the time. So I've seen it with you.
John:I've seen it with Austin. The potential to jump high is much higher as their power clean goes up. We're only talking about power clean. I'm not even gonna get into Snatch or any of the other lifts right now, but whether you're good at them or not, it doesn't matter. What I see is that as you get better at them, people jump jump higher.
John:Yeah. That's what I've seen.
Isaiah:Yeah. That I mean, that has been my experience with it. I actually have a pretty big background with Olympic lifting. The reason being is my stepdad, he was an Olympic weightlifter when he was in college. He was actually a elite level Olympic weightlifter.
Isaiah:He won athlete of the year, for Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico. Think like 2003 for all all college sports. And growing up, I would always watch VHS tapes of him lifting. He taught me lifting technique with a broomstick, when I was really little, and I was always fascinated by the sport.
Isaiah:And when I was around 14, 15 years old, that's when I started doing Olympic weightlifting and looking up YouTube videos about it. Looked up a lot to guys like, Clarence Kennedy, the Chinese everybody in the Chinese Olympic weightlifting team. So that was my inspiration for doing the Olympic lift, specifically power cleaning. And then when I when I started playing high school basketball, the coaches would make us do power cleans, and that was at both the schools that I that I went to in high school. So it was always something that I did, and I would specifically, would squat a lot and I would power clean a lot.
Isaiah:And as I started improving a lot and jumping every single day this is very distracting by the way.
John:I'm sorry, dude. I'm trying to tighten this. It keeps falling and you falling out of the frame. Oh. Otherwise, I wouldn't do it.
John:Yeah. Like it literally, it's like I set it up and then it just goes and sinks down because the lens is too big. Yeah. And when it rests on this, it gets shaky as shit. Uh-oh.
John:There's a reason guys. Okay? If you're not watching, I'm I'm trying to adjust the camera to get it to set where it needs to be. But yeah.
Isaiah:I started jumping every day and it's interesting because I I feel like a lot of athletes that had that period of jumping every day just jumped and they didn't really focus on the weight room. I always did both. Like I was jumping a lot and then I was lifting a lot and I was specifically I was power cleaning a lot. And again as I jumped higher my power clean has continued to rise and rise and rise and there has been a pretty freaking strong correlation between me hitting a PR power clean and jumping my highest ever. Like, think every time I have PR'd my vertical, I have hit a PR power clean, like, two to four weeks prior prior to that.
Isaiah:Right. So it's an big indicator of my readiness as well.
John:I That's maybe another question. Like, let's say you let's say, like, you didn't power clean at all. Yeah. Right? Do you think it's that you would just know it's like an assessment for you, like an assessment tool
Isaiah:for you? So I've been thinking about this because there is an argument to be made, like, like, maybe, like, correlation doesn't mean there's causation. Like, the power clean might not be the driver. Like, were
John:there other factors? Is jumping the reason your power clean's going up? Yeah. Like, what
Isaiah:if I Who are we
John:to know? Who are we to say?
Isaiah:Yeah. If I had if I had like, if all other things the same, if I had taken out power cleans, would I still have would I be jumping 50.5 inch vertical? I guess that's the more interesting Yeah. The more interesting question. I'll give my anecdotal experiences.
John:Because we've taken out With it. Cleans, I feel like, before.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:What about pulls? Take out pulls, take out power cleans, take out everything. So the big lift derivative.
Isaiah:I think if I were to take out pulls completely, I wouldn't have hit 50.5 inch vertical. I don't think my vertical would like that. Pull be feeling strong pulling from the ground usually results in me jumping well.
John:What if you only did a hex bar jump?
Isaiah:That's a good question. That is a that is a very good question.
John:Every time I ever programmed oleys, we just put hex bar jump in. Yeah. So And all we did was look at VVT. Yeah. Yeah.
John:I
Isaiah:think there is a possibility I would still jump I think
John:it could. I think it could potentially work. Yeah. It's just that I think your compliance on that wouldn't necessarily be great.
Isaiah:I would get really bored.
John:I think you get a super bored.
Isaiah:I think
John:you become super monotonous. I think your buy in would drop. Yep.
Isaiah:So so I thought about this exact question. Like, I think I was, like, taking a shower or something, and I was like
John:That's the best times. Taking a shit and taking a shower is the greatest times to think about training questions.
Isaiah:And I was thinking about it and I think I think that there's three main benefits to OEs in my opinion. One is your intent is way freaking higher. Mhmm. And with intent, I feel like oh, actually, four. I think the catch is specific.
Isaiah:If you're going really heavy and you're catching in a half squat, it is one of the most we were talking in a different podcast about how there's lifts where I'm just like this transit. This feels just like a jump. Like Right. You know how my two foot and when I when I catch a heavy ass clean, when it's like 90 plus percent of my max, and I'm catching it right there on the half squat, it feels like when I've I'm running fast as hell and I hit that one two, and I'm at the bottom of my plan. Feels really similar to that.
Isaiah:So I think that transfers over really really well. The intent, I don't think you could hit the same intent and I guess like more plyometric like the strength speed similar like squat jumps, hex bar jumps, that type of thing. Right. I just don't try as hard. I think psychologically, I can't try as hard.
John:Like, even on pulls, like, it's different. Yesterday was a great example. You missed two eighty five. Right? Is that what it was?
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:Like, you were pulling the hell out of the bar on Mhmm. On Monday.
Isaiah:Yesterday, you would have had because I was fatigued, so my power thing was down, like, 35 pounds. If you would have had me do, like, squat jumps, I would not have been trying. I'm like Yeah. Yeah. They're going away.
Isaiah:But the weight, it's like there's
John:a goal. There's 85%. Mhmm. You have to hit 87.5% or 90%.
Isaiah:Which I guess if you had VBT though on a hex bar jump or a squat bar jump where you have to hit a certain velocity.
John:Yeah. I just The question is like, would you get bored? Yeah.
Isaiah:I mean, I definitely would get bored. And I do genuinely enjoy
John:Olympic lifting. It's fun. It's a fun skill. It's badass. Mhmm.
John:And it's it's a it's a great equalizer. Like, when I look at Ollie's and I'm looking at an athlete who wants to train and get better and they they're about it, to me it's like, if you don't wanna do Ollies, you're not about it. If you don't wanna master the technique Yeah. You're never gonna be you're never gonna reach your genetic potential.
Isaiah:Well, that's that's where my the third the third thing that was I gonna say. Well, the other one real quick, I think variety.
John:Oh, yeah.
Isaiah:Variety is a freaking training law for adaptation and Olympic lifting is just another tool that you can add variety with. It just expands your
John:A bad ass one.
Isaiah:Yeah. Yeah. Expands your training bag and allows you to keep making progress for a longer period of time. Because they're probably in the few in the near future, we probably at some point, we'll take Olympic lifts out and mess around with x bar jumps just for the stimulus, for the for the novelty of it. But, yeah, the the variety and then lastly, the coordination.
Isaiah:If you can learn how to Olympic lift properly, you'll become a better athlete as a result. The guy on the horse.
John:What the fuck? What the fuck?
Isaiah:We're literally driving down a like a a pretty urbanized area. What would you call it?
John:Like a a regular city. Like it like it's a downtown road leading from downtown
Isaiah:And there's a guy riding a horse on the sidewalk. Crawding, like high stepping.
John:Look, bro. It's almost like electric cars, you know, like, soon enough, electric car if you're in a petrol, it's gonna be like, ah, it's like horseback riding. You just enjoy the sights and sounds and
Isaiah:That smells of so funny.
John:Yeah. That was that's crazy. Anyways,
Isaiah:yeah, you'll you'll be a better athlete. You're gonna you're gonna learn to learn motor skills a lot better. Like, I feel like I've become a better athlete from having to teach myself Olympic lifts, studying it. You learn how to study too. Like, when you're obsessed with, like, Olympic lifting, you're watching videos, and you're taking videos yourself, and you make an adjustment, like, you learn how to learn.
Isaiah:And then it teaches you how to time things properly.
John:Here's a dude, here's another good question. This just came to mind and I had to interrupt. Who you look at our athletes as a whole. Right?
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:Think about all the athletes with incredible Olympic lifting technique. Yeah. Good Ole technique, lift big numbers. Generally speaking, when you look at their ability to dunk I'm just gonna name some names real quick. Isaiah Rivera, you might have heard
Isaiah:of him.
John:Yeah. He's good.
Isaiah:Jordan Kugannon, Jonathan Clark.
John:Think of our athletes too. Dan Gross. Yep.
Isaiah:Austin. Austin Bird. Austin. Trying to think of some some other guys. Trying to think of, like, elite.
Isaiah:But I just I just named guys that are at the top. At the top basically, tippy top of two foot verticals. Yep. Two foot dunkers. They all have sensational like, if you were to take a 100 athletes, they would be in the top 1% of of Olympic lifting technique.
John:Right.
Isaiah:I would say. Yeah. All of them. We lifted with Dan. I've seen Kogan in Olympic lift.
Isaiah:I've seen
John:Jay Clark lift. Kogan's got a good power thing?
Isaiah:Mhmm.
John:Good. I didn't know that.
Isaiah:And They all
John:I mean, for our athletes Success leaves clues. Success leaves clues. I'm thinking about our athletes and, like, off the top of my head, you know, I have a couple of guys that come to mind. That guy Lucas that we just started coaching. Yeah.
John:Amazing Olympic weight lifting technique. Jumps really, really high. As hell. Yep. Powerful as hell.
John:Josh Ruble? Josh Ruble. Two fifty, two fifty five. I no. Maybe two sixty five.
Isaiah:I think he just hit two sixty or two sixty five. Yeah. He's he's
John:beat beating my PR. You know, he's dunks the shit out of the ball. We got as as Dom's Olympic lifting technique has gotten better and his power clean has gone up, So it's his vertical. Hunter Gastona Mhmm. Got his clean up.
John:His hit just hit two zero five. Better at Olympic lifting, better at dunking. Right? Yeah. The guy tagged you in yesterday.
John:Shoot. Why is he he's baited dunk camp in July. Oh, Trenton Pierce? Trenton Pierce. Repping two seventy five for doubles.
John:East base. Right? Yeah.
Isaiah:Really really good. Or better off the dribble at five or And
John:it's it's like the thing is it's not necessarily like how much weight they do. It's almost the way that they do it. Yep. They have good technique. They look proficient.
John:Yeah. They look proficient. And they look great second pull.
Isaiah:And high relative strength numbers Yeah.
John:In the
Isaiah:power clean.
John:High relative strength numbers in the power clean. Like, they generally jump very, very high. That's that's what I've seen. I've seen it with one foot. I've seen it with two foot.
John:High jumpers, like I said, dude, some of the craziest numbers I've ever seen for relative power comes from high jumpers. Like, Mikey Hoffer
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:If you can power clean
Isaiah:Freaky numbers, bro.
John:Shit ton. Even Jordan Western power cleans like a decent amount. And his technique's not even proficient. I've seen crazy numbers from jumpers, track guys in the power clean, like freaky freaky relative strength numbers. Yep.
John:And it's usually from, you know, the the elite elite jumpers. And I think for us, it's like, why would we not use that? I'll tell you what I really haven't seen, elite jumpers who care about their hex bar jump. Yeah. I've never seen an elite jumper like that was like, I really give a shit about my hex bar jump.
John:Like, that's proficient with technique, that's proficient with, you know, technique in the weight room and then also in their jump technique. Yeah. Like, doesn't really happen. Not really a conversation at all.
Isaiah:So having said all that, do you think it is a driver of vertical jump performance or more or more of an assessment?
John:I think it's I think it's deeper than that. Like, it's coordination is so complex. I don't think it's this thing where it's like, oh, you display more power and power clean, you jump higher. Yeah. Like, I don't think it's that I don't think it's like that.
John:I think it's like to have good Olympic lifting technique, you have to be very obsessed with getting good at the little things. Yeah. And I think that that is the same mindset that you need to have with Yo. Jumping. That's something It does improve power.
John:Like, we do see research articles where it does improve power.
Isaiah:Don't get
John:me wrong. And your vertical jump does go up, it is a great power exercise. But for what we do, I think it's that your attention to detail and your focus on improving those things, those aspects in training Yeah. You know, and and just getting after it and building fatigue using that exercise. That got bright fast.
John:You're gonna kill me, but I gotta turn that down. I think that's more about why why they get better. You know?
Isaiah:I also think so specificity is really important for adaptation. The more similar in exercises to what you're trying to improve, the more transfer it's gonna have. And one of the things that's really important, the reason like compound lifts are so much better than like a single joint exercise is because jumping is also complex in a in a compound movement. And what's really similar what's really interesting about power cleans is they mimic not just the jump itself, but even it's like the penultimate into the plant into triple Yeah. Attention is like I
John:haven't even talked about the biomechanics of why I think it's really effective. Yeah. Like honestly, I have not even touched on that. And like if you were just to look at the movement patterns of a two foot jump and the movement patterns of a power clean, they are so freaking similar. I mean, it is insane up until the second pull.
John:Yep. Like, you wanna do the catch, don't do the catch.
Isaiah:Including the approach. Like, not just Like,
John:if you're you're in this you're in a semi bent knee position, I. E. The penultimate step, you extend off of that just like you do off of the penultimate step. And then when you plant your leg. Right?
John:So that that's like somewhat similar. Right? But then but then if you're just talking about mid flight to touchdown of the the plant foot and block foot, like the plant foot is so similar. It's unbelievable. You go from what is essentially bent knee position.
John:Right? When you're in flight, then you you extend the knee, which is the second pole. You contact the ground. What is at the end of the first or sorry, the first pole. At the end of the first pole, you contact the ground, your leg is completely straight.
John:Right? Your shins if you were rotating the whole body, your shins would be vertical, just like a power clean. If you took a power clean, right, and you rotated it, it would look like touchdown of the plant foot. Yeah. That like, you took the shin angle and you rotated it to where that would be.
John:Mhmm. It's gonna look exactly like the plant foot touching down. And then you bend the knee just like you do in a power clean.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:So And then you explode out of that position.
Isaiah:So there
John:there Just like a power clean.
Isaiah:There's two things I I wanna address. One, I I wanna talk about how, like, I guess tips for increasing your power clean. But before we get into that, what would you say about the argument that the ground contact times are way longer So than a power clean than a two foot jump or a one foot jump?
John:Look at the second pull. The second pull of a power clean is a hundred and thirty milliseconds, milliseconds, maybe less. Ho ho ho. It's very very very very very fast.
Isaiah:How how fast what are ground contact times for one and two foot jumps?
John:Two foot jumping is three hundred milliseconds. One foot jumping is about a 180. If you looked at from amortization upwards, like the push up phase that, like like, from the double knee bend to pushing up out of that position, the time frames are very, very similar. Like, you're looking at I mean, depends on the weight. You get anywhere from, like, I think a hundred milliseconds to, like, one sixty.
John:Yeah. Depends on how proficient you are.
Isaiah:And that's at what point of the power clean?
John:That's like when the knees get to the deepest position of the double knee bend to extension.
Isaiah:Okay.
John:You're looking at roughly the same time interval. Right? And I'm not saying like in terms of specificity, I always think there should be at least a degree of separation away. Like, otherwise, why not just jump with weights on your back? Why not just go do approach jumps with dumbbells or something?
John:You know, I think there needs to be a degree of separation away from that. Thomas Court
Isaiah:and Barry a topic for another podcast. Yeah. But I every time I do a q and a, I get asked, weighted vest. Weighted vest. Like, it's like so it's such a common question.
John:Weighted vest. I don't know. I I don't really think it's yeah. That's another conversation. Yeah.
John:But, you know, I I think that time interval is very similar. Now the joint angles, in terms of specificity, you're at some point, you're gonna be in a quarter squat of the jump as you're coming up. Right? Now maybe you don't have as much double knee bend, but it's quite a bit for for guys, you know, and they're up on the ball of their foot. It's a very you're in your strongest position.
John:You're you're in a good leverage position, your strongest position, your most powerful position. You know, a jump you might get into more flexion or whatever else, but in terms of the velocities, like, it's pretty high. And then that double knee bend, like, it happens really fast. You know, you go from being in the second the end of the first pole where your hips are back, you're like a silver back gorilla position to the bottom of the double knee put, like, pretty quick. And then you get out of that position pretty quick.
John:Even if it's four hundred fifty milliseconds, that's pretty fucking close. Yeah. You're moving 300 pounds, you know, in your case or something like that or, you know, I I'm actually I'm gonna pull my phone out because I am curious on we wanna know how long it takes to get in and out of I don't even oh, here's my phone. We wanna know how long it takes to get in and out of the bottom of the double knee bend Yeah. That we're looking at?
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:I'm not I don't but we don't have to wonder. We can look this up. Are we gonna look at one of yours or one of mine?
Isaiah:Let's look at one of mine.
John:One of yours? Yeah. Oh, I might only have, like, 20 You need a power thing?
Isaiah:For a second. A power thing?
John:I probably have one of I mean, I have one of yours. I don't know, like like, what frame rate it'll be. Like, this is one right here. This is probably 24 frames per second. That's okay.
John:Let's get a
Isaiah:little bit of part number.
John:Alright.
Isaiah:The app we're using, by the way, is MyJump two. If you if you
John:It's want a red, blue, and a green.
Isaiah:This is not a sponsor. They don't pay us.
John:Yeah. They're they're not
Isaiah:paying us. Probably should set up an affiliate thing with them, but it's how we measure flight times, ground contact times, RSI. Alright.
John:So I'll just go from the bottom of the second pool to extension. Yeah. Here, here, or here? Well, let's just look at the knee. Let's just go to the knees full extension.
Isaiah:Yeah. Right there.
John:Yeah. Right there. Off the catch. Doesn't matter. Okay.
John:So you you take a hundred and fifty milliseconds with 300 pounds to get from the out of amortization to the top to get to terminal knee extension. A 130 to a 160. Yeah. Because I I went on the the slower end
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:For it. That's fast. That's really fast for knee extension exercises. Alright. So that's one.
John:Alright. Then we wanna look at what it is
Isaiah:You know what's crazy?
John:Double bend.
Isaiah:Wait. Wait. Wait. You know what's crazy?
John:What's that? So that's from That's the entire portion of the second pull concentrically. Until the catch? Dude, just from the from the your knees being extended, they dip under, swing under. So from that position to extension is a 100
Isaiah:brought the bar up. Right? It's just up to the catch.
John:No. No. No. No. So it's let's see how I can explain this.
Isaiah:I'd have to see it visually.
John:Yeah. Yeah. I'm gonna I'm gonna try to show you where this
Isaiah:As I'm as I'm driving.
John:Yes. So it's it's from from oh, this is where Austin bangs his face. From here to here is a 130.
Isaiah:You know what's crazy? Milliseconds. Ground contact time for me is point two six. That's exactly half. Yeah.
Isaiah:There you go. Well, let's see That's
John:like Let's see from the double knee bend. I'd be curious from the double knee bend.
Isaiah:That's exactly we're looking at essentially half. Like, ground contact time with my plant leg to toe off. But touchdown of the plant leg on a two foot jump to toe off of the two foot jump, for me is point two six. He's looking at what essentially is half that movement and it was 13 a 130 Between
John:a 130 to a 160.
Isaiah:Which is
John:like So now extremely specific. Alright. So let's go from the start the end of the first pull
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:To triple extension.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:We'll say there. So that's contact. It's three thirty three. That's close. That's at your top top weights, bro.
John:That's very That's favoring. So you're probably at three hundred to three hundred and thirty milliseconds
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:To get through the the double knee bend and triple extension. Extension.
Isaiah:That's very specific. That's very specific. Slightly lower weights than max. Like if I'm probably at Yeah.
John:You're probably like
Isaiah:It's probably percent.
John:Right at Just trying to move it a little faster.
Isaiah:Highest the highest specificity.
John:We should look at that. That'd be a good idea. We try to figure out at what weight do you
Isaiah:Yeah. Do you
John:hit the same
Isaiah:I bet you there would be a correlation between how easy I do those weights.
John:I bet you it's like two twenty five, how two twenty five feels.
Isaiah:Yeah. There's just a high. I wonder if I could have a three
John:twenty five lift. That's crazy.
Isaiah:There's there's that argument about ground contact times.
John:Yeah. And then if you're gonna look at just like the forces and stuff, we overload clean pulls which helps the first pull and then, you know, like that helps you power clean more weight Yeah. And you're moving you create a reserve where you move the lighter weights faster and your power output goes up at those even more specific angles. Yep. So it's like, there you go.
John:There's a lesson in specificity for you. Because you
Isaiah:know what
John:you don't unless you're doing a counter movement hex bar jumps, you're not gonna get the same velocity. I don't even know with movement hex bar jump, you could even get close. Yeah. They're the same. I I bet you the eccentric forces on that would be a lot higher.
John:Well, obviously, you have eccentric forces. You don't have eccentric forces in the double knee bend. Yeah. You're dealing with eccentric forces in a in a clean, but it's with your leg completely straight. Yeah.
John:You know? Like, it's like you're breaking from support until in a straight leg position, like, you're you're breaking so much of the force at that point. Mhmm. For the first, you know, thirty milliseconds of ground contact at that point, it's probably is kinda similar to Yeah. To a clean as well by the time you're actually like getting into flexion and stuff.
John:So, yeah, I think it's probably does it feel I mean, the catch you said feels very similar
Isaiah:The catch yeah. The catch is super similar. Like at the
John:bottom where you do amortize. That's where you get the eccentric forces.
Isaiah:Yeah. Yeah.
John:So I think it's I feel it when the double knee bend happens a lot in my knee. When it's really like in my heavy heavy weights and I'm pushing power output.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:When I'm pushing p,
Isaiah:pushing power. I'm to I'm trying to think of how that part of the lift feels. The only thing that's different from that part of the lift is the joint angle isn't as deep. What do you mean? In the double knee bend.
John:When you're doing jump? Yeah. It probably feels more like
Isaiah:my block foot. Like the block foot pushing off is how the double knee bend.
John:I don't get as deep as you do in obviously cleans. That's also a big part of it. Like, you really deep relative to what I do.
Isaiah:So now so you explained why you should do power cleans and our argument for helping your jumping. How do you increase it?
John:Bro, I love watching cleans too. Just the way your quads freaking pop out and your calves get loaded up, man. I'm just watching my lift here. You guys can see this. I'm just watching myself just freaking looking the way.
John:Here we go. Just watching myself look like a absolute freaking unit. Oh, I love it. Well, what a great lift. So wait.
John:What was your next what was your
Isaiah:next How do you how do you
John:increase it? How do you increase your clean? Yeah. Oh, this is just some OLE lifting science. So if you're an OLE lifter I mean, what they do is a little bit different.
John:Like, when I worked with Vance, he did some interesting stuff. Like, he would do a lot of a lot of different stuff. He would really start with super high volumes of movements early early in the year. So, like, I think that they would around the spring. Yeah.
John:Because Taylor just did shout out Taylor Turner and Vance Newgard. They mentored me a lot. Well, Vance specifically, but Taylor still works with him. She's kind of his top dog. And I think he coaches at Bruton Parker, is what it's called or something like that.
John:Anyway, so he taught me a bunch about the progressions and then also kinda how he does it. And I saw a lot of it. They track load volume, I a lot of the time. So it'll be, like, how much weight you lifted by the, like, total. Like like, so if you did, like, a 100 pounds for 10 reps, it's a thousand for load volume.
John:Yeah. So he would track that for, like, all of his athletes. And And that number, when he was, like, building volume and stuff, that number would skyrocket. Yeah. So he would do, like, 55 pounds for, like, sets of fifteen, five by 15 on backswat.
John:A lot of the time, you know, he he would use load volume and he'd follow the same principle. So volume would go high to low, you know, that number would go from higher numbers to lower numbers. Yeah. And obviously, you're gonna see massive jumps because if you take a set out, you're gonna lose a thousand on one single exercise. And if you're just doing bench press or something, that's an easy way to get it to go up.
John:So he would use that a lot. And then he also would do, you should just go to Chick fil A bro. Just go
Isaiah:to the Chick fil Bada.
John:That's what I'm thinking. He used that number a lot. He also used generally the scheme where your heavy heavy lifts are like Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and then your general days were those Tuesday, Thursdays. I'm pretty sure that's what he would do. So similar to what we do.
John:Yeah. But he would like squat heavy. I think like back squats would be on Monday and he would pair that with like heavy snatch or no, heavy clean. You pair that with heavy clean and then he would pair like heavy snatch with heavy front squat so that you're able to, like, balance those things, which makes sense. Right?
John:Kinda like balancing qualities. And then he would do, like, I think split jerk on either accessory days or Fridays. And then maybe some, like, accessory work, maybe one of the other squats. And then he would do a lot of, like, complexes and stuff, pulls and stuff like that on Tuesday, Thursdays, or he would do that after, like, his accessory work kind of. Yeah.
John:But usually, they'd pick, like, two big lifts on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and pair them. So I think I'm pretty sure it was like either full clean and jerk or like really heavy full cleans and shit. And then this would be like during specific cycles. I don't know. That I guess I'm getting too far into the weeds.
John:How we do it is a little bit different. Typically, what I like to do for guys to get their power clean up is really boost up their poles, their ability to pull. So clean pole, panda pole, high pole. What else? What other thing poles that we do?
John:At super maximum weights of their power clean.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:That's how I typically get the pool better. And then I'll start with usually density with the cleans, like power cleans and stuff. Not I don't do full cleans usually with my my jumping athletes because they are not very proficient at them and they don't really need to do it. And I'll usually load their squat, you know, either front or back squat. So I like to unload their legs in the Ollies and just focus on power, that being the main emphasis of it.
John:You're gonna get higher power outputs from those guys in PowerClean and PowerSnatch. So typically, I'll do those like two to three times a week, and then I'll start with lower percentages earlier in the year. And then later in the year, you know, I'll I'll actually, I won't even do sometimes I won't even put power cleaner, power snatch early in the year. It'll just be pulls. Yeah.
John:Because it's more strength emphasis and strength speed. And I'll trend towards the power movements. So power clean, power snatch, like further into the year when I want guys to be more specific. And that's usually where their numbers will go up in those lists, like that second or third mezzo cycle of a six six, month macro cycle. Halfway through, they're usually peaking absolute numbers.
John:And then what I like to do is get them really good in more specific movements, which is gonna be pulling from well, for Isaiah, I always keep at least one power clean day in at least once a week. But other athletes, I'll put hang movements in. I'll pull from blocks to try to see higher velocities and higher power outputs because, again, you're gonna get specificity to jump up by doing that. Pauses. Pauses.
John:I'll put pauses in as well. Pauses I like to use for for general work. That's usually early in the year. But I also do counter movement reps. So I'll tell Isaiah, you know, I want you to drop the bar from a high height, catch it, and basically try to change direction really quickly.
John:And usually, that's really, really good for, getting guys eccentrically stronger. Right? So if Isaiah is at the top of a rack or, you know, rack position, I say drop down and then get out catch it and get out of the bar out of that position again. Or a counter movement clean where they're kind of like standing up tall and then they drop down into it and then change direction really quickly. I've done it with high pulls with Isaiah where I'll say, you know, do a high pull and then as soon as the bar gets down to mid thigh, turn it around and and jump out of that position.
John:I've done that with him before. That stuff's very specific. I usually pair that with, like, fast eccentric loading later in the year. So when we're at the tail ends of the force velocity curve, you know, on on on the curves. Right?
John:You now now can see the tail ends where you're holy cow. Holy guacamole. Yeah. You're on the tail ends of that curve and, you know, that's where you want specificity to be the highest. So, if you only cared about just getting your cleanest high as possible, what I've typically seen happen is just basically daily max twice a week.
John:That works super well when you suck. Just daily max. Worked for Nathan. Worked for me. Doesn't really work super well for you now because you're so well trained that you don't have the luxury of backing off of heavy weights.
John:Yeah. So like I feel like
Isaiah:the most beneficial stuff for me at this point are like heavy pulls off the ground and then lots of volume at sub maximal weights.
John:Lots of volume at sub maximal weights,
Isaiah:you said? Yeah. With like high RPE, like if I'm doing like doubles and triples and it's, like, RPE nine and I'm getting a lot of volume there, I usually tend to see
John:my power clean climb up. The thing too for you is, like, you have to be doing those heavy pulls followed up by heavy power cleans. Yeah. Like, if you and you can't do them the same way, same day. That's a big mistake.
John:I think when guys try to go heavy pulls and then connect the dots to heavy power cleans, it never works. Yeah. It's almost like it's almost like in high jump when guys try to jump off a box and then they take the box away, it's like it does not transfer. Like Mhmm. You wanna try to keep it compartmentalized and not do too much in one day.
John:Like, let the athlete kind of figure out what they need to work on, what they wanna focus on on that given day. And then the next session, focus on something else if if you want to. That's that's what I've seen. Yeah. What any anything else you wanna add to that?
Isaiah:That's pretty good there, man.
John:Do your Olympic lifts.
Isaiah:Yeah.
John:They're worth doing. We didn't even
Isaiah:really catch, but How would you go about learning them too? The big push. Yeah.
John:This is how you learn Ollie's. I think the best way to do it is just grab an empty barbell or something with, like, 10 pound training plates, the, like, bumper plates, make sure you have the right height off the floor. I think that's a big, big error a lot of people don't make. Is he wearing face mask?
Isaiah:I've seen a lot of THP not that's
John:I thought he had some paint. I thought he had face paint on.
Isaiah:That's that's a big mistake I see athletes making, especially if they don't have bumper plates, is they're like Pull with 10 pound It'll be like five. It'll be like five and they'll go from the floor. Like, no,
John:like fucks up.
Isaiah:Start from mid shin.
John:Yeah. From mid shin if you don't have if you don't have
Isaiah:Put the bar on something, put it on a rack, stack up boxes, stack up plates. Don't start from the floor.
John:So the progression I like to do for learning them is I'll teach the first pull and then with a with pauses, typically, I'll add in the second pull, which is a jump. So I'll say, look, take the bar from the floor, pull it up to above the knee, make sure the positioning is perfect, pause there, put the bar back down, and repeat that process. Master the first pull off the floor. Then the next thing I'll say is, okay. Go to the end of the first pull and pause and then jump.
John:So then, you know, they'll do that and then they'll jump and now they've developed the double knee bend. And that's really, really important. That's what Isaiah and I were talking about where the knees kind of sweep under the bar. It's what makes it so different than a dead lift. And then what I'll do is I'll say, okay, let me teach you a front squat.
John:So now they have the front rack position. They know how to catch the bar. Then the next thing I'll do is I'll teach them how to transfer basically the jump to the catch. So I'll I'll keep it simple at first. I'll say jump into a front squat.
John:If that's not happening, and this is usually the toughest part for people is learning how to get the bar from the jump to the catch. I'll say take an empty barbell, and I just want you to do an upright row. Keep the bar as close as possible into a front squat. Keep the bars on the fingertip. I've coached this through so many different power paint tutorials.
John:People that generally struggle with that part is because they lack shoulder mobility or wrist mobility. In which case, you just gotta rep that out with a barbell, like empty barbell. It's basically dynamic flexibility. You know, you're just doing the movement over and over and over again. You could do a 100 reps with the bar a day and it's not really gonna fatigue you that much.
John:It's just low grade, very low intensity fitness work. I recommend guys do that as like a set of 30 or 50, you know, five sets of 10 to warm up. Could You do that every day. You could do that with snatch. You do it with overhead squat.
John:You could do it with front squat. You could do it with back squat. And the bar is not gonna be enough weight where it's gonna fatigue you. Even if you had 40 pounds on the bar or 45 kilo or 40 kilos, eighty eighty five pounds, that's almost no weight. Yeah.
John:So I would just say do a ton a ton of reps. This guy's eyeing up your health kizzy, bro. Yeah. That's how it goes.
Isaiah:Reps, man. Reps with empty barbells. Like, I way too often, I see people with ugly technique trying to max, like, master just the bar. If you can't if it doesn't look good with the bar, it's not gonna look good when you're loading it up with weight. So And then if Especially if you're a THP athlete, master it with lightweights and send us the videos too.
Isaiah:Yeah. Are you trying with with
John:And if it's okay at lighter weights and then, you know, you get to a max and your form goes to shit, you can work off of that number, but I wouldn't max until you can almost rep that with good form in the training. Right? So you so, like, for example, we had an athlete who was struggling. His technique was okay until I got to a max and I went to shit. Like, first off, just drop the bar.
John:Don't try to lift the weight at the cost of your body because you're trying to get it, like, you know, especially wrist and stuff. You know, keep your hand open. That's a huge mistake I see people make. They try to hold on to the bar. I try to coach Austin out of it all the time.
John:Think I'm gonna hit you. Let the bar hit you in the shoulders, you know. And if you're scared of it, you know, clothes lining you, then put a towel around the bar and, try not to fall over when it hits you on the shoulders and the neck. Keep your hand open. That's a big mistake.
John:Don't hold onto the bar. Anything else big mistakes?
Isaiah:It's you know what's crazy? I never realized this, but getting good at catching heavy power cleans helps you so much with being physical in sports.
John:Oh, yeah. All the time.
Isaiah:Like, I'm thinking, like, a power clean is literally, like, a contact sport. It's like getting punched. Yeah. Like you have and you have and you just learn how to like take hits. Like it's really similar to being on a basketball court and jumping in air and someone kinda hits you like What's crazy?
Isaiah:I'm used to a I'm used to a 315 bar moving at high velocities. You're nothing to me.
John:Hammering me. Yeah. Yeah. And you still get fouled into fucking a boogie with those three hundred fifteen pound guys.
Isaiah:It's just So is
John:it last
Isaiah:week weaknesses is my weak my weaknesses in the basketball court is six eight three hundred pound dudes. Yeah. They're impossible to
John:move around. Bigger than Jokic. Way more than Jokic and they just body you. Alright. I think that suffices.
John:I feel like we covered that pretty thoroughly. Mhmm. So if you guys have questions, make sure you leave it in the comment section below. Like the video if you're watching on YouTube and subscribe to his channel. You can go to my channel.
John:It is john evans six two six five. And if you're listening on a streaming platform, give us five stars. Leave a comment if you can. Subscribe if that gives you the option. I think that Spotify lets you do that.
John:And, yeah, I guess we'll catch you guys next time. Go to tpooftrain.com if you want the best training in the entire world. See you guys.
