Improve Deadlifts By Fixing Anterior Pelvic Tilt

When we asked what you wanted to cover this week, the response was enormous. As a whole, you requested more advice on deadlift, so that’s what we’re covering here. We’re also sharing resources, news, and a powerlifting diet recommendation. As always, we’re also including a poll to ask what you want to hear more about in our next newsletter.

This Week’s Resources

• Deadlifting With Anterior Pelvic Tilt: What is it, and How to Fix?

• Should You Brace for Deadlifts?

• How to Train Your Back for Deadlifting

• Popular This Week: The 5×5 Workout Program

• How Many Calories Do You Need on a Powerlifting Diet?

• Trending: Olympic Weightlifter Dislocates Finger, Resets It, Continues (Instagram)

What is Deadlifting with an Anterior Pelvic Tilt, and How Do You Fix It?

Deadlifting with an anterior pelvic tilt is when your pelvis is tilted forward when you're in the deadlift position.

Here are 7 reasons why an anterior pelvic tilt happens during deadlifts:

• Over cueing chest up

• Not knowing how to brace

• Center of mass over the forefoot

• Poor abdominal and hamstring control

• Too much anxiety over back rounding

• Over cueing hip hinge

• Misunderstanding back angle in deadlifts

You can fix it by doing deadlift variations such as trap bar deadlifts, doing corrective exercises like the cat-camel, and remembering to keep your hips close to the barbell as you deadlift.

Trap Bar Deadlifts

If you’re looking to fix anterior pelvic tilt, you may want to try this variation. Here’s my advice on trap bar deadlifts.

We also have a guide that shows the difference between trap bar deadlift and front squat.

The trap bar deadlift uses a trap bar, sometimes referred to as a “hex bar” due to its hexagonal shape.

Usually, this specialty bar is enclosed (requiring the athlete to step inside to lift it) and shorter than a standard barbell but still weighing 45 pounds.

Trap bars typically have two sets of neutral-grip handles: a lower set even in height to the trap bar’s loadable sleeves and an upper set raised by a few inches.

How Many Calories Do You Need for Powerlifting?

The top priority in any diet is figuring out how many calories must be consumed. You can do that by determining how much you naturally burn (BMR) and how active you are (activity level).

If calories are too high, you may put on unwanted body fat.

If calories are too low, you may lose too much weight and not have the energy needed for your training.

If you want to gain muscle, then eat more. If you want to get leaner, then eat less. We’ve got a protein intake calculator to help you determine how much you’ll need to eat as a powerlifter.

How To Train Your Back for Deadlifting

When you structure back workouts for powerlifting, you want to make sure the exercises you're doing have a high transfer effect to the squat, bench press, and deadlift.

In other words, you're not just doing back exercises to get a more ‘aesthetic-looking' back, like a bodybuilder.

Rather, you're training your back muscles to ultimately improve your squat, bench press, and deadlift, either by increasing overall back strength or by preventing any potential injuries that might occur from not training your back.

There are generally two types of back exercises, which have to do with the direction and range of motion the weight is traveling: vertical pulling and horizontal pulling exercises.

• Vertical pulling exercises are when the weight is moving up and down (perpendicular to the floor).

• Horizontal pulling exercises are when the weight is moving side to side (horizontally to the floor), or when your torso is positioned horizontally to the floor and you’re pulling weight toward your chest.

If you incorporate at least one vertical pulling and one horizontal pulling exercise into your back workout then you should be using all of the muscle groups in your back.

You may want to try the Rep Fitness Functional Trainer for some of these types of exercises. It’s one of our top-rated home gym setups.