Light Sumo

[LexAnderson]

Posted this in my log, but figured I would post here to get some critiques on my form. Any feedback would be great!

[ShuggyBear]

I'm no expert, but you look pretty solid to me. Chris Duffin has some great Sumo instruction you can check out on youtube, here is one...

[LexAnderson]

I'm no expert, but you look pretty solid to me. Chris Duffin has some great Sumo instruction you can check out on youtube, here is one...

Thanks Shugg! Duffin is really good at explaining things, must be the engineer in him.

[ShuggyBear]

My favorite Deadlift cue is... Wedge Yourself Under The Bar

[mgil]

The only thing I see worth mentioning is your upper back could stand to be tighter on those last reps in the video.

[simonrest]

Are you a competitive powerlifter? Are you training to pull sumo in a meet? In any case, stick with conventional deadlifts. Get massively strong pulling conventional, and then feel free to experiment with sumo.

sorry, couldn't resist.

do you have a 3/4 angle video?
I've had a couple of sessions with a high level (masters) PL coach when I was switching to sumo, but the technical advice I got from that I cannot see side on. FYI it was to do with the shin angle, and the difference in use of the adductors to squeeze the bar off the ground, vs using the quads to push off the ground in the conventional.

If you are using an Ed Coan style narrow sumo though all bets are off. If that's your bag this is probably the best instruction I've seen (from the man himself) and this is what shaped my sumo pull technique (much to the disgust of the PL coach I mentioned above):



In short, I used a slightly wider than grip width stance to open up my hips more, but I still used a lot of quad to initiate the movement. IMO this is a better technique because you can use more muscle mass to start the pull, and then as long as your hips and traps are strong enough to finish it, leads to a bigger pull. Others disagree - JP Cauchie is the record holder in his weight class and he has a very wide stance and uses all adductors to squeeze the bar off the ground. I have a shit pull and am never going to hold any records so maybe just listen to Ed and not me

[LexAnderson]

The only thing I see worth mentioning is your upper back could stand to be tighter on those last reps in the video.

Yeah, I felt it when it happened.

Are you a competitive powerlifter? Are you training to pull sumo in a meet? In any case, stick with conventional deadlifts. Get massively strong pulling conventional, and then feel free to experiment with sumo.

sorry, couldn't resist.

do you have a 3/4 angle video?
I've had a couple of sessions with a high level (masters) PL coach when I was switching to sumo, but the technical advice I got from that I cannot see side on. FYI it was to do with the shin angle, and the difference in use of the adductors to squeeze the bar off the ground, vs using the quads to push off the ground in the conventional.

If you are using an Ed Coan style narrow sumo though all bets are off. If that's your bag this is probably the best instruction I've seen (from the man himself) and this is what shaped my sumo pull technique (much to the disgust of the PL coach I mentioned above):



In short, I used a slightly wider than grip width stance to open up my hips more, but I still used a lot of quad to initiate the movement. IMO this is a better technique because you can use more muscle mass to start the pull, and then as long as your hips and traps are strong enough to finish it, leads to a bigger pull. Others disagree - JP Cauchie is the record holder in his weight class and he has a very wide stance and uses all adductors to squeeze the bar off the ground. I have a shit pull and am never going to hold any records so maybe just listen to Ed and not me

Thanks Simon! Yeah I will get a better angle for you next time! I started with a more narrow Coan stance when I switched to sumo, but I’ve since widened my stance and it’s helped a lot.

[BootyBeech]

Yeah definitely film from slightly to the front or back so we can see your whole body. I pull sumo. I was at 550 at one point but I got injured and now I'm 110lbs down from it, and there's a few things I focus on:
Keeping your knees out and over your feet (I'm always expecting to see a horrific accident with those people you see pulling with almost caved in knees.)
Locking your hips into a solid and low, as your body allows, starting position. You see lots of people pull sumo and nothing happens until they are basically in a massively wide stance conventional.
Research this but I find that if if I can get my knees locked out quickly I have an explosive lockout almost. Check out the Russians for an example of what I mean. Yuri Belkin is a pro at it. It's almost like you are hanging out over the bar for a split second and then BOOM you slam your hips into it.

Anyway, they look good. You have very little, none even, hip movement so you are well on the way.

[ShuggyBear]

Here is a video that popped up on the youtubes this morning that I think you will enjoy.

[LexAnderson]

Yeah definitely film from slightly to the front or back so we can see your whole body. I pull sumo. I was at 550 at one point but I got injured and now I'm 110lbs down from it, and there's a few things I focus on:
Keeping your knees out and over your feet (I'm always expecting to see a horrific accident with those people you see pulling with almost caved in knees.)
Locking your hips into a solid and low, as your body allows, starting position. You see lots of people pull sumo and nothing happens until they are basically in a massively wide stance conventional.
Research this but I find that if if I can get my knees locked out quickly I have an explosive lockout almost. Check out the Russians for an example of what I mean. Yuri Belkin is a pro at it. It's almost like you are hanging out over the bar for a split second and then BOOM you slam your hips into it.

Anyway, they look good. You have very little, none even, hip movement so you are well on the way.

I appreciate the feedback, its nice to find people who actually pull sumo as well here.

Here is a video that popped up on the youtubes this morning that I think you will enjoy.

Belkin is a god among men.

[OCG]

Think of it like a really wide squat, you want to keep those knees out.

You want to push the hips forwards at the start, keeping those knees out and trying to stay more upright and driving up with the chest. You want to maintain that position and just keep pulling until the bar moves, not let yourself come anywhere else to get the bar up. Kinda almost like a high bar squat, you want that vertical back angle.

[LexAnderson]

Kinda almost like a high bar squat, you want that vertical back angle.

THIS! This is the one thing that I have had to really focus on when I switched to sumo.

I watched Cailer Woolam's video on YouTube on how to pull sumo, and he said something that I have found to be very helpful. He said that unlike conventional, in a sumo stance you don't want the bar over the midfoot, you want it as close to the shin as possible. I've since started to do this and it has helped a great deal.

[KOTJ]

I think it's good to start off with a narrow sumo and inch out over the first few weeks.

[LexAnderson]

I think it's good to start off with a narrow sumo and inch out over the first few weeks.

I started with a narrow, Coan-like stance, and over the past several months I’ve widened the stance more.

[ShuggyBear]

The Calgary Barbell youtube channel is putting out some good content.