Various Barbell Drills

Weightlifting has been a sanity saver in the absence of a reliable archery range and has actually given me far better results for the time involved, although I do try to get to a decent range when I can.

Monday was a pretty standard barbell class with hang power snatches, snatch pulls, and overhead squats. I was actually late for class courtesy of a doctor's visit that ran overtime and was in a bit of a mood from that combined with traffic and a less-than-helpful fuzzball.

First were the power snatches, where I still have a tendency to row the bar in as well as not always remembering to drop down fast enough. Apparently I also sometimes forget to get the knees back under the bar. It's a learning process, but it can also get pretty steep.

Then there were the snatch pulls to help with positioning, timing, and maintaining smoothness.  Again, I do struggle there with my tendency to row the bar in, but that's where block pulls start coming in handy, as well as remembering some of the cues I've learned.

To cap it off on Monday, there were some overhead squats, which are my strength and one of my favorite, most comforting lifts.  Granted, I struggle to get very much over my head, but if it safely gets over my head and stays up there, I can overhead squat it.

So today (Tuesday), I worked on some drills based on my observations of where I tend to struggle on my snatches.  One thing I have learned from a mixture of working with Coach J and following sites like Ma Strength and observing other athletes is how to address form faults.  Coach J has been especially helpful in teaching me what to look out for and what will likely help me reinforce better movement patterns. I ended up working on my drop snatches because I have some trouble dropping down quickly enough on my snatches as well as block snatch pulls because I have some trouble with timing and positioning on my pulls.

I do have a tendency to not be very smooth or continuous on my drop snatches and turn it into a bit of a piecewise function when it should be a continuous function where there's no abrupt change in direction.  And then there were the snatch pulls from the blocks... Apparently I was able to finally figure out how to get my knees back under the bar in a timely manner, although it was very subtle and Coach J had to point it out to me.