Trap Bar Deads for Tall Athletes

Most of the basketball players I have been around are lazy. You have a big fight on your hands to get them to squat low.

Because of this, I would hypothesize that one reason of the utilization of the trap bar deadlift is because the strength coach is tired of watching 1/16 squats.

I personally like trap bar deadlifts, except the trap bars at my gym can only hold 6 plates which inhibits my max effort day. I use them mostly as an auxillary movement now.

Arioch you also have to consider Torque

the lever arm on a tall person is much longer and will effect the amount of force required to move weights

[quote]Cowboy92 wrote:
I personally like trap bar deadlifts, except the trap bars at my gym can only hold 6 plates which inhibits my max effort day. I use them mostly as an auxillary movement now.[/quote]

6 per side, or total?

If per side, that means you can trap bar deadlift more than 565 which is pretty respectable. That being said, I recently did these and just used two 100 lb. plates per side (in addition to 45’s) b/c I was worried I would run out of room.

6 per side without a collar. My gym has Iron Grip plates which I believe to be a bit thicker than standard iron plates.

The trap bar is one where the handle is elevated. It would be an inch or two higher than a normal bar.

Obviously safety becomes a concern when the weight is that far out without a collar so I will rarely go beyond five plates. Iron Grip plates suck to pull with as well.

That’s weird. The trap bar I use the handles are lower than the regular bar, which makes it a little harder.

machine, there is a difference between a Gerard trap bar and a super deadlift bar. The deadlift bar has raised handles and is shaped more like a box.

[quote]Cowboy92 wrote:
Most of the basketball players I have been around are lazy. You have a big fight on your hands to get them to squat low.

Because of this, I would hypothesize that one reason of the utilization of the trap bar deadlift is because the strength coach is tired of watching 1/16 squats.

I personally like trap bar deadlifts, except the trap bars at my gym can only hold 6 plates which inhibits my max effort day. I use them mostly as an auxillary movement now.[/quote]

Cowboy,

That is a very good point. A strength coach might not be able to monitor every athlete individually during his whole workout. With a deadlift, you either pick it up or you don’t. A full squat can very easily become a half squat as the weighth increases.

The person who discussed Torque is very correct. We have talked about this before on this forum…

The person with worse leverage actually has to create far creater muscle tension to overcome the weight…plus the distance traveled is very far… remember that strength, when looked at from a muscular tension standpoint is very different than athletics… but it underlies performance for sure…

Strength is the ability to produce a tension over the duration of the lift… so tall people have another disadvantage in that the long stroke length requires that the tension not only be greater to overcome leverage issues, but also be maintained longer due to stroke length…

It is simply very difficult for a taller guy to produce enough tension to overcome the leverage disadvantages…

This is why there is a standard, but it is more an art than science… relative strength does matter, but it is tough to compete with the shorter guys who have full muscle bellies.

One of you physics geeks want to explain this better… ? And come up with some kind of a formula…?

That is why a guy who is 7’ with narrowish shoulder isn’t ever going to push numbers like Ed Coan… period…

After all of this hemming and hawing, I will say that basketball players are many times weak just because they are pusses who shy away from the work…

There, I said it. And I consult for smaller collegiate strength programs concerning basketball…

at the top levels, they are tough as nails… but the lower level guys whine…

But then wonder why they aren’t bigtime…hmmm

J

[quote]jtrinsey wrote:
In any case, trap bar deads are definitly a great exercise. In my opinion, they are the best glute exercise you can do.[/quote]

Man, that’s for sure. Nothing gives me sore glutes like trap bar deadlifts.