We need to talk about deadlifts

I’ve never seen two exercises more misunderstood than deadlifts.

I’ll teach you all about two deadlift variations. Romanian Deadlifts, and Stiff Leg Deadlifts. Somehow no one knows what these are…

Look RDLs aren’t even what they were originally.

They used to look COMPLETELY different.

OG RDL Guide

1. Grab the bar with an olympic style clean grip

2. Pull the bar to the top of your thighs with a soft lockout (knees slightly bent)

3. Lower bar to two inches from the platform

4. Return up

This exercise is actually really similar to what an SLDL is now.

Look somewhere along the way the SLDL and RDL have transformed into different things.

It doesn’t matter what they used to be, it matters what they are now.

There’s a really weird thing people say…

“SLDLs start from the floor because they are a deadlift”

Then they’ll talk about how RDLs start from the top…

They’re both deadlifts.

The only thing that makes sense to separate the two is what muscle they bias. I’ll tell you all about the two different ways we perform these exercises to target different muscles. Hint: it’s not about touching the floor.

In fact I want you to completely forget about the bar. Imagine all we’re doing is having a force pulling our arms down.

You know what I’ll stop wasting everyone’s time yapping and just go bullet speed.

• Both movements focus on pushing your butt back

• SLDLs have you push your butt back whilst keeping your knees out of the movement (some small bend is okay)

• RDLs have you push your butt back whilst letting your knees move too

The more you bend over the more the hamstrings are involved in a lift, this is why SLDLs focus on the hamstrings.

When you allow knee bend when bending over you weaken the hamstrings, this makes them work less and makes it more glute.

RDL = Glute + Adductor

SLDL = Hamstring + Adductor

It’s that easy!

If you’re accidentally doing an exercise that’s growing your glutes when you want big hamstrings… switch to SLDL

Stop the movement when your butt stops going back, and keep progressing.

If you want to reduce the eccentric portion because it has irritation to your back etc, learn to brace, or use the safety bars/blocks to let you do the movement deadstop.

If you want to learn more about hamstrings/glutes or lats/chest and how bends and ranges can effect them, checkout todays video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0ay9CFsZbM.

Your Hypertrophy Hero,
Fletcher

P.S. My theory on what’s caused confusion is personal trainers. They’ve been taught some sort of standardised form SLDS TOUCH FLOOR and RDLS GO SLIGHTLY PAST THE KNEE. When this sort of cult understanding gets together we end up going very far from what works, even making exercises worse by having more spine bend etc.