The other day I got an email with a quesiton from someone that had just read an article I had written a while back for EliteFTS: Rapid Rate of Force Development
He asked:
It’s a good question. My assumption is that he was thinking that the power clean starts off the floor with minimal muscle activity, so it’d require a greater rate of force development to get the bar moving. To an extent, that may be true, but this is based on a couple important assumptions:
- The muscle activity in the start position is greater in the hang clean than power clean (reasonable)
- The same muscles must reach the same amount of muscle activity to perform the exercise (probably unreasonable)
Both lifts involve some sort of muscular pre-tension (holding the bar in a hang clean will pretension the muscles; gripping bar and pulling yourself into the right position will pre-tension the muscles in the power clean). In other words, you aren’t starting from complete muscular inactivity in a power clean. You still need to perform an isometric contraction against the bar to get into the correct starting position, but it’s reasonable to assume there would be more activity in the glutes, traps, and back extensors during a hang clean.
To expand on the latter, the exercises are simply different. Even with the same load, the momentum and stretch-reflex characteristics of the two exercises are likely to be different. I don’t think a power clean is necessarily a more explosive lift. You definitely do more work (by definition work is calculated by the distance a weight travels) during a power clean than hang clean, but I think saying it’s more powerful may be giving the wrong impression.
Regarding athletics, I think the hang is a better option because you get to reinforce the proper athletic position and you avoid the problems most athletes have with off-the-floor exercises associated with limited range of motion.
To your success,
Kevin Neeld
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Kevin,
I wanted your thoughts on how useful or not useful the VERT computerized resistance training equipment is. I have 6 pieces and there are video clips of our players using it on our website.The reason I bought it and use it is it allows especially younger players to do their resistance training explosively in a safe manner because it eliminates inertia. I know it is only a tool, and I know it is a machine and doesn’t fit in to the current mode of functional training. I just have had a few trainers or coaches who say they don’t like it but really can give me no reason why. If there is some reason it doesn’t benefit players in terms of developing rapid recruitment of their muscle power, I’d really like to know, in which case I would stop using it.
Thanks so much for your time. I am sure you are extremely busy.
Dave Roy
Hi Dave-I’ve never used one so it’s tough for me to really provide an educated opinion. In general, I don’t think any device that predetermines range of motion is optimal; there are almost always better options. Also, we tend not to use a lot of isolative patterns when developing power as it’s not as transferable to more integrated movements. For example, developing explosive quadriceps in a seated knee extension machine won’t transfer as well as developing explosive quads AND the other assistive muscles while training in a proper pattern using an exercise like a vertical jump. Hope this makes sense.
Kevin