Fadi
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No, no cleans and no snatches. I'm totally against any bodybuilder performing cleans and I've made that known on numerous occasions. Now you're probably wondering why I'm against cleans. Here's my reason...
Cleans are not the safest exercise on earth for your knees, especially as the weight begins to head north. Please keep in mind that I'm strictly speaking bodybuilding now and not weightlifting. Weightlifters have no choice but to clean; bodybuilders on the other hand do have a choice in the matter.
So what's so bad about a bodybuilder performing cleans, even perfect form clean? Like I've already said, the first reason is the bodybuilder has no need to perform cleans, they are not a requirement in his chosen sport, and to top it all off, the unnecessary invitation of patella tendon injury of the knee goes from non existent to highly existent.
How does that happen, I mean how or why can a clean cause such potential for a knee injury? It's all in the catch; the racking of the bar on one's clavicle after diving underneath it to catch/meet it, upon the completion of the first phase of the lift, i.e. the pull.
When I mention the above, still some wish to argue and say: "but Fadi, I don't lift too much weight like a weightlifter, so the chance of injury to the knee is not the same." To that I say, since when was weight the sole element in causing one's injury? Please reflect on that for a bit, perchance you (the one who's arguing) may see what I see, and that is yes, injuries are not always caused because the weight is heavy, but at times, they're caused because of bad exercise/movement execution. Would anyone here disagree with that?
Now how much more injury inviting it is when one chooses to go from performing an exercise in a smooth fashion (a la bodybuilding) to a movement (such as the clean) performed in such tremendously explosive manner a la Olympic weightlifting! There is no comparison to even talk about, it's like comparing chalk and cheese, they look similar but in reality they are poles apart.
Okay alright now, is this all doom and gloom or are there some rays of sun shine on the horizon... for the bodybuilder choosing to inject some weightlifting lifts into his program? I say rest assured, there's hope...
Enter the BEAST with two heads! Mmmm, what beast is that? It's the power clean/front squat combo. Just in case some of you have fallen asleep, I'll continue with this next time... lest I write a full novel here.
Fadi.
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Would love to have a coaching sesh with Fadi
