Starting Strength

function of the first part of the pull.
    The bar needs to be in contact with your legs during this phase, touching the skin all the way up, as you maintain straight elbows. The path is vertical because the knees and hips extend in a coordinated way that results in the load’s moving up in a straight line, with as little forward or backward deviation (seen as horizontal movement in the bar path) as possible. During this section of the pull, forward movement of the bar is usually due to an incorrect start, as previously discussed. Starting errors are magnified as the bar goes up. If the bar feels like it is too far forward – if it is not touching your thighs all the way up – check your starting position again. Your hips may be too low, the bar may be too far forward, or you may need to think about using your lats to actively push the bar back into your legs on the way up.
     

    Figure 6-35. It is important that the bar be in contact with the thighs. At this point in the pull the back angle has become quite vertical and the knees have shifted into position to finish the extension. The bar must move from this position upward with as explosive and vertical a line over the mid-foot as possible, and peak power directed correctly upward cannot be developed at this critical position if the bar is forward of the thigh.

    One way to ensure that the middle of the pull is finished correctly every time is to establish a marker for its successful execution. If you actively try to touch the same place high on your thighs with the bar during each rep, and develop the ability to feel the contact point and control it, you will gain a large measure of conscious control over the finish of the power clean. Bar contact on the thighs is necessary for correctly meeting the jumping position, and if you use that contact as a cue, you are much more likely to perform the clean correctly. Using this bar contact as a cue can also increase the speed of the clean because the bar will be hitting the thighs harder and you will be using more extension power to cause that contact. You can also use this contact as a diagnostic tool, clothing permitting, by looking at your thighs to see where the red mark from the bar contact is. You can identify pulling errors by seeing where the mark is on the thighs in relation to where it should be for the most efficient finish.
    At the top
     
    After the bar has been pulled up past the knees from the correct starting position, it should assume an essentially vertical path until it reaches the jumping position. During this phase, the bar must remain over the mid-foot for the most efficient power production to occur. As you jump, and your feet break contact with the floor so you can drop under the bar for the rack, force stops being applied to the bar. The bar path can deviate from vertical at this point because force is no longer being produced, and the racking phase happens after the bar has stopped its upward acceleration. Some deviation will occur at the top due to the actions that occur while the elbows rotate up into the rack position, and as long as the deviation is not excessive, it will not be a problem. If it is excessive – more than a couple of inches – something happened on the way up that caused the deviation.
    All cleans and snatches involve the shrugging of the shoulders, as video analysis will show. The shrug is a concentric trapezius contraction that protects the bony anatomy of the shoulders during the upward explosion and adds force to the pull at the top. The scapulas are suspended from the spine by the traps and related musculature; they hang from the muscles of the upper back, and their only bony attachment is at the arms and collarbones. If you didn’t shrug as you jumped up with the heavy bar in your hands, your scapulas would be explosively compressed down onto your rib cage by the upward force of the spine in the jump. The traps’ contraction is an involuntary reflex: it occurs as a consequence of having the bar in your hands as you jump, and this is why we don’t need to talk about it during the early part of learning the clean. But later, after the weight gets heavier as you get stronger, the shrug becomes an important cue for completing the upward explosion against the load.

    Figure 6-36. The finished pull results from the hips and knees coming into full extension, with the traps having shrugged and the momentum causing a rise up into plantar flexion. Any completed pull will go