Starting Strength

saved on the plate racks can be used for additional, more useful plates. Plates lighter than 2.5 pounds should be provided for use by women, kids, and everybody who wants to maintain linear progress on the bench press and press. Lighter plates can be made from 2-inch flat washers glued or taped together in the appropriate groups. Metric plates are 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and occasionally 45 kg, with lighter plates down to 0.5 kg used in weightlifting competition.

    Figure 8-13. Standard Olympic plates are the best choice. They come in a wide variety of denominations and constructions. Metal plates as light as a quarter-pound are very useful, and bumper plates up to 25 kg (55 pounds) allow heavy bar loads with fewer plates.

    Good plates are milled to be close to the weight named on the casting, and they should be well within a half-pound, or 0.25 kg. Metric bumper plates go up to 25 kg, and bumper plates calibrated in pounds are available from a few sources. Bumpers are useful for power cleans, and save a lot of wear and tear on bars and platforms. All plates bigger than 25 pounds, and all bumper plates (since they won’t bump if they don’t touch the floor), should be 17.5 inches (45 cm) in diameter. Good plates should also have a correctly sized inside diameter (ID) – the size of the hole in the middle where the bar goes. A sloppy, loose ID in a plate limits its usefulness to merely hanging from the bar in a rack for a squat, bench, or press. Bad plates are quite aggravating to use for a deadlift because the slack between plate and bar sleeve lets the plates lean sideways as they support the bar on the ground, resulting in the plates continually “walking” off the bar if it’s uncollared.
    Plate racks are available in two main styles: the A-frame tree and the plate tray. If the A-frame is used, it should have two pins on each side, spaced so that 45s or other full-diameter plates can be loaded on the bottom and smaller plates can be loaded on the top pins. Such a rack can accommodate more than 650 pounds of standard barbell plates. The pins themselves should be made from at least 8 inches of 1-inch rod, so that the 2-inch hole in the plate fits over it with an inch of slop. This is very important for ease of racking the plates – if the pins are made from 2-inch material, you’ll have to use both hands every time you rack a plate. This can become annoying. Tray-style racks are easy to use since there is no center pin, but they usually do not hold as many plates as an A-frame rack does, and their design is not as sturdy.

    Figure 8-14. Plate racks are essential for weight room organization. An A-frame plate rack and two types of tray racks are available commercially, or can be manufactured by clever, talented lifters.

    Collars are usually thought of as necessary safety equipment in the weight room. Although collars are important on occasion, it is much more useful to learn to keep the bar level so that plates don’t slide off it. Plate slide is often a problem during squats, since walking a bar out of the rack unavoidably involves some side-to-side movement when you step back. Collars are useful when you’re squatting, but they are less important when you’re benching and pressing since the bar theoretically stays level during the movements, and you take only one step out of the rack for the press. In the event of an uneven elbow extension, collars are quite handy. If it becomes apparent that you have problems with uneven extension, it would be prudent to use collars. It would also be good to correct this error if possible. Collars are useful in the deadlift, since they help keep sloppy plates from “walking” down the bar during the pick-up/set-down cycle. The same holds true for the clean, although bumper plates aren’t as bad about this as standard plates because they are thicker across the ID and more plate is in contact with the bar.
    Collars come in many designs, from inexpensive spring clips (which are very serviceable and reliable unless worn out or sprung), to expensive, very sturdy plastic types, to set-screw sleeve types, to adjustable competition collars. Collars used in powerlifting and weightlifting competitions weigh 2.5 kg, while the other styles will vary quite a bit. Springs work fine for most training purposes. If security is a problem, two springs can be used on each side. The weight of the collars will have to be calculated into the load if precision is necessary.

    Figure