During our fundraising seminar, we had to erase and re-engineer pulling technique of 20 different people.

We believe Chinese technique differs a lot from American technique, and we wanted to present people with alternative point of view.

On paper, it looks certainly the same: keep bar close, use your legs, good back position, extend... nothing new under the sun...

So, when you hear Chinese repeating: close, fast, balanced... it's not that Americans teach far away, slow, and unbalanced... the difference is in actual execution, correction, and programming based on weakness...

For example:

Bar close means bar lightly touching along thighs, not just one place of contact, then it stays close to abdomen, chest, and even face... So if you bump or brush the bar, you don't keep it close enough to your thighs.
Fast is only important after reaching perfect power position.
Chest is open and back arched throughout the whole movement, not just at starting position.
Proper extension doesn't mean exploding, it means actually joint straightening at knee and hip, you can add speed later.

The main technique teaching tools are:

snatch high pull from the hang (finish with elbows up)
snatch deadlift from the floor (finish in full extension on balls of feet and shrug)

“If you cannot perform snatch deadlift or snatch high pull correctly, you are not snatching correctly. ”

Please watch the video to observe major technique concepts.

For most people, Chinese power position (more crouching) was something different from what they were used to - no surprise here, as everyone hears "stay over the bar longer" all the time.

Notice that there are a lot of minor technical details, and many cues are visual or tactile, not just verbal. We don't like to listen ourselves talk.

Goal #1 was to teach everyone to achieve decent power position and extension, and we think we were successful. Other small details, like arm bending, not keeping the bar super close, chest closing, etc. can be adjusted easily by training in front of the mirror by athletes themselves.

So if you take away only one thing from this post, think: power position every time!!!

Thanks again for supporting our youth weightlifting program and all generous donations!