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Clean

advanced · pull_vertical

Clean

Setup

Train on a lifting platform with bumper plates and clear about two meters around you so you can dump the bar when a rep goes wrong. Set the bar against your shins, feet hip-width apart, grip just outside shoulder width with a hook or standard grip. Drop your hips, weight on your heels, chest open, shoulders slightly ahead of the bar.

Execution

  1. Push the floor to pull the bar past your knees, keeping the back angle fixed and the arms straight, at a controlled pace.
  2. As the bar reaches mid-thigh, explode by extending the hips, knees and ankles together like a jump, accelerating the bar upward.
  3. Shrug and pull yourself under the bar, whipping your elbows around to the front and up as fast as you can.
  4. Catch the bar racked on your shoulders in a front squat position, elbows up, riding it all the way down to full depth.
  5. Exhale and drive through your heels to stand all the way up and finish the lift.
  6. If you miss the rep or catch the bar off balance, push it forward, let go and step back; never try to save a bad catch on your shoulders.

Breathing

Inhale and brace before the pull, hold through the hip explosion, then exhale as you stand tall with the bar racked. If you have high blood pressure, heart disease, a hernia or are pregnant, do not train this breath-holding style lift; ask a coach about a light-load version or skip it.

Quick cues

  • Pull slow, explode fast.
  • Finish tall before you pull with the arms.
  • Whip the elbows around fast.
  • Meet the bar low, not standing tall.
  • If the bar drifts wrong, push it away, don't fight it.

Common faults

  • Fault: Pulling with the arms early, before the hips finish extending

    Fix: Drop to a light bar and drill the high pull alone, feeling the hips finish extending before the arms do anything.

  • Fault: Catching the bar too high, not riding it down into a deep enough squat

    Fix: Drill the catch on its own with a frankenstein squat or a very light hang position squat clean.

  • Fault: The bar swinging away from the body during the pull

    Fix: Drop the load and drill keeping the bar brushing the shins then the thighs the whole way up, shoulders over or ahead of the bar.

  • Fault: Trying to muscle through an off-balance, badly caught rep

    Fix: Push the bar away to the front and step back the moment it feels off; there is no rack here, so never grind to hold a bad catch on your shoulders.

Equipment

barbell

Muscle groups

legs, glutes, back, shoulders, arms