Olympic lifts are still a controversial topic among strength & conditioning coaches, and they always will be. Some coaches regularly include them in their programming, while others choose alternative exercises for power development because learning an efficient technique seems too time consuming and not worth it.
Each side has good arguments, and we should always keep in mind that the application of certain training exercises and methods is always dependent on the sport, athletes, setting and your ability to coach them.
I decide whether to implement Olympic lifts in a strength program based on criteria such as the competence level of the athletes in relation to strength training, the physical demands of the sport, previous training experience, short- and long-term goals of the program, and organizational and time factors. Of course, these also differ, above all, across the developmental stages of the athletes. I am not trying to teach a clean or snatch to a 24-year-old rugby player who is already playing rugby at the highest level if he never learned these movements before. There are many alternatives to Olympic lifts that will result in the desired adaptations for that player.
However, for a 12-year-old athlete who is doing structured strength training for the first time, it makes sense to give them as many tools as possible in the form of strength training competencies. Strength training competencies describe the ability to perform strength training exercises with a technically high quality of movement, regardless of the load used [1].
Tweet ThisFor a 12-year-old athlete who is doing structured strength training for the first time, it makes sense to give them as many tools as possible in the form of strength training competencies
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The time before and at the beginning of puberty is rich for the development of strength training competencies, i.e., learning as many different exercises as possible from a technical point of view. If athletes have an efficient and safe technical execution of exercises and a sufficient steadiness in movement patterns, then loading can be utilized more effectively in later stages.
To counter the argument, then, that learning the Olympic lifts is too time consuming when the focus is on adaptations, season preparation and other goals, it is advisable to teach the movements at early stages of athletic development and focus on learning rather than loading.
Teaching Olympic lifting with youth athletes for learning, not imitation
First, a few thoughts on learning, as I keep seeing coaches from the “pro Olympic lifts group” claim that young athletes can learn a snatch or clean in 15 minutes. This is not learning. What these athletes are doing is simply imitating the movement that was shown to them in those 15 minutes. One remarkable performance is not indicative of learning.
Learning is defined as a relatively permanent change in an athlete’s capability to execute a motor skill as a result of practice or experience. To claim that an athlete has learned, they must exhibit persistent and consistent changes in movement behavior [2].
If you regularly coach children and young people, you have certainly had the experience of ending a training session with the feeling that the young athletes have learned a new exercise or improved a skill. However, in the next session a few days later, you are disillusioned to find that they can’t even remember which exercises they did in the last session, let alone which stance width they should have in a squat.
To determine if young athletes are actually learning, coaches look for persistency and consistency in movements. Indicators of successful learning include when young athletes automatically take the correct stance width for squats; their setup for deadlifts always looks similar or the same over a long period of time; or they can remember how to perform an exercise even after a long summer break without training.
Learning involves understanding. It’s not enough for young athletes to just imitate movements. Demonstration and imitation are at the beginning of the learning process, but the coaching process should always impart understanding of essential aspects of the movement.
Young athletes must understand which key aspects of the lift they have to pay attention to, so they can learn to assess themselves from the beginning. It’s not about explaining biomechanical principles in detail, but rather helping them recognize and apply basic characteristics of the movement.
An example of this is the transfer of power from the lower body to the upper body in exercises such as the push press or the jerk. Many young athletes have not yet developed an understanding of the fact that it is not the strength of the arms that is important, but a more dynamic and explosive dip using their lower body to master the overhead lifts.
The same applies to the pulling phases in both snatch and clean. Young athletes should understand why they need to accelerate the barbell and create the highest possible max velocity in the pull. Coaches can teach this in easy language or through trial and error. “Slow always feels heavy.”
There is no one right way, model or method to teach young athletes these movements. Many different approaches can work in a setting, dependent on training experience and movement competency. Technique is dependent on the anthropometric characteristics and physical abilities of the athlete, but there are key aspects and principles that apply to (almost) everyone.
Teaching the clean to youth athletes: Instructions, coaching points and cues
The teaching approach for the clean depends on the objective. If you are working with young athletes from team sports, where the long-term plan is that will only have hang cleans in their future programs, then the top-down approach, starting with high hang cleans or hang power cleans is a good choice. However, if other derivatives such as clean pulls, power cleans and, of course, the (full) clean are in their future, then I recommend starting with the foundation of the lift and the starting position in order to focus on the pulling phases first.
The following is my approach, adapted from the German Weightlifting Technique Model, to teaching the clean to young athletes. It will seem very structured and also static at times because I break down the movements into positions and sequences.
But over the years, I’ve learned that young athletes can remember the positions of the barbell and their body very easily, and better exhibit their own movement competencies, when it´s structured this way.
1. Starting position
The starting position “1” is the foundation of the lift. If the athlete makes mistakes in the starting position, they will have a hard time getting the rest of the lift right.
Many mistakes in the pulling or turnover phase occur because the starting position is not optimal.
When the young athlete stands at the barbell, it should not touch the shins. Now I tell them to look down and see if their toes are in front of the barbell. If yes, the toes should be rotated slightly outward: “But not like a penguin, just a little bit.”
To get into the start position, the young athletes should “sit down slightly bent forward” while grasping the barbell in a narrow grip. The shoulder positioning is crucial: shoulders should be slightly in front of the bar. The athlete can control this by changing the height of the hips. If the athlete bends the legs a little less, the hips move further up and the shoulders move further in front of the barbell. If the athlete lowers the hips, the shoulder moves over or behind the bar. This is something you can let them test and try themselves.
The weight of the body should be distributed over the whole foot and should not be shifted forward or backward. Kids need to learn how it feels when they´re shifting and what it does to their body positioning.
2. First pull
In the first pull, the athlete lifts the barbell from the floor, going from Position 1 to Position 2, right in front of the knee cap. The imaginary line between the shoulder and the hip moves in parallel upwards by extending the legs. The torso angle remains the same.
In Position 2, the shoulder is still slightly in front of the bar. “Stand up, but don´t lean back.”
When the young athlete lifts the barbell by extending the knees, it should be close to the shins but not touching them. You can tell kids that they shouldn´t scratch their shins or the knee with the barbell, but keep it as close as possible. They can push the knees slightly outwards, something that will especially be necessary as they grow and their body proportions change.
In the first pull phase, the young athlete should make sure that neither lift the hips faster than the shoulders, nor the shoulders faster than the hips. It´s more common that the hips move up first. When that happens you can tell kids, that they shouldn´t be tipping forward with their upper body. Here it will pay off if you´ve previously taught them how to distribute weight evenly on their feet.
3. Breaking down the Second Pull
When the athlete has reached Position 2 in front of the knee cap, they begin to open the torso angle. It is important that the knee angle remains the same and does not decrease. By opening the torso angle, the shoulders move backwards and should be directly above the bar in Position 3. In this position, the barbell touches the body for the first time on the lower third of the thigh.
This is all information, that your young athlete doesn´t need to know at this stage, but you do as a coach.
What they do need to know about Position 3 is that the barbell touches the lower part of the thigh. To do that, “the upper body must lean back slightly,” so the shoulder is exactly over the bar.
Again: Show them the differences between the shoulder being in front, over and behind the bar. In Position 3, “heels are still on the ground, arms are loooong.” We want to avoid teaching an early arm bend. Ask them after the lift: “Has the barbell touched your thigh?”
If we look at the athlete in Position 3 from a side angle, an imaginary line runs through the shoulder, the barbell touching the lower third of the thigh and the mid of the foot.
The second part of teaching the second pull includes the triple extension. I call this Position 3+ because, compared to Positions 1,2,3 and later 4 and 5, the athlete can´t really stop or start in the position, so it´s not really a position. The main goal here is to teach the young athlete to extend the hip, knee and ankle. We focus mainly on the bar path – teaching what it means to be explosive and accelerate the barbell in the pulling phases will be added over time.
At first, I let young athletes extend hip and knee with a shoulder shrug instead of a heel raise. Cues for the shoulder shrug are very simple: “Do the I-don´t-know smiley or meme!” Most of the kids know what that means – shoulder shrug means “I don´t know!”
Then you can add the heel raise and go through positions 1 through 3+ again and put the clean pull together. A cue that has worked very well for me and that targets the ideally vertical triple extension is “Grow as tall as possible to the ceiling!” I explain to young athletes that we´re measuring their height, and they are allowed to cheat and go on their toes and make themselves as tall as possible without tipping forward or falling backward.
When kids understand this, you’ve already taught them a triple extension and the first and second pull. Then you can progress to accelerating the barbell more and more over time.
4. Turnover phase
I start teaching the turnover phase from Position 3 with the barbell touching the body in the lower third of the thigh. This is also always the starting position for hang cleans to keep some consistency. From there, the athletes extend and actively pull themselves under the barbell by bringing the elbows forward as quickly as possible to catch the barbell in the front rack position, either in a deep squat or a half squat (power position).
Cues I have used and that have been working with kids are: “Spin the elbows around the bar,” “High elbows and spin the barbell” and “Be faster than gravity! Beat it!!”
To teach kids that they should not crash into the deep squat position and actively decelerate the barbell, they have to understand that the moment the bar is in on their shoulders and their feet fully on the ground, they have to “work or push against it.” The feet have to move quickly and as close as possible to the ground. There’s no jumping so they can reach a position where the deep or half squat position feels stable.
The turnover is all about timing, so they will need some practice to figure out how high to pull and then dive under the barbell.
The power clean and the clean do not differ much in the teaching approach. The catching positions are different and with increasing load the pulling height changes, but that´s not important for kids yet. I do not use the power clean as an intermediate step to introduce young athletes to the clean. I´ve experienced kids being confused about catching higher in a power position and can´t really transfer it to the clean, so I don´t teach them a power clean first. I would do it with adults, though, because they can actually grasp the differences and transfer from a power to a full clean.
For kids, it always seems like it´s two completely different movements, but that´s what I consider “street knowledge” based on my experience with the kids I´ve been working with in the last couple of years.
Compared to the overhead position in the snatch, the front rack Position 4 in the clean is stable, so it´s not necessary to remain in the deep squat position to balance and stabilize the weight.
The young athlete can directly reverse the downward movement of body and barbell in the deep squat/half squat and stand up reactively into Position 5, the end position. You can tell kids to “stand up dynamically/quickly” and “use the bounce.” This actually facilitates the concentric phase.
Let young athletes experience how it feels and which movement feels heavier by having them do a front squat or clean with a pause, and then standing up or doing a front squat immediately and explosively standing up. Give them the chance to experience the differences between a fast concentric phase and a tempo or slow concentric phase. It´s very important to let kids discover it and develop a feeling for these movements.
Integrating Olympic lifts into youth development programmes
This clear structuring of the clean and referring to the positions with numbers makes it very easy for young athletes to remember what is important. As a coach, you can ask specific questions, give indirect feedback and encourage them to reflect on their movements: “Where has the barbell touched your thigh?” “Where’s your shoulder in the starting position?” and so on.
The numbers for the positions associated with important coaching cues increase the learning process and understanding of the young athletes. This also gives the kids the competence to step in as a “coaching friend” and support their training partners, give them constructive feedback and learn faster and better. Although it is very much a coach-centered teaching method, elements of cooperative or experiential learning can make the learning process more fun and enjoyable.
We should not forget that children should not be overwhelmed with too much structured, instruction-based training. This article recommends such an approach for learning the Olympic lifts, but this does not mean that training sessions should always be predominantly structured in this way.
Learning strength training exercises should be a small part embedded in a holistic approach to children’s athletic development. Youth athletic development should always consist of a balanced mix of athlete-led and coach-led parts in the training design. Meanwhile, there are a variety of pedagogical frameworks and concepts for children’s training and development. Coaches should find a middle ground to cover and combine physical skill development and psychosocial facets like play and fun.
Tweet ThisYouth athletic development should always consist of a balanced mix of athlete-led and coach-led parts in the training design
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I myself started with children (U10) at 20% instruction-based learning of strength training exercises in a session and 80% fundamental movement skills, game-based learning or other pedagogical approaches. Then at the U12 level, the percentage of strength training exercises and technique learning increased to 30%, and so on. I think this is justifiable and beneficial for the athletic development of young athletes, if you do not disregard the other pedagogical concepts.
Weightlifting is a sport as well as a skill
Finally, I would like to make another argument for learning weightlifting movements in childhood and early adolescence. It’s one we forget far too often because we are strength & conditioning coaches mainly interested in the physical preparation of athletes for their sport.
Weightlifting is an Olympic sport with high complexity, especially from a technical perspective. It requires concentration, commitment to a long learning process and also extremely precise movement execution. Weightlifting is an actual sport, not just some exercises for power development. In the context of a multisport approach, young athletes of different sports can also be introduced to weightlifting and learn the snatch and clean and jerk as an additional sport.
Check out Elisabeth’s online course, Strength Training for Kids which covers the fundamentals of strength training with kids and provides an evidence-informed and athlete-centered approach to introducing kids to lifting weights.
