Avoid THIS Common Ultimate Sandbag Training Mistake

Social media can be hard for me to watch many days. I get tagged in A LOT of material that actually hurts my heart because I know people are trying to use our DVRT Ultimate Sandbag Training to achieve certain goals, but HOW they are using it isn’t going to let them do so. There are SOOOO many mistakes people make in technique that it both can prevent them from getting anywhere in their training and make them more prone to injury. We are going to highlight of the bigger mistakes people make and what you should do to get the results we know you want to reach.

Too Much Elbows Bending

Watching the action of the elbows can key you in on a lot of potential technique mistakes during our Ultimate Sandbag Training lifts. It could be occurring because people don’t know the right technique, they are trying to use the wrong parts of their body (typically their arms instead of their core and/or lower body), or they don’t understand the propose of the exercise. Here are a few examples of where the elbow issues shows up!

Hip Hinges

Whether it is deadlifts, cleans, shouldering, even snatching, the elbows don’t and shouldn’t play a big part in the movement other than directing the weight on power movements. When people bend their elbows at any point in deadlifting, they are going to start using the upper body, load the back, and miss what the deadlift can offer for the glutes, posterior chain, and overall good movement.

When we get to power movements in Ultimate Sandbag Training drills, we want to make sure we only use the elbows to help direct the float that the hips have created. Many people bend the elbows WAY too early and disrupt the movement of both the body and the weight. That is why the tips Steve Di Tomaso shares below are so important (as well as his emphasis of coming down with the weight correctly).

 

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A post shared by Cory M. Cripe (@corymcripe)

Bending The Elbows Ruins Good Core Training

Whether we are discussing using Ultimate Sandbag Training to make dead bugs, bird dogs, lift/chops, or even hip bridges better, the same key exists. That is we do NOT want to bend the elbows! When we create deliberate tension by either grabbing the outside of the Ultimate Sandbag or the outside handles themselves, the point is to create tension very similar to what we used in the hip hinges because that is what helped us create and maintain our “plank”. Pulling the USB or handles apart helps us instantly know how to properly use our lats and create core bracing which provides us core stability. When we bend our elbows we remove both of those items and start to load our shoulders as well as take away from what we are doing for the core.

When people often don’t feel strong in their Ultimate Sandbag Training lifts, they try to substitute using the upper body to dominate the movement. Sadly, people also tend to bend the arms because they just don’t understand the intent of the movement. In our drags, if you bend the elbows you take away so much of the good core training that the exercise can provide.

You even see when we get to higher level Ultimate Sandbag Training movements like dynamic lift/chops that we keep our emphasis on the tension we are creating. When we are upright and doing Ultimate Sandbag Training movements like these lifts/chops we grab the outside of the Ultimate Sandbag itself to avoid the “drooping” that would be caused by holding onto the handles. This should allow us to keep our elbows locked and engage our core much better.

When we teach our DVRT certifications (you can check out upcoming dates HERE) we use simple language to communicate to people pretty sophisticated ideas. Your clients don’t need to know the Posterior Oblique Sling of the lats, core, and opposing glutes, but they can know that if they “pull the handles apart” and don’t bend the elbows make their low backs feel better, they are stronger, and they can “feel” the exercise better. Good coaching isn’t how complicated you make things, but how you can make the complex simple for people!

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