If we are taught to never lift with our backs, why are there popular exercises like Romanian deadlifts and good mornings which has you specifically lifting with your back?
In: Biology
Lifting with your back is perfectly safe if you’re used to doing it and you know how to brace your lower back. The lower spine is supposed to stay locked in position and the whole upper body hinges forward at the hips. Training this safely makes your whole core stronger and makes your lower back more resistant to injury but if you’re someone who never lifts things unless you have to it’s safer to lift with your quads and keep your back upright.
The same safety guidelines that say to never lift with your back also say that anything heavier than 50 pounds needs more than one person to lift it, the average person is weak and doesn’t know how to deadlift safely. There are some other old fashioned exercises that are now considered too dangerous to be worth doing like the neck bridge but deadlifts are a good compound lift. Romanian deadlifts especially use relatively light weight and long range of motion to load the hamstrings in a stretched position. The hamstrings and spinal erectors are some of the strongest muscles in the body, they need to be loaded pretty heavy to get stronger.
Doing deadlifts makes your spine strong and resilient but most people don’t do them so now the advice people get to avoid injuries is basically don’t lift anything heavy ever.
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