The Deadlift: A Comprehensive Technique Guide
Create tension. Push the floor. Finish with control.
The deadlift begins without a lowering phase to prepare the first pull. That makes your starting position and the tension you establish before the plates leave the floor especially important. This guide covers conventional and sumo pulling, practical grip choices, technical review, and competition preparation. It is an independent educational synthesis of the linked coaching resources; those coaches do not endorse Iron Brotherhood.
Inside: style selection · conventional setup · sumo setup · grip · bracing and tension · the pull · lockout · troubleshooting · variations · filming · competition readiness.
Start with a repeatable task
Use a clear lifting area, secure plates, and collars. Check the surface and footwear for traction and stability. Standard full-size plates establish a consistent starting height; if lighter practice plates are smaller, raise them appropriately rather than accidentally learning a deficit pull. Leave enough room to lower the bar without striking another person or object. The goal is a controlled lift you can repeat, not a dramatic collision with the floor.
1 / Choose conventional or sumo through practice
Conventional places the hands outside the legs; sumo uses a wider stance with the hands inside. Both require a stable connection to the floor and a coordinated extension of the knees and hips. Give an unfamiliar style time to become a skill before comparing maximums. Log the style separately and compare ordinary sets, setup consistency, and how well you can maintain position as load increases. A shorter-looking range of motion is not enough information to decide which style suits you.
Dave Tate’s discussion of leverages offers a useful general principle: build technique around the lifter rather than treating body proportions as a defect. Your stance and torso position should serve your movement, not mimic a champion’s photograph.
Dave Tate: Your leverages are not a liability →
2 / Establish your conventional setup
Chad Wesley Smith emphasizes that the conventional deadlift is a hinge rather than a squat with the bar in your hands. Begin with a practical stance around the width you would use to jump, then refine it. Keep pressure through the whole foot. Establish your grip, brace, and lat tension before applying force. If you set the hips artificially low, they may rise before the bar moves; repeatedly seeing this can be a reason to test a slightly higher starting position. The aim is coordinated movement of the hips and shoulders, not a low-hip pose followed by a second setup under load. Keep the arms long and connect yourself to the bar before attempting to accelerate it. Pulling abruptly into a loose setup can change your position before the lift has really begun.
Chad Wesley Smith: Four keys to a better deadlift →
3 / Build your sumo position deliberately
Smith’s sumo teaching starts with stance, toe angle, and the relationship between knees and ankles. More toe turn can make a wider stance accessible, but may reduce stability; widest is not automatically strongest. Use a width that lets the knees track with the feet while maintaining floor pressure. Bringing the hips closer to the bar can reduce their horizontal distance from it, but the position still depends on your proportions. Establish your brace and lat tension with long arms. Stay patient as the bar leaves the floor rather than allowing the hips to escape backward. Once the bar passes the knees, bring the hips through and stand tall. Practice this sequence with loads that let you distinguish deliberate pressure from simply yanking harder.
Chad Wesley Smith: Three steps to better sumo deadlifts →
4 / Choose and practice your grip
Greg Nuckols explains the main options. Double-overhand is straightforward but may become limited by the bar rolling in the hands. Mixed grip opposes that roll by turning one palm forward; keep both arms long rather than trying to curl the bar. Hook grip traps the thumb beneath the fingers and takes practice to tolerate and position consistently. Straps can remove grip as a limit in selected training work, but they do not teach the competition grip. Nuckols also shows why a single starting-shin angle does not fit every lifter: proportions and style change the position needed. Use the full setup to assess balance instead of insisting all deadlifts begin with vertical shins.
Greg Nuckols: How to Deadlift →
Record which grip you use. Practice your intended meet grip before competition approaches. If the bar repeatedly slips, inspect hand placement and whether you consistently establish the grip before assuming the solution is a completely different pulling style.
5 / Brace and take tension before the pull
Juggernaut’s Deadlift Pillars organizes the movement around the hinge, lat involvement, breathing and bracing, pressure against the floor, and lockout. The practical lesson is to establish these connections before the bar moves. Bracing creates trunk tension; the lats help keep the bar connected to the body; pressure through the feet initiates the pull. “Take the slack out” means apply tension until you are connected to the load rather than striking the bar with a sudden jerk. It does not mean perform a separate maximal tug before the repetition.
Juggernaut: Pillars of Deadlift Technique →
6 / Pull with a coordinated sequence
Once your setup is established, push against the floor while maintaining your connection to the bar. Let the bar rise close to you without deliberately dragging it through the knees. Watch whether the starting position remains recognizable as the plates leave the floor. As the bar clears the knees, continue to standing rather than trying to finish by leaning the torso backward. Lower with enough control to maintain your grip and clear the knees; let the hips and knees bend as needed for the return.
For dead-stop sets, settle the plates and rebuild the setup between repetitions. Touch-and-go sets have a different rhythm and should be logged accordingly. If later repetitions depend on a bounce or a different starting position, they are no longer giving you the same practice as the first pull.
Cues: test the effect, not the slogan
“Connect, then pull.” Try when the lift begins with a visible jerk into a loose setup.
“Push the floor.” Try when you focus entirely on pulling with the arms.
“Long arms.” Use as a reminder to avoid bending the elbows under load.
“Hold the start.” Try when the hips immediately change position before the plates move.
“Stand tall.” Use when you exaggerate the finish by leaning backward.
Use one cue with a manageable load. If it creates a new problem or no observable improvement, revise it. A cue is a tool for a particular lifter at a particular moment.
Troubleshooting: review the whole repetition
Your hips rise before the plates move
Compare where you first set the hips with where they actually begin lifting the bar. Check whether you start too low, lose tension, or change pressure through the feet. Test a more repeatable setup instead of forcing the same unsuccessful starting pose.
The bar drifts away
Use a side view to identify when separation begins. Did the bar start too far away? Did it move while you reached for it? Did your knees obstruct its path? Inspect the sequence and tension before prescribing extra lat work.
You struggle at lockout
Review the pull from the floor, not only the final frame. Did your position change early? Did grip begin to fail? Did you try to finish by leaning back? A slow lockout alone cannot identify one weak muscle or prove you need heavy block pulls.
You rush sumo off the floor
Check whether the stance remains stable and the hips stay connected to the starting position. Compare a deliberately patient repetition with your rushed one at the same manageable load. Patience is control while applying force, not passive waiting.
Your grip fails before the pull is complete
Track whether this happens on the first repetition or only late in a set. Rehearse the intended hand placement, inspect chalk and bar conditions, and distinguish grip practice from pulling work performed with straps.
You experience persistent symptoms
Do not force a painful stance or repeatedly test a provocative maximum to “see if it is fixed.” Get qualified assessment for persistent or worsening symptoms. This guide cannot diagnose a back, hip, or arm problem from a clip.
Variations: account for the whole training week
Andy Baker separates lift variations from smaller assistance exercises and emphasizes that closely related, heavily loaded pulling variations carry meaningful training stress. A rack or block pull is not a harmless addition just because the range is shorter. His guide distinguishes overload and partial-range work from extended-range and hinge variations, including Romanian and stiff-leg deadlifts. The useful programming question is what a variation replaces and how it affects the rest of your week. Avoid adding several hard pulling exercises simply because each promises to fix a different weak point.
Andy Baker: Deadlift variations and programming →
Paused deadlift: pause at a deliberately chosen point to review whether you can maintain position. Write down the pause location so sessions remain comparable.
Romanian deadlift: practice a controlled hinge from the standing position. Select a range you can manage consistently rather than treating floor contact as a requirement.
Block pull: begin from a raised, documented height. A higher number is a result for that variation, not a new competition deadlift maximum.
Deficit pull: add range by elevating the feet on a stable surface. Use a modest, recorded height and reassess the changed starting position.
Opposite stance: use conventional or sumo as a separate training movement when it has a clear role in your plan.
Warm up and film with intention
Progress from manageable practice sets toward your work weight, reducing repetitions as load rises. Rehearse the same grip and setup each time. Keep enough energy for the assigned work rather than adding an unplanned test. Film a side view with the plates, whole body, and feet visible; an oblique view can add stance information. Keep camera placement consistent. Compare the first and last repetitions of a set and similar loads across sessions.
Review questions: Did I connect to the bar before it moved? Did my hips change position first? When did the bar separate from me? Did grip remain secure? Was the finish controlled? What one adjustment will I test next?
Competition check: IPF example
Finish erect with knees locked and shoulders back. Wait for “Down,” then return the bar with both hands controlling it. Hitching and supporting the bar on the thighs can invalidate the lift. Check the full current rules.
Official IPF technical rules →
Make progress measurable
Keep a consistent setup checklist, log the style and grip, and choose one technical focus. Preserve changes that improve ordinary work sets before evaluating them under heavier loads. A better deadlift is one you can reproduce when the setting, fatigue, and pressure change.
Independent educational synthesis. Technique and federation requirements vary. Reviewed October 2026.