Brett provides a fun way to improve your power output:

It’s time we talk about one of my favorite lifts. It starts with weight on the ground or in “the hang;” is a functional, core-to-extremity movement (legs drive, hips open, arms just finish); is dynamic, ballistic, and requires force (speed!) development in order to succeed with the weight flying overhead. This means, go hard or you won’t make the lift!!

Any guesses?

No, it’s not the snatch! Get your mind out of the… Olympics. But, this is a great tool to improve your capacity to open the hip and finish the triple extension necessary to make lifts like the snatch or clean or the keg or caber toss.

I call it “Sky Ball.” “Ceiling Ball” is more accurate, but harder to say and a little less exciting.

1. First, find a medicine ball and an open space in a room with high ceilings or outside. Make sure you have space! What goes up…

2. Next, get both hands under the ball with both arms straight.

3. Now, throw the ball at the ceiling…. Like you want to put a hole in it! Aim straight up since this is the shortest distance.

4. Hitting, or even touching, the 20’ ceiling with the ball is a successful lift. Missed? Throw harder! Watch out!

5. The acceleration of gravity is 9.8m/s2, so the ball will come back down from 20’ at about… hard.

So far, the best I’ve seen is a guy hitting with 14 pounds and a woman hitting with 8 pounds. Can you beat those numbers? It’s harder than you think!!

Sky Ball makes a great warm-up for Dynamic Effort leg lifts or Olympic Weightlifting and it’s more fun than snatch pulls or banded deadlifts.

Give it a try!

“I would rather he able to appreciate things I can not have than to have things I am not able to appreciate” –Elbert Hubbard

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