5 Ways to Avoid Lower Back Pain from Deadlifts
Feb 25th, 2008 by Mehdi
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Mick Holding 400kg Deadlift. Image credit: Powershots.co.uk
The prime movers during Deadlifts are your quadriceps, hamstrings & glutes. Your lower back, upper-back, traps & forearms perform isometric contractions: they stay contracted during the whole lift.
That’s how Deadlifts strengthen your lower back: you must keep your back rigid against a load. Unfortunately many don’t strengthen but hurt their back doing Deadlifts. Here are 5 ways to avoid lower back pain from Deadlifts.
1. Keep Your Lower Back Straight. Deadlifting with a bent back puts anterior stress on your lumbar vertebrae. This increases the risks of back injuries like hernia. You must Deadlift with a straight lower back.
- Chest Up. Your back can’t round if you keep your chest up. Put your shoulder-blades back & down and keep your chest up at all times.
- Bend Your Hips. Lower the weight to your knees by bending at your hips first. Unlock your knees once the bar reaches knee level.
- Hip Flexibility. Tight hips will make your lower back round on Squats and when lowering the bar on Deadlifts. Do Leg Swings & Squat Stretch.
2. Use Your Glutes. The deadlift is a pull exercise. However pulling with your back increases the stress on your lower back. Pulling back is also inefficient as it means you’re not using your glutes properly.
- Push Through Your Heels. Curl your toes up if needed. This makes it easier to engage your hamstrings & glutes.
- Bring Your Hips Forward. Don’t pull back using your lower back. Bring your hips forward by squeezing your glutes as hard as you can.
- Squeeze Your Glutes. If you have problems engaging your glutes, do glute activation exercises and check your posture for lordosis.
3. Don’t Hyper-extend Your Back. This is as bad as Deadlifting with a bent back. Hyper-extending your lower back puts posterior stress on your lumbar vertebrae, which also increases the risks of back injuries like hernia.
The Deadlift ends when your hips & knees are locked. No need to hyper-extend your lower back at the top. Lockout the weight by bringing your hips forward & squeezing your glutes hard.
4. Keep The Bar Close to You. The further the bar from your body, the greater the torque on your spine. You need to keep the bar close to you at all times.
- Bar Against Shins. Start with the bar against your shins, shoulders in front of the bar & shoulder-blades directly over the bar.
- Bar Against Thighs. Let the bar roll over your shins, past your knees. Bar stays in contact with your thighs at all times.
Check Eric Cressey’s 650lbs/295kg Deadlift: bar against shins & thighs.
5. Use Your Legs. Deadlifts are not Stiff-legged Deadlifts. You can’t use your legs if you start with your hips too high or let your hips rise faster than your shoulders. Your lower back will be forced to do all the work.
Hip height depends on the length of your legs & torso. However the rules are the same for everyone. Bar against shins & shoulder-blades directly above the bar. Keep your chest up & push through the heels.
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Hey Mehdi,
I’ve just started doing deadlifts again after a few years out due to poor form and a painful lower back. I’ve read up quite a lot on the subject before getting back into it and you have the best advice out there for this kind of stuff so I was very pleased to see this article. Great advice and I can now add this amazing exercise to my arsenal. I find it is fantastic for cardio purposes as well as strength. I feel like I’ve ran a 200 hundred metre sprint after a set of deadlifts. Great article. Stumbled.
Christian
Good article. Hey Mehdi what do you think of stiff leg deads as an exercise?
I also think that regular deadlifts are the perfect exercise for lifters who just want to get bigger in general.
I do not like Eric’s posture in the youtube-lift. Allmost no leg-bend at all. Now a deadlift is not a squat, but his back looks way too round for my liking because of his straightened legs.
@Christian
Thanks for the stumble, appreciated.
@Alex
Thanks. I don’t like stiff-legged deadlifts, too much stress on the lower back.
@Wazzup
Cressey rounds his upper-back indeed, which is something a lot of big deadlifters do. You need muscle control to round your upper-back without rounding your lower back. I don’t recommend it for beginners.
Hey Mehdi,
The big one for me was squeezing the glutes. After I mentioned to you that I had a pretty sore back, and you recommended concentrating on that again, I am lifting stronger and the pain isn’t there. Thanks for the reminder!
Yeah squeezing the bum works wonders. I too thought the video looked a bit iffy, but then I’m sticking to lower weights (around 60-70kg) and focusing on form for the time being until I can build up the strength to lift heavy.
Great article. Deadlifts and squats are the foundations for my workout programs. I typically feel much more spent on my deadlift days than my squat days. As for form, I sometimes have the problem of rounding my upper back, which of course propagates to my lower back. I have been working on form a lot lately, though.
Great tips as usual Mehdi. I started out deadlifts a few months back, and was able to move up in weight a lot very quickly, but I noticed pain in my lower back. I was definitely rounding and struggling to get the higher weight up. I dropped all the way back down to 135lbs and started to move up again slowly, but only when I am happy with my form on all reps.
I have always tried dead lifts and have had the hardest time. Mostly with back pain. Squeezing my glutes really helped.
Mehdi, you spend a lot of time covering the deadlift. Do you consider this the mother of all lifts?
And in comparison to bench and squatting, how should my DL compare? If I am benching 300 and squatting 315, what should I be DLing?
@Lauren
You’re welcome, glad to read it worked.
@Michael
Deadlifts are one of those exercises that have bad reputation because of the injuries caused by bad technique. I feel the Squat is the mother of all lifts, but Deadlifts has benefits Squats don’t have.
Your Squat should be much higher than your bench. Deadlift should be around 380-400lbs with that kind of Squat. Check these strength stats.
I liked this post too since I injured by lower back last year lifting too much. That darn ego… What really helps me is the concentrating on the heels and sticking my butt out. I feel like I have sticking it out like crazy, but it really helps keep my back straight and my hams and glutes rocking… stick that butt out!
Should ur lower be sore after deadlifting? I feel it most in my upper back but my friends always tell their lower backs are sore as hell.
Great article - excellent tips!
Many people have a comparatively weak lower back compared to legs, especially if they haven’t done much powerlifting before. Back strengthening exercises such as rack pulls and good mornings are very useful for bringing the lower back up to scratch. I had just this problem and I’ve found doing specific lower back work to be helpful (I held off the deadlifts whilst doing this work).
@Jason
The back performs an isometric contracton, so soreness is possible on heavy attempts. However most soreness should be felt in the movers: glutes, hamstrings, etc.
@Gubernatrix
Thanks.
People often think they have a weak lower back, because they feel pain there. When we look closer we see a) dormant glutes b) bad posture (like lordosis) c) overworked lower back because the glutes are not working.
That’s why you see so many back injuries (or hamstrings) but rarely anything in the glutes. Back gets the whole load because the rest isn’t helping the movement.
Hi Mehdi,
Fair enough, I am sure that many people think they have a lower back weakness when they don’t. Equally, many people do have a genuine lower back weakness, especially if they haven’t done much lifting before.
Eric Cressey has written this about that particular lift:
5. Speaking of a 628 competition deadlift, here it is.
The important lesson to take away from this lift is that you should never use a competition lift as an example of ideal form. Powerlifters in competition are doing whatever they can to reduce range of motion.
Notice how rounded my shoulders and upper back are. If I’m training an athlete or ordinary weekend warrior client, I want to strive for efficiency at all costs; the shoulders are back and the chest up.
Great article Mehdi! I started your workout plan like 2 months ago and deadlifts was the hardest excercise of all: deadlifting days guaranteed lower back pain for the next day or so. Then the pain would get lower as I got stronger? Is that normal? (for someone who rarely, if ever has included the deadlift in his routines)? I’ve been a gym goer for about 3 years now, but just recently I have read about the benefits of deadlifting.
I love the tips you give on deadlifts. My lower back started with squats though. I dont know why this happened. I ve done heavy squats all my life and ive never had this problem. What do you recommend?
I am a 45 year old male. I have done DLs for years because they are so efficient. I have injured my lower back in the past, thank god for Skalaxin.
My question is that I typically have problems lowering the weight, not lifting it. That is where I have hurt myself in the past. Any suggestions?
I am now trying to incorporate DLs back into my workouts. I also noticed that the picture above the lifter is more bend over. Can your butt be too low when you address the bar? Thanks