Why Your Deadlift Sucks (And It's Not What You Think)
Why Your Deadlift Sucks (And It's Not What You Think)
Let me tell you about the day I nearly shit myself under a loaded barbell.
It was 2019, some dingy powerlifting meet in Oakland. I'm standing over 495 pounds thinking I'm hot stuff, and within 0.3 seconds of breaking the floor, my lower back decided to tap out harder than a white belt in a Gracie academy. The bar crashed down, I hobbled off the platform, and spent the next three months learning to tie my shoes without wanting to cry.
That injury taught me something most deadlift articles won't tell you: Your technique problems aren't really technique problems. They're compensation patterns for shit you don't even know is broken.
Everyone's obsessed with the same three deadlift "fixes" – get closer to the bar, tighten your lats, create tension. Yeah, sure, those matter. But here's what pisses me off about most deadlift advice: it treats everyone like they're the same person with the same body and the same problems.
You're not.
The Real Issue: You're Fighting Your Own Body
I've coached probably 200+ people now, and here's what I've learned – those "common" errors everyone talks about? They're usually symptoms, not causes. You're standing too far from the bar because your ankle mobility is trash. Your back rounds because your hips don't work properly. You can't create tension because you've never actually learned what real tension feels like.
Most people are trying to deadlift with bodies that aren't ready for deadlifting. It's like trying to drive a car with three flat tires and wondering why you can't go fast.
The Ankle Thing (That No One Really Explains Right)
Yeah, you've probably heard about ankle mobility before. Stretch your tibialis anterior, they say. Do some calf stretches. Whatever.
But here's what they don't tell you: your ankle restriction might not even be your ankle.
I had a client – let's call him Dave – who couldn't get his shins within six inches of the bar. Spent months stretching his ankles, doing all the "right" mobility work. Nothing. Turns out his problem was his big toe. Dude had broken it playing football in college, and ten years later it was still jacked up enough to throw off his entire kinetic chain.
Fixed his toe mobility in two weeks. Deadlift went up 75 pounds.
The point isn't that everyone has a broken toe (though you might want to check yours). The point is this: your body finds a way to move, even when parts of it don't work right. Those compensations become habits, and habits become "technique problems."
The Lat Lock Everyone Gets Wrong
Andy Bolton's "lat lock" thing? Gold. But most people think engaging their lats means just squeezing their shoulder blades together like they're cracking a walnut. That's not it.
Real lat engagement feels like you're trying to break the bar in half with your hands while simultaneously trying to shove it through the floor. Your shoulders should feel like they're connected to your hips by steel cables. Everything locked into one piece.
But here's the kicker – if your thoracic spine is completely immobile (and let's be honest, it probably is), you physically cannot get into this position no matter how hard you try.
I spent years beating my head against this wall. Kept trying to "engage my lats" while my mid-back was locked up tighter than Fort Knox. It's like trying to bend your elbow while wearing a cast.
The Tension Thing That Actually Matters
"Take the slack out of the bar." Yeah, we've all heard it. But what does that actually mean?
Most people think it means pull until the bar bends a little. Nope. Taking slack out means loading your posterior chain until your glutes, hamstrings, and entire backside are coiled like a spring ready to explode.
Here's how I teach it: Get set up, grab the bar, then try to push your hips THROUGH the bar while simultaneously trying to drag it backwards into your shins. You should feel like you're about to either rip the bar apart or launch yourself backwards. That's tension.
But again – if your glutes don't fire properly (and statistically, they probably don't), you can't create real tension no matter what cues you use.
The Honest Self-Assessment You Need to Do
Okay, real talk time. Before you try to fix your deadlift technique, you need to figure out what's actually broken. And I'm not talking about some fancy movement screen – I'm talking about basic questions you can answer in your garage.
Test #1: The Honest Ankle Check Put your toes 4 inches from a wall. Can you touch the wall with your knee without lifting your heel? If no, your ankles are probably screwed. Don't even think about deadlifting until you fix this.
Test #2: The T-Spine Reality Check Lie on your back, knees bent. Try to get your arms flat on the floor above your head without arching your lower back. Can't do it? Your mid-back is locked up and you're never going to get proper lat engagement.
Test #3: The Glute Honesty Hour Lie on your stomach. Bend one knee to 90 degrees and try to lift that knee off the ground using only your glute. Feel it mostly in your hamstring and lower back? Your glutes aren't working.
Test #4: The Hip Hinge Truth Bomb Stand with your back against a wall. Try to touch your toes while keeping your butt against the wall. This one humbles people quick.
If you failed more than one of these, congratulations – now you know why your deadlift technique looks like hot garbage. You're not a bad lifter; you're just working with limited raw materials.
The Real Solutions (That Actually Work)
Here's where I probably lose some of you, because this isn't sexy. This isn't about adding 50 pounds to your max in 30 days. This is about building a body that can actually deadlift properly.
For the Ankle Issue:
Forget just stretching your tibialis anterior. Work on your big toe extension, calf flexibility, AND anterior hip capsule. Yeah, your hips affect your ankles. Bodies are weird like that.
My go-to: Wall ankle stretches, but hold a dowel overhead and try to keep your torso vertical. Forces you to actually use the mobility instead of just creating it.
For the T-Spine Disaster:
Stop trying to "open up" your thoracic spine with a lacrosse ball (sorry, not sorry). Start with basic quadruped extension-rotation movements. Think cat-cow but with a twist. Do it every damn day until you can actually extend your mid-back.
For the Glute Situation:
This one's gonna hurt your ego. Go back to basic glute bridges and clamshells. Yes, like a soccer mom in a group fitness class. Your glutes are probably so disconnected from your brain that you need to literally re-learn how to use them.
For the Hip Hinge:
Practice the movement without weight. A lot. I make people do 50 bodyweight hip hinges every day for a month before they're allowed to touch a barbell again. Sounds crazy? Your herniated disc will sound crazier.
The Part Where I Get Real With You
Look, I know this isn't what you wanted to hear. You probably came here looking for a quick technique tweak that would add weight to your max. Instead, I'm telling you that you might need to spend months working on basic movement patterns.
But here's the thing – I wish someone had told me this ten years ago. Would've saved me a lot of pain, a lot of frustration, and a lot of time spinning my wheels.
Your deadlift doesn't suck because you're weak. It doesn't suck because you're not trying hard enough. It sucks because somewhere along the way, your body learned to compensate for things that don't work right, and now those compensations are limiting how much force you can actually produce.
The good news? Bodies are adaptable as hell. Fix the underlying issues, and your technique problems often fix themselves. It's not magic – it's just physiology.
Your Action Plan (If You're Actually Serious)
- Do the self-assessment tests. Be honest about what you find.
- Pick ONE area to focus on first. Don't try to fix everything at once. You'll just get frustrated and quit.
- Commit to daily work for 4-6 weeks. Not three times a week. Daily. Most mobility and activation work needs frequency, not intensity.
- Test your deadlift technique every two weeks. Film yourself from the side. See if things are actually improving.
- Be patient with the process. Your body didn't get fucked up overnight, and it won't get unfucked overnight either.
The thing is, once you start fixing these underlying issues, everything gets better. Not just your deadlift – your squat, your overhead press, hell, even how you feel walking up stairs.
Because here's what I've learned after way too many years of doing this wrong: Strength isn't just about how much weight you can move. It's about how well your body works as a complete system.
And when your system works right? That's when the magic happens.
Now stop reading and go test your ankles. You might be surprised what you find.
What's your biggest deadlift frustration? Drop a comment and let's figure out what's actually going on. And if this helped, share it with someone who needs to hear it. We've all got that friend who deadlifts like they're trying to hurt themselves.
