Benefits of Incorporating Olympic Weightlifting into Your Training

Photo by @whitwaycreative

Most of us with athletic backgrounds feel comfortable quickly with a barbell on our backs for a squat, or over our chest for a bench press. But throwing it overhead in a wide grip for a snatch, or punching it overhead with our feet in a split for a jerk? Not so much. 

Olympic weightlifting can LOOK intimidating, but the snatch and the clean and jerk and really just high skill and technique movements. Similar to a gymnastics movement, or a box jump, or a movement where the mechanics of HOW you perform that specific movement are very important. 

Learning the proper fundamentals of Olympic Weightlifting is imperative to your success with OLY lifting. While this might seem like a hassle to someone who has never done these lifts before, there are SO many benefits to incorporating Olympic Weightlifting into your training. 

Benefits of incorporating Olympic Weightlifting into Your Training: 

1.Become a more explosive, powerful athlete. 

Training OLY lifts can be super beneficial in other areas of your life. Are you a runner looking for a little extra power in your strides? Insert OLY lifting. Do you want to have more explosiveness on box jumps? Train OLY lifts. Olympic Lifting doesn’t work without speed or explosiveness and will help you improve all of these things. 

2. Holy calorie burn, batman. 

Have the goal to burn some extra calories? Olympic lifts are a full body movement that burns a LOT of calories. Whether you are shooting for a heavy lift that day, or going for a lighter weight but more reps: you will burn a ton of calories.  

3. Need another reason to improve your mobility and stretch? 

Being successful in OLY lifting requires mobility and flexibility so that you can catch the barbell and move your body around heavy loads of weight. Olympic Lifters might look big and bulky, but these athletes tend to have some of the best mobility of any type of athlete. We all need another excuse to stretch! 

4. Fight osteoporosis and improve your bone density 

Improving your bone density and lifting weights are very important for women as we age to fight Osteoporosis. Olympic lifts can help you improve your overall bone density as these are full body movements. Increasing your bone density will also decrease your chances of injury! So many benefits.  

5. Improve your coordination and balance 

Olympic lifting requires coordination, timing, rhythm and balance. Drilling these different techniques will help you improve overall coordination and balance which is important for everyday life!