Big Squat, Big Bench, Big Deadlift-BIG AIR

So you want a big squat, bench and pull?

Are you taking big air?

We hear this all the time in the gym right?

Air!
Belly!
Breathe!
Big Air!

Go into any powerlifting gym and you’ll hear people yelling this as a heavy lift is attempted.

Do you know what this means or how to do it?

You might.

You might not.

I’ve seen veteran lifters with huge total that didn’t fully understand this.

What I am talking about here is bracing your midsection before a lift. We must do this to effectively transfer power through our bodies into the bar. Just strapping on a belt will not do the trick.

We must learn to breathe low into our bellies and then push the muscles out so that the abdominal wall can brace the spine. Adding in a belt makes this even better as we can now push into the belt for increased tension.

Increased tension equals increased poundage.

I read in a book somewhere that the human body will breathe as it needs to until intervened on by a trained professional.

I couldn’t agree more. For the most part.

When coaching people on how to take air and brace I like to use cues that are as simple as possible to make it easy to understand.

Let’s illustrate it like this:

If your car was stuck in snow and you had to push it out, would you:
A: draw a deep breath into your chest and then suck your abs in and up as many “experts” on the interwebs say to do?
OR
B: Would you suck a HUGE(er) breath into your gut and then STRAIN as hard as you can while you push?

If you said “A”, call a tow truck because your car is staying stuck.

This is a prime example of the body doing what it needs to do. This gets lost in the gym.

Let’s review how to take air into the belly for bigger lifts.

First, stand up either in front of a mirror or with a friend watching, and take a deep breathe, as deep as you can and try to get it low in the belly below the belly button.

If your chest raised you did it wrong.

As you can see the chest is high. This is wrong. She took air into the chest as opposed to the belly.

This is normal.

In today’s society we all tend to breathe into our chests and this causes lots of tension in the traps and upper back, but that’s a different article……

Try again and really focus on breathing into the belly. Did your belly push out?

Here the chest is low and he belly is pushed out. This is much better.

Good.

If it did not, try this.

Stand tall and place your fingertips on your belly just below your belly button.

Push your gut out against your fingertips and then open your mouth wide and suck air through your mouth into your lower abdomen and push into your fingers harder as you do.

Cheryl smashed a double bodyweight deadlift at 47 years old after getting this tip mastered. 300 pounds baby!

Once all the air is in there, tuck your bottom rib down and lift your pelvic floor.

What?

That’s fancy trainer talk. There is no classy way to describe lifting the pelvic floor so here goes:

We all know what it feels like to have to go potty really bad right?
We all should know how to hold it as well so we don’t have accidents.
That is lifting the pelvic floor.

As you push the abs out against your fingertips and tuck your ribs down, hold “it” in hard. Hold for a solid 3/1000 count.

You should now feel incredibly tight and like you can hit a 50 pound squat PR.

If you feel like your head is going to explode, keep practicing, you have the air too high in your belly.

Try again and push that air down. Push your belly button down.

Now, hold “it” for a 3/1000 count.

Did your head pop off?

No?

Good.

I’ve got a few more drills for this.

Let’s begin here and master this one first.

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Vincere vel mori