Dead Lifts

What is a dead lift?

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You stand with your feet apart, knees slightly bent. The weights in each of your hands pull slightly at your arms as you hinge your hips forward, bending until the weights are almost touching the floor. Your back is straight as you raise yourself back up, drawing up the weight of the dumbbells. 

You hinge your hips forward again, still keeping your spine straight and after the fourth dead lift, you start to feel a tingling start in your upper legs, spreading to your calves and your lower back. The tingling intensifies as you raise your torso up and lower back down into your fifth dead lift. The dumbbells are pulling your body forward and you utilise the strong muscles in your back to fight their downward pull and lift your body up.

Your upper legs are feeling tight as you lower yourself for the sixth time, bending forward and keeping your spine straight, feeling your back tense to fight the pull of the weights. You breath, lift your body and lower yourself again. The weights are getting heavier and by the tenth rep, they feel like they've doubled in weight.

A hot ache starts to spread through your arms, especially around your shoulders. The stiffness in your legs and back intensifies and you're surprised to feel the exertion in your hip muscles since you're so rarely aware of them. You keep your back straight and lower your body for your eleventh rep, slowly drawing air into your lungs and exhaling as you lift yourself again.

The dumbbells feel like they've tripled in weight now. They're pulling hard on your tired arms and the muscles in your back are hot from fighting their downward pull. You feel the burning from your legs to your shoulders and down your arms as you bend forward, breath, and raise yourself again.

Just three more, you tell yourself, and ignore the pain as you do your thirteenth dead lift. Just two more. Your back and legs are burning, they feel too stiff and tight to move, let alone lift the dumbbells that feel like they've turned into thousand pound weights. You breath, and bend forward until your nearly touching the floor, then raise yourself back up, Just one more. The last one is agony. You just want to drip the weights, but you push yourself to keep your back straight, slowly lowering yourself and drawing yourself back up.