Achieving Structural Balance
by Charles Poliquin
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Throughout my years in the strength and performance business, I've often observed that an athlete's
plateau in strength development is caused by a lack of structural balance. Let's say, for instance, that
you can bench 250 pounds, but unfortunately, you've been stuck at that particular weight since the
year Donna Summer's hit "Love to Love You Babe" soared to the top of the disco charts. That wouldn't
be good.
Believe it or not, I meet lots of athletes who are in the same situation. The first thing that I do is look
for the aforementioned disproportionate ratios between different exercises. For instance, if a particular
athlete's personal best on the close-grip bench press is 225, but he has to ask the bag boy at the local
Piggly-Wiggly to heft the one-gallon jugs of milk into his trunk, something is terribly, terribly wrong.
In other words, more than often enough, if you're failing to make progress in a given lift, the body is
protecting itself from injury by neurally inhibiting strength gains.
By working with hundreds and hundreds of elite athletes over the course of two decades, I've been
able to collect some normative data about how much an athlete should be able to lift, relative to his
other lifts. The athletes who achieved those ratios tended to perform better on the international scene
and had the lowest incidence of injuries.
For the purpose of this article, I'm only going to discuss the upper extremities. I use the 14-inch grip
bench-press test as the reference value for other upper extremity exercises. Even though I
acknowledge that this area needs further study, this was the first time that the strength and
conditioning coaching community was presented with simple tests to assess the athlete's optimal
strength ratios. This data is presented below in Table 1. You don't need to spend too much time
looking at it right now, because I'll be coming back to it.
Table 1
Optimal strength ratios in the male elite athletes involved in upper body dominated sports as they
related to a 1RM, 160 kg performance in the 36 cm close-grip bench press (Poliquin, 1997)
Optimal Strength Ratios
Close Grip Bench Press
Absolute score: 160 kg (352 pounds)
Relative score: 100%
Incline Barbell Press
Absolute score: 133 kg (293 pounds)
Relative score: 83%
Supinated Chin-Ups
Absolute score: 130 kg (286 pounds)
Relative score: 81%
Behind-the-Neck Presses
Absolute score: 102 kg (224 pounds)
Relative score: 64%
Scott Barbell Curls
Absolute score: 74 kg (163 pounds)
Relative score: 46%
Standing Reverse Curls
Absolute score: 48 kg (107 pounds)
Relative score: 30%
External Rotation SA*
Absolute score: 15 kg (33 pounds)
Relative score: 9%
*Done for eight reps
Let's take a look at one of my case studies, and you'll get a better idea of what I'm talking about:
Case #1202 Beginning Stats
May 15, 1998
Athlete: Jim McKenzie
Sport: Ice Hockey
Position: Left wing/enforcer
Nickname: The "Real" Big Mac
Team: Phoenix Coyotes
Age: 28
Height: 6'4"
Weight: 235 pounds
Bodyfat: 15.7%
Lean Body Mass: 198 pounds
14-Inch Close Grip Bench: 280 pounds
Single-Arm External Rotation: 8 pounds for 3 reps
Fighting Record for 1997-98 Season: 19-1-0
Jim's close-grip bench press poundage, at 280 pounds, was average for someone his size. Take a look
at the table, though. Based on his close-grip bench 1RM, he should be able to use 25 pounds on
single-arm external rotations (with a dumbbell) for eight reps (25 pounds is 9% of 280). The trouble
was, he could only do eight pounds for three reps! In other words, he needed to start using a TV
remote control (without the batteries, of course) as a means of resistance. In other words, his
external rotators of the humerus were pathetic!
Since one of the priorities of the ice hockey enforcer is the ability to pummel an adversary, bench
press power is important. I knew that the best way to increase his bench press strength was to
increase the strength of the limiting factor in his strength profile which, of course, was the external
rotators. So what did I prescribe?
First, contrary to what you might think, I had him stop bench pressing. Second, I had him start doing
two different external rotator exercises on a five-day training cycle. Third, I needed him to drive up all
of the other values that were out of line. In Jim's case, he had poor brachialis strength and poor
overhead pressing strength.
By August 15, he was able to do 35 pounds in the single-arm external rotation for eight reps, and a
331-pound close-grip bench press. That means he had a 51-pound improvement in the close-grip
bench press without even doing the exercise for 12 weeks! His rotator cuff strength was now at 10.6%
of his close-grip bench press. Therefore, he enabled his close-grip poundage to zoom upwards.
Single-Arm External Rotations
Start Position | End Position
Since he was just three weeks away from training camp, combined with the fact that he had just been
traded from the Phoenix Coyotes to the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, I wanted to make sure that he would
test awesome at the pre-season training camp. Since I knew that his rotator cuff was now up to par, I
put him on one of my bench press specialization programs. By September 10, his final stats were as
follows:
Case #1202 End Stats
September 10, 1998
Athlete: Jim McKenzie
Sport: Ice Hockey
Position: Left wing/enforcer
Nickname: The "Real" Big Mac
Team: Anaheim Mighty Ducks
Age: 28
Height: 6'4"
Weight: 229 pounds
Bodyfat: 7.0%
Lean Body Mass: 213 pounds
14-Inch Close Grip Bench: 380 pounds
Single-Arm External Rotation: 35 pounds for 8 reps
At the Mighty Ducks training camp, Jim performed 23 reps at 225 pounds in the bench press. This is
exceptional, since the average NCAA Division-1 lineman does only 11 reps.
Furthermore, during the 1998-99 season, Jim only fought 20% as much as he had in the past. His
potential opponents are well aware that they're no longer a match for him. News of the dramatic
changes that he made in his physique and strength spread like wildfire through the league. In fact, the
beating he gave to Jim "Fighting Legend in His Own Mind" Cot? of the Nashville Predators was so
fierce that every single one of my NHL clients who phoned me during that week asked me if I had
seen it.
Okay, chances are you're not a hockey player, nor do you have the reputation of being the
neighborhood enforcer. Regardless, you probably want to make sure that your lifts in the movements
outlined in my chart are within acceptable limits. Otherwise, you're going to be spinning your wheels
for a long time.
I suggest that you figure out your 1RM in all of the described movements and make training
adjustments accordingly. For instance, if you test your close-grip bench press 1RM and it's 225
pounds, you know that you should be able to do eight reps of single-arm external rotations with 20
pounds (225 x 0.09 = 20.25 pounds). Similarly, you should be able to do 187 pounds on the incline
barbell press (225 x 0.83 = 186.75 pounds), 182 pounds on supinated chin-ups, 144 pounds on
behind-the-neck presses, 104 pounds on Scott barbell curls, and 68 pounds on standing reverse curls.
If you fail to come close or meet any of those parameters, you need to focus on that particular body
part. Again, this topic needs more research, but I've found these guidelines to be invaluable in
determining an athlete's strengths and weaknesses.
Here are some general notes on the tests that I use:
• All lifts are done on a 40X0 tempo (that's four seconds to lower the bar, no rest, and an explosive
concentric rep).
• Lifts are to be tested after six to eight sets of low-rep (one to three) warm-ups.
• Form, of course, has to be perfect on all lifts.
• Except for the reverse curls, in which I use an Ivanko bar, I use competition Eleiko plates and bars.
The Eleiko weights allow me to adjust the weight to the nearest 0.5 kg.
• Not all lifts are tested on the same day. Instead, I prefer to use different ones at various sections of
the training process.
Here are some specific notes on the lifts I use:
14-Inch Close-Grip Bench Presses
Start Position
• I chose the width of the grip myself, as it represents the most common hand spacing in all of those
sports requiring some sort of pushing action: bobsleigh start, clearing traffic for hockey defensemen,
push-off in the short-track speedskating relay, keeping opponents away in judo, etc.
• I wanted to use a grip that my colleagues in other sports or other countries could also use to collect
data.
Incline Presses
Start Position | End Position
• The width of the grip should be slightly wider than the bi-acromial width (the distance between the
two points of the shoulders), and the elbow angle should be 45 degrees between the forearm and the
upper arm in the bottom position.
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The bench is inclined at 45 degrees.
Supinated Chin-Ups
Start Position | End Position
• The weight recorded is equal to the weight of the athlete, plus whatever additional weight that he or
she can pull.
• The chin must clear the bar, and the elbow flexors must make contact with the forearms in the top
position.
Behind-the-Neck Presses
Start Position | End Position
• I can hear physical therapists pissing and moaning at the choice of this exercise, but they're the
same people who recommend knee extensions for knee rehab patients, so don't pay much attention to
their advice. The shoulder, when healthy, is designed to do the press behind the neck without any
problems. If you can't do it, you have, as my good friend Gary Roberts of the Hurricanes would say,
"some issues." These issues can range from a tight subscapularis to a weak infraspinatus. Before
testing it, fix these problems.
• The bar is pressed from the meaty area of the traps to 99% of elbow extension.
• The grip is as narrow as your present level of hypertrophy will allow.
Scott Barbell Curls
Start Position | End Position
• I use an Atlantis Scott bench for the test. I like it because it prevents cheating. You might not have
one, but don't ignore the point: refrain from cheating!
• The grip is slightly narrower than bi-acromial width.
Standing Reverse Curls
Start Position | End Position
• I use an Ivanko bar for the reverse curls.
• The grip is the mid-grip pronated spacing on the EZ-Bar.
• The back is supported by a Swiss ball to prevent cheating and minimize the stress on the lower
back.
Single-Arm External Rotations
Start Position | End Position
• A dumbbell is used as the means of resistance.
• I look for 8RM performance. If the athlete does, let's say, only five reps with a given weight instead
of eight reps, I deduct 2% per rep off the 8RM target. For example, if the athlete did six reps with 20
pounds, he is two reps (two reps = 4%) off the 8RM target. Therefore, he would have done 19.2
pounds for eight reps (20 x 0.96 = 19.2 pounds).*
• The elbow is supported on the ipsilateral vastus medialis (on top of the thigh) and should be about
two inches lower than the tip of the shoulder.
• It is extremely important that maximal range is achieved in the eccentric range.
*The 0.96 is derived by taking 100 and subtracting 4%. Similarly, if he had only done five reps with
20 pounds, he'd have missed his rep target by three. I would then multiply three reps by 2% to get
6%. If I subtract 0.06 from 1.00, I get 0.94. Therefore, 20 pounds x 0.94 = 18.8 pounds.
Now, I realize that it would be swell to include strengthening routines for any body part in which you
may lack strength, but that would make this article as long as "War and Peace." Instead, I suggest
that you use the Testosterone search engine to dig up any or all of the articles that we've posted in
the last year on training various body parts.
You may consider all of this testing to be too much trouble. Fine. At the very least, test your close-grip
bench press and your single-arm external rotation. If you're like the majority of athletes, you'll find
that your rotator cuffs are woefully underdeveloped, and simply including this movement into your
routines will dramatically increase your bench press performance.
T