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Deadlifts- Best Strength Exercise known to man

Personally I think the deadlift is the king of ALL exercises. You can read another post of mine Best Martial Arts Exercises where I discuss effective strength building exercises for martial arts.

From Wikipedia:
The deadlift is a compound movement that works all of the major and most of the minor muscles in the abdomen and lower body, with emphasis on the Erector spinae, lower back and back, along with the quadriceps, hamstrings, and gluteus maximus. The remaining muscles are involved in stability control. It is, in a sense, the purest single event test of strength because it is one of the few lifts of dead weight (weight lying on the ground). In most other lifts the weight changes direction or starts in the air and several other athletic skills such as balance, coordination are emphasized. For example, both Olympic weightlifting events require a great deal of athletic skill in addition to strength. In addition, it is commonly believed to be the oldest test of strength dating back to cultures who competed at lifting the heaviest stones.

One favorite lines in that statement is "It is, in a sense, the purest single event test of strength". I firmly believe that.... not because of any other movements or changes of angles or anything like that. The lift is just "raw". There's something really heavy on the ground, and you need to pick it up. The feeling I get from a deadlift too is very powerful, more powerful then a squat. The push press is close, but not that close. It is one of the three main lifts associated with powerlifting: bench, squat and deadlift; and is regularly featured in strongman competitions. The funny thing is that if you walk into most gyms right now, the chances of you seeing someone doing HEAVY or strength building deadlifts is rare. There are very few people I know of or have seen actually train the deadlift heavy.
... View the reminder of the article on MartialFighter.com Blog