Good mornings can be done in an infinite number of ways and with several implements, says Shane Sweatt of Westside Barbell. During this CrossFit Powerlifting Trainer Course at Integrated Fitness, a CrossFit box that does sport-specific training just outside Pittsburgh, he begins by talking about good mornings with a safety-squat bar.
“We can do them seated, we can do them standing,” he says as his wife, elite powerlifter Laura Phelps-Sweatt, demonstrates.
Phelps-Sweatt begins with a so-called stiff-legged good morning.
“See, she pushes her butt backwards and keeps her butt as high as she can,” Sweatt says. “She’s a little bit above parallel. We don’t want to go parallel or below because we really up the back-injury rate.”
Next, there’s round-back good mornings, which are actually much like a back extension on a GHD. The key to the movement is learning to stabilize some parts of the spine while moving other parts.
“So you’ll see she’ll just round the upper back, she doesn’t round the lower back,” he continues.
There are also good-morning squats, banded good mornings and even walking good mornings.
“You can do these sideways, you can do ’em on a 45-degree angle, you can do ’em forward, you can hang chains from there,” Sweatt says. “You can do many different options as far as it goes.”
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Additional reading: Single? by Bill Starr, published Nov. 16, 2011.