Ripping heavy weight off the floor will make you bull-strong. But if you’re more interested in packing slabs of mass onto your back, a simple deadlift tweak can do the trick: Lower the bar just below your knees.
This deadlift variation, made famous by six-time Mr. Olympia Dorian Yates, will still strengthen the muscles needed to pull big numbers—your spinal erectors, hamstrings, and upper back.
And keeping the bar suspended throughout the move places more tension on your traps, shoulders, and back than a traditional deadlift as they fight to pull your scapula back into place (as the weight pulls them down).
“Dorian’s technique in the deadlift did not allow for any rest between reps, making it even more intense than the standard method,” says Eric “Merlin” Broser, a bodybuilding prep coach.
And more tension on the muscle equals more damage—and more damage equals more muscle. Broser recommends following a “two weeks on, one week off (meaning do regular deadlifts)” approach if gaining back mass is your goal. A final note: You may be wondering how a Dorian deadlift is different from its Romanian counterpart, and you’re right to wonder. They’re not that different, but the range of motion on the Dorian dead is shorter than the RDL, which has you lowering the bar to your mid-shin or lower. This slight tweak with the Dorian dead keeps the tension more on your back and less on your hamstrings. Don’t believe us? Lower the bar another six inches and feel your hammies light up.
5 Dorian Yates Quotes to Live By
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1 of 5
Chris Lund
“If I listened to my instincts, I’d be down at the pub chasing women, not under a 400-pound bar squatting.”
2 of 5
Courtesy of Weider Health and Fitness
“The single biggest mistake that most beginners make is putting 100% of their effort into the positive [concentric] part of the rep, while paying no attention to the negative [eccentric] segment.”
“One set at extreme intensity does the muscle-building job. It must be stressed that the one final, all-out set I do takes me to the very limit of my capabilities. If you feel you can attempt a second set, then you couldn’t have been pulling out all the stops during the first set. It’s not pretty, but it works.”
5 of 5
Chris Lund
“The path to added muscle is consuming more calories than the amount needed to keep your current body weight unchanged.”
“If I listened to my instincts, I’d be down at the pub chasing women, not under a 400-pound bar squatting.”
“The single biggest mistake that most beginners make is putting 100% of their effort into the positive [concentric] part of the rep, while paying no attention to the negative [eccentric] segment.”
“One set at extreme intensity does the muscle-building job. It must be stressed that the one final, all-out set I do takes me to the very limit of my capabilities. If you feel you can attempt a second set, then you couldn’t have been pulling out all the stops during the first set. It’s not pretty, but it works.”
“The path to added muscle is consuming more calories than the amount needed to keep your current body weight unchanged.”
