Here’s that lift again

Posted on August 24, 2012 by Michael

I was looking through some old weight lifting books that once belonged to my grandfather when I came across an exercise I had written about in the past. At the time I called it the cleave and jerk. It turns out it as an alternate name:

I believe “one arm power jerk” is probably a more accurate name, but either way works. Of course, it’s all somewhat moot since this is a fairly old fashioned lift. In fact, aside from that excerpt/image coming from a book originally published in 1963, I was once doing this exercise when, just after I set the dumbbell down, an older gentlemen by the name of Ralph asked me if I had learned it from my grandfather. I asked if he had had the honor of knowing the man, but he said no. He just knew that there was no way I had learned it from a high school coach or any modern trainer.

On another note, here is a picture I found of my grandfather doing a similar exercise:

Again, this is only similar to the description above. The one arm power jerk involves an extended press of the bar as opposed to the resting of the upper arm on the ribcage. I’m not even sure if that’s safe. (I estimate there to be about 90 lbs in discs with the bar likely weighing 15 or 20 for a total of 105-110 lbs.)

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Going up

Posted on October 9, 2011 by Michael

Some time ago I wrote about weight lifting. In that post, there was an exercise I couldn’t find. Eventually I figured it out. Of course, that didn’t mean I could find a video of it. Not even an image. So for that reason, I have uploaded a picture of my grandfather performing the feat in December of 1950:

"GOING UP - Bob Hawkins, Augusta, one of the most talented young weightlifters in New England, shows good form on a one-arm cleave and jerk of a 152 pound lift. Hawkins and other leading Maine lifters will compete in a Knights of Columbus sponsored, Maine AAU sanctioned, meet here January 6 at City Hall." Dec 1950

Just to emphasize, that’s 152 pounds. I don’t know what my grandfather’s weight was at the time, but I would estimate not over 170, and I think I’m high-balling it a bit. In short, what he did was damn impressive.

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I found that exercise

Posted on September 1, 2011 by Michael

Awhile back I made a post about weight lifting exercises. In it I wrote about a particular exercise my grandfather had taught me, but I couldn’t find a video of it. I found something similar, but with some caveats:

The difference between that and what I do is that I don’t hop and split my feet. Instead I press and squat all in one motion. (Unfortunately YouTube searches for “one arm press and squat” either yield kettlebell exercises or simple one arm presses coupled with separate squats.)

Well, I took another look at the picture I have of my grandfather doing the exercise and in the caption underneath it, it actually says what the exercise is. (I didn’t have the picture with me when I made that post and it must have slipped my mind to look later on.) It’s called a cleave and jerk. Unfortunately, any search with those terms tends to yield undesirable results. You know, the sort of results the Internet is more well known for. In fact, I’m sure if I did find the actual exercise, Rule 34 would somehow manage to apply to it.

But there you have it. The one-arm cleave and jerk. Don’t search it.

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