If all a skilled tradesman has access to is a hammer, everything will look like a nail. At IPC, while we’re solid in our foundational programming principles, we like to use a variety of speciality bars or, what we like to call, “weapons of MASS CONSTRUCTION” to get the job done!
If you’ve been in the gym for any significant length of time, you may have grown tired of using the classic straight bar over and over again for all of your big movement patterns. Even if you haven’t mentally experienced that staleness, your joints certainly may have with increased mileage, potentially leading to aches and pains! Today, we’re going to discuss how specialty bars may be just the answer for you.
Although there may be many more available, our favourite specialty bars that we use frequently at IPC include the Trap Bar, Safety Squat Bar, Swiss Bar (or Football Bar), Axle Bar, and EZ Curl Bar.
Structural Balance:
We’ve seen plenty of people who have a strong Swiss Bar bench press that have a strong barbell bench press, but the inverse is not always true; the same can be said when comparing the safety squat bar squat to the classic barbell back squat. The Swiss Bar’s neutral grip nature allows you to hit the triceps even harder than the traditional straight bar and has tremendous carryover to pressing of all angles, from overhead to decline and everything in between. The safety squat bar forces the lifter to stay upright even more than the straight barbell squat does, effectively helping to build strong quads and upper back. Specialty bars can allow us to train the weak muscles of each lift that will help carry over and improve our classic barbell lifts!
Aches and Pains
As we alluded to earlier, he who trains the longest will get the strongest; I’m sure Socrates, Aristotle, or some other philosopher said it at some point in history! All jokes aside, implementing specialty bars in your training program from time to time can certainly help prevent overuse injuries. Folks who have shoulder discomfort during the classic barbell bench press or barbell back squat can typically find some relief by using the Swiss bar or the Safety Squat bar, respectively. Those with low back issues may prefer the Trap bar deadlift from time to time over the classic straight bar deadlift, or an EZ-Curl bar to save the elbows during bicep curls. Because of its larger nature, using the axle bar during pressing movements can actually disperse the load more evenly across the joints, oftentimes helping to diminish any joints discomfort the lifter may be feeling.
Technical Cues
As we know, there are multiple different types of learners. Sometimes as a coach, no matter how many cues we may give our athletes or clients, they still may struggle to make the technical correction we are trying to teach them if they are more of a kinesthetic learner (learn by doing/feeling); this is where specialty bars may be able to help! If you are struggling to keep their chest up in the squat for example, introduce the Safety Squat Bar into their routine. If you don’t fight to keep your chest up, that bar will fold you like a cheap suit! For our athletes who are struggling to learn how to tuck their elbows on the bench press, the Swiss bar can be a great tool as it essentially forces you to do so (or at least makes it much more natural). Using the trap bar can help you keep your chest up and maintain optimal posture in the deadlift. Finally, using the axle bar for your pressing movements can reinforce the need to grip the bar as tight as possible during these exercises. These are reasons why, with some clients, I like to teach the big foundational movement patterns on these specialty bars first and then these technical cues will carry over to the classic lifts once we do introduce them!
Variety is The Spice of Life:
In addition to structural balance, using specialty bars can help prevent boredom and staleness in training. All too often, training variety is equated to fancy exercise variations, balance drills on BOSU balls, and attaching bands to every exercise. Instead, it would be much more effective for us to simply swap out the bar we’re using from time to time to allow us to continue hammering the big patterns in slightly unique ways! I would almost argue that there should be a new “big three” for non-powerlifters in the gym. Switch your classic Barbell Squat, Barbell Bench Press, and Barbell Deadlift for the Safety Bar Squat, Swiss Bar Bench Press, and Trap Bar Deadlift and watch your gains soar while avoiding some of those common aches and pains!
