Weight lifting belt for beginners

YouTube, what's going on? Did I scare you? Welcome to the video. In this video, we're talking about weightlifting belts, and I just can't wait. Hope you feel the same. All right, YouTube, what's actually going on? Hope you're doing well. As you already know, in this video we're going to be covering everything you need to know about using or not using A weightlifting belt. We are first going to talk about how to actually use it. Yours truly is going to give you a nice demonstration. The second part is what the hell does this thing actually do? Does it like automatically keep your lower back safe? Is it like should you use it all the time? What does this thing even do and why do we use it sometimes in our workouts? We're going to talk about that, and then at the very end, we're going to talk about when. To use it versus when not to use it, because there are very specific times where you might want to lean more towards using it versus maybe times where you don't want to use it, because there can be some pros and cons, which we will talk about in this video. So let's dive right in. All right, let's first demonstrate how to actually use this weightlifting belt, which by the way, YouTube, if you like my shirt, Let me know below in the comments section. Somebody told me, won't say who they are, but somebody told me this shirt is a little bit too bright, and I said it's not bright enough. So let me know if you like this shirt. Now, the way that you use this weightlifting belt is you can see right here, this one is from Pioneer. I have no affiliation with this company or this brand or nothing. This is just the one I use and the one, you know, I suggest you might pick up as well. There's some various different ones. I'll put some in the description of this video. Here below if you want to check some of these out. But you see how you can read this, right? So for me, the left side is— I'm sorry, this is going to be the left side, this is going to be the right side, right? Because right here you can read the letters. If it were the other way around, you would not be able to read the letters, right? So it also might just say on yours where the left side is. Like for example, right here it has an L, so obviously for the left side, right? Not sure if you can see that or not, but it has an L for the left side. So just check on yours if and when you get one. So you want this belt to be somewhere around where like the bottom rib is for you, but before you get down to like where your hip bone is. So everybody has like from the bottom rib to the hip bone, This is roughly where you want this belt to be placed, because if you put it up too high, you're just going to be like clamping your rib cage together. If you put it down too low, you're just going to be smashing your hip bones together. So you want to make it kind of like in that crevice between that bottom rib and the top of your hip right now. Once you have that right there, as you can see, do a little 360. What's like those fashion models like do a little Do a little twirl. Uh, I don't know what the fuck that was, but, uh, we are gonna continue on. Once you have it in the correct placement, now this is all about how tight should it actually go. And what you are going to want to do is— most people, they're like, oh, make it as tight as I possibly can and I can't even breathe. You don't want it to be so tight that you can't fit You're like 1, 2, or 3 fingers underneath the belt right here. Notice how like I can't even get like my fucking fingernail in there, right? You do not want it to be that tight. And we're going to talk about why in a little bit later here, but you want to make it tight enough where you can probably fit somewhere around like 2 to 3 fingers underneath the belt, right? So you can see right here, roughly around this area for me is probably how tight I would go if I using this belt in one of my workouts, right? You also don't want it so loose that like you can just fit your whole fucking hand underneath the belt because that's not good. It's going to defeat the purpose of the, of the belt, right? So you want it in that in-between spot where you are trying to get probably 2 to 3 fingers in between you and the belt. And then again, just one more time, you should probably be— if you have it set up correctly, you will feel this because But you should be feeling like around your lower abs, like around lower abs, belly button, you should be feeling this belt almost kind of like pushing against your lower abs and around your belly button area. And then again, if you have it set up, this should already be in the case, but just make sure. Sometimes you'll find it up too high. So just make sure you're having it to where it's kind of pushing against the lower abs and the belly button. And it's really That's simple. Now, let's talk about what this belt actually does for you in your workouts. So, you may or may not be familiar with bracing your core. If you're not familiar with bracing your core, I will put a video somewhere up here. I've done a pretty in-depth video on how to brace your core. It's been very helpful for a lot of my clients. It's the same video that I send to our clients. And so, if you want to check it out, feel free to check it out. But this belt is going to help you brace your core. And let me explain why. It's not just going to be this magical thing where, oh, you put this on and your lower back is automatically safe, right? No, that's not how this works. What it does do though is it provides you 2 main things. Number one, an external cue, right? Because this belt is wrapped around your core, If you know how to brace your core properly, you almost should be kind of like pushing out with your core. That's how you brace your core. You don't want to suck your stomach in. You want to kind of push your stomach down and bear down to kind of brace your core. With this belt right here, this belt is offering your core that external feedback to push into the belt. That's what you should be trying to do when you wear this belt. You should be trying to push your core into the belt. So it gives you the external feedback. And as you can see, it's a 360 brace. When you're going to do, you know, movements like squats, deadlifts, stuff like that, you want to not only think about bracing the front of your core, yes, but you also want to think about bracing the sides of your core and even the back of your core. Yes, there are some core muscles back there in the back. You want to think about 360 bracing your core. So you're pushing the sides of your core out against the belt, you're pushing the front, you're pushing the back, you're pushing everything out against this belt. And because the external feedback cue is there and it's 360, this is usually going to allow you to brace your core Even that much better. Again, when you're going into movements like squats or deadlifts or things of that nature, because even if you're bracing your core without it, this just gives you that little bit of extra, like, hey, make sure you're pushing against it. Because if you stop pushing against it, you'll feel, you'll feel your stomach kind of like come in. You'll feel your sides come in and it won't be as tight or as rigid as if you were pushing out against the belt while you're doing your squats and your deadlifts. And so that's how it can help protect your back. It's not like this magical tool. It's just going to help you brace your core a whole lot better. So that is what the belt does. Now, when should you use one of these puppies and when should you not use one of these puppies? Alrighty, so when you should versus when you should not use one. The first thing is going to be If you are a complete beginner, and I mean like if you are within probably the first, the first 6 to 12 months of you like really lifting weights, really following a proper strength training routine, like you're really just kind of getting into it, I don't think you're going to need a weightlifting belt. And I think it could potentially actually take away from your results long term. And here's why. A lot of people will use this belt As a crutch. What I mean by that is they'll use the belt so much that they won't actually learn how to properly brace their core. And this is a big issue, not just for when you're doing your workouts— that's obviously an issue— but for outside of life. Because, you know, you have to brace your core outside of the gym as well, whether you're picking your kids up, whether you're doing some housework, some yard work, you're doing groceries, whatever the case may be. If you're so reliant on this belt right here that it takes away from you actually learning how to brace your core on demand, because I'm speaking from experience here, I used to use this belt for everything. Like you would see me in the gym doing bicep curls, doing lateral raises, doing whatever, and I would, I was using it all the time. And what started to happen was my back pain actually got a lot worse. Because outside of just the gym, I was using it so much that I didn't— my central nervous system, this is what can happen to you as well, it didn't actually know how to brace my core without the belt. And that's a big issue because you're only using that belt for like an hour a day, a couple days a week when you're doing your workouts. If you're doing it for every single thing you were doing like I was, which was very dumb, which is why I'm telling you, you know, that that might be another thing as well we'll talk about. But But especially as a complete beginner, you need to make sure that you have a very good, solid foundational base of how to properly brace your core first. This is not going to be in lieu of learning how to brace your core. If you don't have proper core bracing first, this is not going to help you. It's not. It's not going to save your lower back. It's not going to help your lower back pain. It's not going to keep you safe. Because you need to know how to brace your core properly first. And in this, in the first 6 to 12 months of you learning how to strength train, do, you know, do workouts, do exercises, squats, deadlifts, whatever, that's when you're learning how to properly brace your core as you go through these movements and go through these ranges of motion. So if you're throwing in a belt, you're probably handicapping yourself more than you are helping yourself because The other part as well, when you're more on that beginner stage, you're not going to be lifting such heavy weights that you would need the weightlifting belt. The weights that you should be lifting should— you should be able to control those weights. You should always be able to control your weights, but especially on the beginner side, it's much more focused on proper form, much more focused on getting used to pushing yourself in the gym, so on and so forth. So if you're somebody who's more on the complete beginner side, I probably would not recommend wearing this weightlifting belt. I would recommend getting really good at bracing your core, learning how to brace your core. Again, I have a video here on YouTube or I have an article. I can drop that down in the description below on how to properly brace your core as well. So feel free to check it out if you'd like to. But if you're more beginner, probably stay away from it for the most part. Now the second part to this, which I kind of alluded to a little bit earlier, Um, I would save using this belt more for your bigger compound movements and your heaviest sets. So what are bigger compound movements? Things like deadlift, things like squats, things like potentially Romanian deadlifts, maybe something like a shoulder press, and maybe something like Uh, a barbell bent-over row or something like that. Maybe like those 5 movements— squat, very— it's like barbell back squat, front squat, whatever the case may be, deadlift variations, potentially Romanian deadlift variations, potentially a shoulder press, and potentially a bent-over row if you are going very heavy. Those like 5 movements are usually the movements where I say On those are your bigger compound movements, like they're multi-joints, you know, they're, they're, they're big, you know, you're working big muscles, that kind of stuff. And it's your heaviest sets. So if you're going for like, you know, 3 reps, 4 reps, 5 reps, 6 reps, something like that, maybe you would use the belt just to give you that little bit of extra reassurance, just to give you— because those movements involve a lot of core strength and core stability. Because one of the main things that happens during those movements is you saw earlier how I talked about If you don't push out against the belt, you're going to feel it, right? Well, not only does it require that like core strength, but when you're doing 2 reps, 3 reps, 4 reps, 5 reps, whatever the case may be, sometimes what will happen is you will lose a little bit of that core bracing as you're getting into the reps and you're getting fatigued and so on and so forth. And so the belt might be able to help you kind of like just cue yourself and remember, oh crap, I got to keep, I got to keep up my core. strength and endurance because you want to be able to get through those heavy reps and so on and so forth. So for the heavier sets on your compound movements, I might think about using the belt. Now people always ask me, well, what's the, what's the weight? What weight is it? Is it 200 pounds? Is it 225 pounds? Is it, is it double? Is it 1 time your body weight? 2 times your body weight? Listen, I don't have an answer for you on that. I'm sorry. I can make something up, but I've never really gone by that. For me, what I've always gone by is number one, you got to be beyond the beginner stage. Once you get beyond the beginner stage, there is just simply going to be a period where the risk outweighs the rewards, so to speak. So like I'll use myself as an example. When I'm doing, let's say squats, right? Anytime I really get past that like 295, 315, 335 range on squats, I'll throw a belt on because I'm like, I know, and we're going to talk about this in a second, but I know for me on squats, once I get past like a certain weight, I just, I want the extra like insurance policy. I want the extra security blanket. I'm going to make sure I still brace my core. I know how to brace my core. I'm not a beginner, but I want to make sure I'm doing all that I can to keep myself safe. Or if I'm doing a deadlift, for example, once I get past that like 405 pounds on a deadlift. Now again, you don't have to deadlift 400 pounds or 300 pounds or 500 pounds. It's really, it's up to you. I'm just saying there are certain numbers for me where I'm like, once I start deadlifting past 405 pounds, I'm like, I'm going to throw a belt on no matter what, every single time, because it's just not worth the risk of potentially injuring. And I just want that extra security blanket. So you'll probably have to do some trial and error where you're like, once I get past this certain weight, I'm going to probably use that belt on my heavier working sets. Okay. And that's again, that's, that's going to be different for every single person, every single time for every single exercise. So there's, I don't, I don't like the blanket statement of 1 times your body weight, 1.5 times your body weight. Once you're getting into that beginner stage and you're kind of going into your like heavier compound movements and you're like, This is a little bit scary. I really want to make sure I stay safe here. Cool. Throw a belt on if you want to. That's totally fine. Because again, at that point you know how to brace your core. You're not a beginner. You're lifting pretty heavy weight there, right? Because once you start to get into the intermediate stage, you've gained strength and you've put on muscle and you've learned how to do proper movements correctly and things of that nature. So you're lifting a bit heavier weight, which as you lift heavier weight there risk of injury is going to slightly increase. And so on those heavier working sets for your compounds, I would throw it on. But again, I wouldn't put it on for like a hip thrust. I wouldn't put it on for like a one-arm dumbbell row or bicep curl or a tricep extension or like a lat pulldown or stuff like that. I would leave it solely for probably those 5 movements I said, squats, deadlifts, Romanian deadlifts, which is like a deadlift variation potentially, Potentially a shoulder press if you're doing like standing. If you're doing seated, I probably would not use a belt for a seated shoulder press because you have the seat pad, which is going to help with stability. And potentially bent over rows. Again, if you, if you are going heavy in like a barbell bent over row or something like that, or like a heavy dumbbell bent over row or something like that. Because again, like we talked about earlier, if you're using it for bicep curls, shoulder raises like I was, and you know, circa 2016, you're going to eventually— it's going to backfire on you and you won't be able to actually brace your core on demand when you need it to. You'll be so hindered by that belt. So you don't want that to happen. Alrighty. And the last point I'm going to make here is I wrote down core stability, and I've been talking about this entire time. I don't want you to use this belt as a crutch. You should still be trying to work on both your core stability And your core strength. You want to make sure you're not just relying on that, but you're continuously trying to get stronger in your core and trying to improve your core. Yes, only like, even if you're 50 pounds overweight, yes, you should still be working your core. You should still be trying to get stronger in your core. You should still be doing some sort of core stability work throughout the course of your workout program for the week, for the month. All that good stuff. This is going to ensure— cool, use the belt for heavier sets, but you still want to facilitate strength and stability through your core, through your trunk, through your spine to maintain injury-free, maintain you being able to get stronger, all of those good things. What I'll do is, again, I've done a video here on YouTube. I'll link it here above on what I normally do for like core stability work, ab work, that kind of stuff. I'll also drop an article here below that I wrote. That really goes over all of this stuff in depth as well. But I want you to make sure this is not a reason for you to like not do any core work. Like, I fucking hate core work more than probably any of— any person who's ever going to watch this video. I fucking hate it, but I do it because I know how beneficial it's going to be for me in the long run. So just make sure you're not skimping out on doing your core work. And if you want some help, like I said, video here on YouTube or article below. And that's it. That is weightlifting belts 101. Hopefully you enjoyed this video. If you did, give it a thumbs up, subscribe to the channel, and let me know below if this helped you, if this was, you know, beneficial for you, if you liked my shirt. And just thank you so much for watching. All right.