So you want to be an athlete?

[Alan H]

Couple of things about hammer....grip is important. I know that I can actually torque a hammer around so hard that I simply cannot hold on to it. well, you gotta hold on to it! You'll notice in the video that I spend some time seriously locking down my grip on that handle. I also spin the 22 pound hammer twice, but spin the 16 pound hammer 3x.

Coming back to this thread, now that it's January 2011 and with a couple of years experience under my belt.....grip IS important, but the last thing you want to do in hammer is to get tension in your forearms. if you get tense, you'll pull in your arms. That shortens the radius of your winds, and that results in shorter throws. You don't want to hold on to the hammer harder than you have to. My way to do this is to use those latex-palmed cotton or bamboo cloth gloves you can find in the gardening stores. A little pine tar tacky helps, too. Honestly, if you don't lose a hammer once in a while in practice, like once a month or so, I think you might be gripping it too hard.

big hint...keep your head up and lean back. Go for maximum extension of the arms in front of you.....the farther out you swing that thing, the more torque you get on it. I honestly think that most beginners need to start out solving the balance and "long arms" issues. Once you've got that, and some people never get that.....but once you've got those figured out, you then move on to moving OUT of balance and using your body mass, not your shoulders, to move the hammer. But that's not really appropriate for this thread.

OK...yours truly with the 16 pound hammer..thanks WalkerK...at Woodland 2010. URL updated I set a PR with this throw, but it needs improvement. I'm winding the hammer on the right side of my body in this throw, which was the breakthrough that gave me the PR, but I need to do it even more. I also need to get OUT of my central balance axis, but again, that is beyond the scope of a newbie hammer discussion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NFEX5HZdAM

I removed the link to the weight over bar video, because it's just not very good In WOB I prefer the direct approach.... One swing and launch it. Other guys like to rock it around a lot. You'll find what works for you.

I notice that some guys kind of snap the weight up. update 2011: I try to do this, now. Instead of thinking about a "strong" pull, I think of a "fast" pull. I personally try to use my quadriceps more than that, and really dig deep....let that weight swing as far behind me and as low as I comfortably can. I then concentrate on...well...to be crude "wiping my butt" with it. You can't hit yourself, the weight has so much momentum that it swings out away forward of your ahhh privates, anyway. I figure that the deeper I start and the longer I hold on to the weight, the more force I can put into it, and the higher it will go. [b]I now try to SLAM my hips forward as hard as possible when I do this. Go look at YouTube video of two things: Olympic lifts like power cleans and power snatches and also dancers doing a move called a "body roll".

Again coming back to this in January 2011: big hint in the gym. Do power cleans, or high pulls from the power position. Do at least one fast lift off the floor. Starting with an overhead dumbell snatch is what I did, it seemed like a good way. A LOT of the WOB is going to depend on explosiveness in your hip flexors. To oversimply, don't wing the weight up in front of you too much during your wind-ups....let it swing down and back and then STAND UP AS HARD AS YOU CAN...as in, *jump*. SLAM your hips forward. Keep your arms straight. The weight will fly.


I'm lousy at the stones, so I ain't sayin' nuthin . I've only turned a "qualifying" caber in an actual Games, but I'm getting so that I can turn my practice 12 foot, 70 pounder 5x out of 6, now, so hopefully at Ben Lomond..... OK, it's 2011 and my stones are coming along and I've turned my share of cabers, now! Still, these are my two worst events, so I ain't sayin' nuthin.

If you google the terms Yaish used above and then look for video, you can find a mess of videos of all the events. I personally think that the weights for distance are the most technique-heavy events.