Practical View of Bar Movement At The Hips

2 Weeks ago I wrote a blog on the impact of Newton’s law to bar track. I referenced the impact of the hips on the bar when moving horizontally. The goal of a proficient lifter is that the bar would reach their hips at the power position and “be carried” by the hips vertically and never leave the hips until the hip is extended. Any excessive horizontal hip movement will prevent this from happening and send the bar out away from the lifter. This excessive horizontal movement of the bar will do two things. First, it will likely send the bar away from the center of pressure in the feet and as a result move the combined center of gravity away from the bar making stabilization and a proper third pull impossible. Secondly, in order for the bar to move back to overhead it would have to loop out around the body and stop at just the right place overhead. The likelihood of this happening is slim and results more often in missed lifts behind as the bar swings around them OR missed lifts out front because not enough power was applied to the bar to get it to arc to overhead.
I experienced the tough problem of making the bar stay on the hip yesterday in training. I was doing a heavy singles from a deficit off a platform in the snatch. Likely because of the deficit and the lengthening of the time from the ground to my hip, I kept wanting to get behind the bar too early and as a result send my hip horizontally into the bar. As a result the bar did not stay on my hip nor did it move vertically with my hip. It looped out in front of me. Here’s couple videos showing the mistake.
115kg Snatch Miss from 2.5in Deficit
After looking at the video and realizing my mistake I made some corrections (though it was far from perfect) and attempt to get the bar to my hip quicker while still staying over the bar longer. Then my one and only cue for the lift was to move UP with the bar not move the bar out away from me. The video below is the result.
115kg Snatch from 2.5in Deficit
Here’s a comparison and bar track analysis of the two lifts side by side.
Bar Track Analysis 115kg Snatch from 2.5in Deficit