Thinking about going back to cleans instead of the deadlift. I hate to continue on the path of explaining injuries but a life time of athletics and lifting have left their mark. I have a lot of trouble racking the weight. My left elbow won't fully bend and my right shoulder is a mess. I love the attributes the power cleans gives. I swear in just three weekly sessions my vertical leap and sprinting speed improves from this one lift. It improves explosive power and that's important in so many athletics endeavors.
Well, deadlifting heavy is very fatiguing for the back for sure. Eddie Hall deadlifts heavy every other week. The in-between week he still does deadlifts but light.
Wrist flexibility comes into play for cleans for me too. When the weight gets heavy my wrists become painful when catching the weight. I stretch my wrists a bit before each set.
It's usually recommended to keep reps low for cleans as it is a technical lift. I think this is best. Doing only a rep or two or three gives the wrists a break.
Logically this means more sets need to be done.
Front squatting for higher reps aggravates my wrists. However, 2 rep sets are manageable.
I had a back problem. I could feel some shifting in my discs at times when rolling over in bed or bending over. Scary! Deadlifting in particular seemed to aggravate this. I think it came from butt winking while squatting deep a couple years ago. Then it was always there. A real problem for me and I thought it to be a permanent condition.
I realized recently this back problem disappeared! I can only attribute this healing to doing cleans. Better than a chiropractor.
Like you, I have a bunch of other aches and pains but at least this one seems to have gone away.
