I shake my head. I follow a Youtube channel of a young guy who talks about business and firearms. The last video that showed up on my feed he was in a gym, about 60 pounds overweight (he has had some medical problems). I watched do a routine where you a type of countdown alternating burpees with conventional deadlifts.
Having back problems that were amplied by several years of convential deadlifting as a keystone to my routine; it was painful to watch, and on the video he talks about back pain. He gave it a good effort, but had to stop before he made to his goal. I don't often comment on people's choice of exercise, but I like the guy, and suggested the combination of burpees and conventional deadlifts might not be best thing he could be doing for the health of his lumbar and sacral vertebra. I also suggested he switch to a trap bar, if he was going to do deadlifts.
He appreciated the advice but took the blame for a lack of form. O.K., I did my part. But then his trainer chimed in on the comments with the B.S. about proper form always preventing injury and some Nietzsche style encouragement. I explained that the sacral vertebra act as a hinge on conventional deadlifts where the pressure of the weight is at one point entirely on the joint, asked him to let me know if he had the same advice ten years hence. Anyway, I was stepping on his turf and bowed out.
I am not against conventional style deadlifting, but it is not a exercise to use as an conditioner because of the wear on the lower vertebra and the risk for form breaking down. That is also a problem with burpees. You can probably get away with them when you are young, but it definitely has an adverse effect if you already have compression and deterioration in the lower spine.
I've lost count of the number of students I have who have had debilitating injuries from doing Crossfit style workouts in P.E. But, they gut it out and blame themselves. I had one that had to leave the Marine Corp because of a high school deadlifting injury that never healed. As the old saying goes - why is youth wasted on the young? I could also add - Why do I even bother?
Thank you DD. I got diagnosed when I was in my mid thirties with a great deal of deterioration in my cervical, lumbar and sacral vertebra. Foolishly I lifted heavy a decade after that. When I had an ATV accident in 2005 the X-ray revealed the same. So I have to be careful of how and what I do. It is the cumulative effect of years of weight training, rough and tumble martial arts, manual labor and several accidents. On the positive note, I can train like I do now, and if I am careful of what I do and am cognizant of what I am doing when I am doing it, I can stay healthy for many years to come.