Loaded Carries: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Fitness

The loaded carry is the most functional lift

De Veer argues that the loaded carry is the best method for training grip, core strength, mental toughness, and injury prevention, calling it the most functional lift with the greatest carryover to sports and daily life.

"the loaded carry winds up being an afterthought in training and it truly is the best method I know to train grip. Core We'll define that a little better later. Strength, mental toughness, correct injuries, bullet proofing from injuries quite frankly Improve work capacity. As a lift, it's going to have the most carryover into sports and life, dare we say, the most functional lift that I know of."

Loaded carries train the entire core, not just abs

De Veer explains that loaded carries train all the muscles supporting the spine, not just the abdominals most people think of as core, making them the most efficient core training method available.

"It was funny, though, because I don't actually even identify well. I know that I obviously lift weights and train people and stuff, but, believe it or not, I don't identify in my mind as a big guy. I don't really know how other people perceive me often. Yeah, caught me off guard, but the guy behind the pastry counter, he took one look at my forearms and, I guess, the veins in them in particular and asked me how do you get forearms like that? I said absolutely. I mean, I find that a lot of things happen and I have a little bit of a sense of responsibility. Again, these are just funny to me because I've been the same person my whole life, so I still identify as a little siney from growing up, obviously, I played basketball as a sport, so nobody ever accused me of being big. I was always a little guy until I wasn't. Anyway, I'm not entirely used to it. But the guy stops me, asks me about my forearms, decided to give him a tip. He actually mentioned to me that his primary workout typically was calisthenics, body weight progressions but he was trying to improve. I don't know if this was just an aesthetic thing, I didn't have enough time. There was folks in line behind me. But yeah, I knew that he wanted to grow his forearms and since I knew that the body weight training was a big part of what he was doing, my recommendation to him was loaded carries and we're going to talk about all the benefits. But namely for him I was citing that the if he's geeking out of my forearms that the main exercise I do for that, quite frankly, is loaded carries. I don't do any direct forearm training. I don't do the curls and the roll-up things. I've done it in the past but that's not a part of my programming anymore. The only piece I have in my training that would directly impact my forearms obviously any of the pulling work that I do, but namely the loaded carries. That's where the vast majority of my grip strength and thus forearm strength and hypertrophy, if I have any Well, I guess I don't have to be so modest. It's good enough that it got me stopped at a farmer's market, so we'll just take it at face value. But anyway, I started telling the young man on why he should be doing loaded carries and again, namely for his calisthenics, his primary workout. I was seeing this as something that would improve his time up on the bar. Obviously, it follows if you get better at carrying weight, improve your grip strength, you will be better at pull-ups or anything that involves grip. So anyway, after giving him just a little rundown on some carries that he should maybe include in his workout, he finally asked me what we were going to get. And they make these beautiful little custard croissants that well, there's custard in the center and there's all these berries and that's the one my daughter picked. And then, cool guy, he actually just gave it to me for free and, yeah, just took him up on his hospitality and I still wanted to pay for the croissant Anyway, didn't want to turn it down and just acknowledge the value that he and I were sharing with each other. So, anyway, we'll be back again. It's one of our favorite spots and I look forward to catching up with the guy and see if he has put any of that to work. And reason I'm excited for that is I know that if he does it, it's going to go really well for him and maybe we'll have even more free croissants In our future. Just kidding, but not really. Anyway, without further ado, I do want to. Today, the deep dive is going to be all on loaded carries. We're going to talk, actually, about the history of loaded carries. We're going to get in and talk about some of the benefits. I've already kind of scratched the surface of that. We're going to go a little deeper. We will look at the different variations and I'll give you guys a brief explanation of each. They're all great, but we'll kind of run down why you might want to gravitate into some versus others. Couple DIY variations, if you will, that you can pull off. We'll talk about how to program these into your workouts for an array of goals, because I think the loaded carry can be used in a number of different ways. And, yeah, that's going to be pretty much how we're going to go about today's episode. So anyway, let's dive into the history first, and what's fun about this is I also get to shamelessly plug an episode that we have already done. So if you've been listening for a while, you might remember our episode on progressive overload. That was the first time I introduced you to a man named Milo of Croton. So anyway, there's kind of two really important takeaways from that story. Number one, obviously, progressive overload. That's why we did a whole episode on that. But we should also remind you what was Milo doing? Remember, milo picked up a bull every single day as it went from a calf into a bull, and so obviously, the lift that Milo chose is what we would call today a fireman's carry, but he was doing it with a bull. So there really are two really great takeaways that we can pull from the story of Milo, and that would be number one, progressive overload. And then number two, the value of loaded carries."

Grip strength as a biomarker for longevity

The episode highlights research showing grip strength is one of the strongest predictors of overall health and longevity, and that loaded carries are among the most effective ways to develop this critical capacity.

"It was funny, though, because I don't actually even identify well. I know that I obviously lift weights and train people and stuff, but, believe it or not, I don't identify in my mind as a big guy. I don't really know how other people perceive me often. Yeah, caught me off guard, but the guy behind the pastry counter, he took one look at my forearms and, I guess, the veins in them in particular and asked me how do you get forearms like that? I said absolutely. I mean, I find that a lot of things happen and I have a little bit of a sense of responsibility. Again, these are just funny to me because I've been the same person my whole life, so I still identify as a little siney from growing up, obviously, I played basketball as a sport, so nobody ever accused me of being big. I was always a little guy until I wasn't. Anyway, I'm not entirely used to it. But the guy stops me, asks me about my forearms, decided to give him a tip. He actually mentioned to me that his primary workout typically was calisthenics, body weight progressions but he was trying to improve. I don't know if this was just an aesthetic thing, I didn't have enough time. There was folks in line behind me. But yeah, I knew that he wanted to grow his forearms and since I knew that the body weight training was a big part of what he was doing, my recommendation to him was loaded carries and we're going to talk about all the benefits. But namely for him I was citing that the if he's geeking out of my forearms that the main exercise I do for that, quite frankly, is loaded carries. I don't do any direct forearm training. I don't do the curls and the roll-up things. I've done it in the past but that's not a part of my programming anymore. The only piece I have in my training that would directly impact my forearms obviously any of the pulling work that I do, but namely the loaded carries. That's where the vast majority of my grip strength and thus forearm strength and hypertrophy, if I have any Well, I guess I don't have to be so modest. It's good enough that it got me stopped at a farmer's market, so we'll just take it at face value. But anyway, I started telling the young man on why he should be doing loaded carries and again, namely for his calisthenics, his primary workout. I was seeing this as something that would improve his time up on the bar. Obviously, it follows if you get better at carrying weight, improve your grip strength, you will be better at pull-ups or anything that involves grip. So anyway, after giving him just a little rundown on some carries that he should maybe include in his workout, he finally asked me what we were going to get. And they make these beautiful little custard croissants that well, there's custard in the center and there's all these berries and that's the one my daughter picked. And then, cool guy, he actually just gave it to me for free and, yeah, just took him up on his hospitality and I still wanted to pay for the croissant Anyway, didn't want to turn it down and just acknowledge the value that he and I were sharing with each other. So, anyway, we'll be back again. It's one of our favorite spots and I look forward to catching up with the guy and see if he has put any of that to work. And reason I'm excited for that is I know that if he does it, it's going to go really well for him and maybe we'll have even more free croissants In our future. Just kidding, but not really. Anyway, without further ado, I do want to. Today, the deep dive is going to be all on loaded carries. We're going to talk, actually, about the history of loaded carries. We're going to get in and talk about some of the benefits. I've already kind of scratched the surface of that. We're going to go a little deeper. We will look at the different variations and I'll give you guys a brief explanation of each. They're all great, but we'll kind of run down why you might want to gravitate into some versus others. Couple DIY variations, if you will, that you can pull off. We'll talk about how to program these into your workouts for an array of goals, because I think the loaded carry can be used in a number of different ways. And, yeah, that's going to be pretty much how we're going to go about today's episode. So anyway, let's dive into the history first, and what's fun about this is I also get to shamelessly plug an episode that we have already done. So if you've been listening for a while, you might remember our episode on progressive overload. That was the first time I introduced you to a man named Milo of Croton. So anyway, there's kind of two really important takeaways from that story. Number one, obviously, progressive overload. That's why we did a whole episode on that. But we should also remind you what was Milo doing? Remember, milo picked up a bull every single day as it went from a calf into a bull, and so obviously, the lift that Milo chose is what we would call today a fireman's carry, but he was doing it with a bull. So there really are two really great takeaways that we can pull from the story of Milo, and that would be number one, progressive overload. And then number two, the value of loaded carries."