Push Your Hips Forward to Finish Your Deadlift

It's a common mistake: standing up with the weight and not reaching full hip extension. This is a subtle error, but it'll negatively affect your deadlifting potential. Leaving the hips even slightly hinged at end range places excess load on the spine. A deadlift isn't truly complete until full hip and knee extension is achieved i.e. locked-out.

Instead of cueing yourself to pull UP on the bar, think of pushing your hips forward throughout the lift. This keeps you in a better position mechanically and signals for strong hip extension.

If you're sufficiently bracing your trunk, the bar will have to go up as you extend at the hips and the torso moves upright. The task of pushing the hips forward becomes easier to do the closer the bar gets to (and past) knee height.

Fully contracting the glutes at end range by pushing the hips into the bar will complete the lock-out. Just make sure the extension takes place through the hips and not through the lumbar spine.