Your deadlift, checked before your back pays for it.

Where your hips sit between your knees and shoulders at the moment the bar breaks the floor. The deadlift wants them in the middle band - not a squat, not a stiff-leg.

How much your knees bend at the bottom. A deadlift bends them less than a squat but more than a stiff-leg - the hinge lives in the middle.

How much your torso angle travels between the bottom and standing tall. Big is right in a deadlift - this number IS the hinge.

How far your hips wash sideways during the pull, seen from the front. A clean pull keeps them centered between your feet.

How far your torso leans at the moment the bar leaves the floor. Deep lean is correct here - this checks you're in the hinge's working range.

How your torso angle changes between the floor and the knee. Holding or rising is the back doing its one job: keeping one shape.

Hold a dowel along your spine touching head, upper back and tailbone. Push the hips back until the hamstrings load, then stand - if the dowel loses a contact point, the spine changed shape. This is the whole deadlift, rehearsed with zero load.

Stand a foot from a wall, facing away. Push your hips back until they tap it - knees soft, shins vertical - then stand tall. Step an inch further away each set. The wall teaches hips-back instead of knees-forward.

From the top, push the hips back and slide the bar down the thighs to just below the knee, spine holding one shape, then drive the hips through. The RDL is hinge patterning with exactly the muscles the deadlift wants loaded.

A kettlebell between your feet: hinge down, grip, stand tall, control the way back down. Every rule of the barbell lift at a friendlier scale - the perfect place to groove the pattern before the bar.