6 Underappreciated Benefits of Trap Bar Deadlifts

The trap bar deadlift is awesome for so many reasons. Whether you’re a beginner, powerlifter, or sports athlete, you can benefit from doing more trap bar deadlifts.

In most cases, the trap bar gets overlooked at the gym for the far-flashier and more well-known barbell deadlift. From my coaching perspective, I think lifters see the trap bar deadlift and forget just how dynamic this bar can be.

For starters, the trap bar deadlift can be used to build strength and power, and it can be a powerful teaching tool for lifters wanting to improve their hinge and squat mechanics, but there’s a lot more to it than that.

Before you dive into the trap bar deadlifts, make sure you have your form on lock. Check out my trap bar deadlift breakdown for a detailed explanation of nailing this exercise.

Benefit 1: Great for Developing the Quads

The first trap bar deadlift benefit that I think most lifters pick up on right away with this exercise is how fantastic they can be for building the quads. When pulling trap bar deadlifts, you’ll be using a blend of the quads and posterior muscles.

For example, whether you use high or low-handle trap bar deadlifts you’ll be using the quads a lot to initiate your deadlift since your arms are to the side and you’re assuming a more squat-like position.

If your goals revolve around building quad strength and size, this gives the trap bar deadlift an edge over the barbell deadlift. For newer lifters, this can be great to keep in mind as they develop foundational leg strength.

Trap Bar Deadlift for Quads Coaching Thoughts

• If your goal is hitting the quads heavily, then I’d suggest doing low-handle trap bar deadlifts. This will give you more flexion which will place higher demands on the quads.
• If your goal is moving more weight and hitting the quads, then I’d suggest using high-handle trap bar deadlifts for higher volumes and higher intensities.

Benefit 2: Awesome for Developing Power

To build power in the gym, you need to move weight fast with a lot of velocity. The trap bar deadlift is one of my go-to exercises for building power because it’s an easy exercise to set up for success.

When we talk about lower body power, we want to consider how fast we can extend at the knees and hips, especially when we’re trying to improve our jumping abilities vertically or forward.

With the trap bar deadlift, there tends to be a lower bar to entry regarding how skilled you need to be to perform reps at a high velocity. On top of this, you can get a nice blend of different lower body muscles responsible for power such as the glutes and quads.

Trap Bar Deadlifting for Power Coaching Thoughts

• If your goal is pure velocity, then you’ll want to use lighter loads — think <60% 1-RM strength. You can also add trap bar deadlift jumps or high-pulls with lighter loads to focus on pure velocity and speed.
• Trap bar deadlifts performed like clean pulls for speed can be an awesome means of building power while moving heavier loads.
• When in doubt, use a velocity tracker. This can be a powerful tool to help prevent you from overshooting when training for power.

Benefit 3: Carryover to Sports

For my friends who play sports competitively or even at the rec center every week, the trap bar deadlift can be fantastic for creating some harmonious carryover to your sport.

When talking about carryover from the gym to sports, I think of this from multiple angles, including strength, power, coordination and balance, and durability. All of these components can be trained with exercises like the trap bar deadlift when programmed with intent.

In most sports, you’ll move through various ranges of motion that resemble a squat and “athletic position” AKA a shallower squat. The trap bar deadlift’s setup can resemble a wide range of athletic positions, creating carryover in that context.

On top of this, you can perform the trap bar deadlift with so many different intentions that you can create a flow that replicates the needs of your sport.

Trap Bar Deadlifting for Sports Coaching Thoughts

• If your goal is durability, then performing higher volumes with moderate intensities and slower tempos can be a powerful tool. This will give your muscular and joint tissues more time under tension with gradual progressive intensities.
• If you play a sport like hockey or football and you need to be explosive, then performing a blend of heavy and light velocity-focused sets can be fantastic.
• If you want to build full body strength for any sport, then performing moderate-volume trap bar deadlifts with varied intensities can be an awesome strategy call.

Benefit 4: Reduced Loading On the Lower Back

If you find that traditional barbell deadlifts constantly blow your lower back up then trap bar deadlifts can be an awesome alternative to program to build back strength without potentially overshooting your lower back’s capabilities.

When the barbell is in front of us like it is in the barbell deadlift we can be more prone to utilizing the lower back to help us lift the weight. This is typically due to the body trying to resist the barbell from pulling it forward and poor deadlift mechanics.

Since the trap bar deadlift utilizes more legs with the hands to the side of the body, the lift is a lot more leg-dominant and vertical. This then creates a greater balance of the displacement of load through the midline of the body.

For example, you might feel like it’s easier to “feel” the weight through the middle of the feet in the trap bar deadlift than it is in the barbell deadlift. This can in turn make it easier to keep excessive load off of the lumbar spine.

Trap Bar Deadlifts and Low Back Stress Coaching Thoughts

• If you’re feeling pressure in the lower back when barbell deadlifting, check your hip height. You may be sitting too low which is causing your hips to shoot up.
• Adjust your hip height in the trap bar deadlift based on your goals. Lower hips will place more load on the quads and higher hips will keep a majority of the weight in the posterior.

Benefit 5: Fantastic Grip Strength Builder

You can train your grip in a variety of ways. However, if you want an awesome full-body workout while building your grip at the same time then it’s tough to fault the trap bar deadlift’s performance.

The trap bar deadlift’s hand positioning replicates what you use in the Farmer’s carry which is one of the most popular exercises for building grip strength. This is great because it can “feel” more natural holding trap bar deadlifts compared to barbell deadlifts.

Factor in the fact that you can typically load trap bar deadlifts heavier than normal deadlifts and perform them for higher volumes and you have a seriously dynamic tool for building grip strength, endurance, and resiliency.

The ability to squat and hinge while holding weight will also place a unique demand on your grip. Is your grip strong from a static context or while moving and producing force and power?

Trap Bar Deadlifts and Grip Coaching Thoughts

• If your goal is building pure grip strength, then I’d suggest programming a block of trap bar deadlifts and letting your grip be your limiter. For example, don’t hook grip for heavier weight, hit weights that you can successfully lift with pure grip.
• If you want to expedite your grip gains try adding holds at the top of your deadlifts. This will add more time in which you’re training your grip and it can be a fun balance challenge.
• One of my absolute favorite ways to build grip fast is to perform a trap bar deadlift set, a farmer’s walk with the weight, and then perform a few reps after I’ve hit my distance goal. It’s a fun mental and physical challenge.

Benefit 6: Trap and Back Builder

Outside of building the quads and glutes, the trap bar deadlift can also be a sick training tool for building the traps and back. You’re not trap bar deadlifting 315+ lbs for reps without having a strong back and traps.

After a few big sets of trap bar deadlifts I’m always shocked at how much work my traps and upper back get. The traps are working to keep the weight centered and balanced and your upper back is working to prevent excessive flexion.

The culmination of these with the squat-like movement pattern of the trap bar deadlift can give your traps and back an awesome stimulus. Now, this doesn’t mean to go and replace all of your back training with trap bar deadlifts but its ability to build the back is underappreciated.

On that note, I find that the trap bar deadlift can be best for building foundational back strength for beginners and intermediates. It’s less technical than the barbell deadlift so you can get comfortable holding heavy weight for longer periods.

Trap Bar Deadlifts and Traps/Upper Back Coaching Thoughts

• Don’t overretract the scaps when setting up for trap bar deadlifts. Let your arms hang and let your upper back, traps, and lats do their thing to create a strong setup and positioning.
• If you’re feeling spicy, add a pause or two at the top of your trap bar deadlifts. This will give you an additional stimulus for the traps and can be a sneaky way to get in more heavy shrug work.

Final Remarks

There are a ton of reasons to do more trap bar deadlifts in your workout programs. Whether you’re a beginner or an advanced lifter wanting to take a break from barbell deadlifts, trap bar deads have their place.

While I’ve provided six trap bar deadlift benefits in this article, there are a ton more we can discuss and unpack and these will ebb and flow based on training goals and needs.

These are typically the six big benefits I like to discuss when lifters ask why we’re doing trap bar deadlifts so often. If you have additional questions on this article, drop a comment below!