Deadlifts are a great exercise for your back, butt, and legs, and they're a key movement if you hope to get anywhere in powerlifting, strongman—or the king of all sports, helping a friend move furniture. But when you head to the gym to start doing them, you'll realize deadlifts can be tricky to set up: the bar is on the ground, not on a rack, and you'll be working with fairly heavy weights right away.
By the way, I have a whole article on loading, unloading, and handling weights at the gym. If you're not sure how to carry plates around, or how to load them on squat or bench racks, read up—I've got you covered.
Anyway, let's talk about deadlifts. In theory, loading is simple: just slide each plate onto the barbell. But there’s friction between the plate and the floor as you’re trying to slide it on (or off), so this is easier said than done. Here’s how to get the plates on and off like a pro.
Grab the plate and pull
The first thing you need to know is the basics of getting a single plate on or off the bar. For the first plate you load, you can actually stand it up on end and slide the bar into the plate. (Then attach the collar or clip so it won't work its way loose as you do the rest.)
After that first plate, though, you'll need to load the plates by pulling them on. The trick is to not hold the plate by its top, which you probably instinctively do. Instead, do it like so:
Bring the plate to the end of the barbell, and line up the barbell with the hole in the center of the plate.
Straddle the barbell, facing the plate.
Grab the plate with two hands, right at 3 and 9 o’clock, and pull toward you.
I was first taught this trick by a bro in the gym who saw me struggling, and I’m going to tell you how he offered his advice because he did it in a polite and respectful way. (When he first walked up, I thought he was going to just lift it up and shove the plates on for me, which is not helpful if a person has not asked you to do so.)
First, he hung back to see if I was going to figure it out myself. Then, when I didn’t, he asked if I would like a tip for loading the plates. I said yes, and then he showed me how, and after that I was able to do the other side on my own.
This 3-and-9-o'clock-pull is the way you get plates on the bar, and also the way you get them off. Simple enough, right? But there's another problem: when you have multiple plates on the bar, it's hard to slide just one of them off. That's where we need either a deadlift jack, or a tiny plate. I'll start with the tiny plate, because there's always one at hand.
Use the tiny plate trick
This trick is easiest to understand when you’re unloading the bar: Place a small plate (like a 5-pounder) on the floor, and roll the barbell up onto it. Try to get it so that only the innermost plate is resting on the tiny plate. Now the rest of the plates are hovering a half inch off the floor, and you can slide them off easily. You can use the same trick for loading: once you’ve got the first big plate on, roll it up onto your tiny plate and load the rest.
Once you have everything loaded, roll the weights back onto the floor, kick the tiny plate aside, and do one more pull as above, giving the plates a good tug to make sure they are all snugged up against each other and the bar.
Use a deadlift jack or wedge
While the tiny plate trick is, in theory, all you need, the "proper" way to load a deadlift bar is to use a deadlift jack. Powerlifting gyms will pretty much always have at least one of these; in other types of gyms, they're less common.
A deadlift jack is a long metal tool that has a part to hold the barbell, a part that rests on the floor, and a handle so you can lever the bar off the floor once those other two parts are in place. When you see one in action, it's very obvious how it works. With a jack, even a tiny person can prop up a heavy deadlift bar to change the plates. Some jacks work on just one side of the bar at a time; the nicer ones can actually pick up the whole bar so a team of loaders—say, in a competition—can load both sides at once.
Here's a basic one-side deadlift jack, if you'd like to get one for your home gym. Here's the two-sided kind. And if you'd like something you can slip into your gym bag, try a deadlift wedge, which works on the same principle as the tiny plate trick, but is a little more specialized to the task. (I will also add, for the sake of completeness, that there are products out there that serve the purpose of a combination water bottle/deadlift jack. I cannot vouch for whether they work, or how well, but I have to say I am intrigued.)
For RDLs: look for a place to prop up the bar
If you prefer to do Romanian deadlifts (RDLs), you'll want to start from the top of the movement. Every now and then, you’ll find the holy grail of RDL preparation: a ledge, possibly attached to a power cage, where you can set the bar at about knee height and easily load and unload plates.