Weightlifting belts can be fantastic performance boosters, but they’re very commonly misunderstood—and often misused. So let’s break down what lifting belts actually do, and when you’ll really benefit from wearing one.
You’ve probably seen someone wearing a thick weightlifting belt in the gym and wondered if it helps them lift better, or even more safely. The latter is actually the common perception; according to a study found in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning a majority of surveyed belt-wearers use one because they think it’ll help prevent injuries. It’s unclear whether this theory holds up in practice, since we’ve been unable to locate any peer-reviewed studies specifically looking at the correlation between the use of weightlifting belts and the incidence of injury events in the gym.
However, we can take the hint from studies in manual labor settings, like this one in JAMA, which shows that wearing a back-supporting belt while lifting heavy objects on the job didn’t seem to reduce incidences of back injuries or lower back pain. In short, don’t put on a belt thinking it’s going to protect you from bad ideas in the gym. That’s not exactly what a lifting belt is for anyway.
How do weightlifting belts work?
In reality, a weightlifting belt primarily supports your abs, and is not intended to directly support your back. It sounds backwards, but here’s why: The belt acts like a second set of abs to prepare your entire body to lift heavy loads, something we discussed when we talked about bracing your core here. The short version is that when you brace yourself for those super heavy lifts, you should take a deep belly breath and hold it, a method of “breathing” called the Valsalva maneuver.
The Valsalva maneuver helps create intra-abdominal pressure that cushions and supports your spine. And that’s where a weightlifting belt bestows its powers. Wearing one, you do your deep belly breath into the belt, which pushes back against your abs. This amplifies the effects of that intra-abdominal pressure, which in turn helps protect your back and helps it handle the stress of heavier loads. This study in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise confirms that the resulting pressure is greater and builds faster than it would without a belt.
The belt increases your lifting efficiency, potentially allowing you to bang out a little more weight than you would without one. Of course, that is assuming you know how to properly lift and use proper technique in the first place. In the end, you might lift a tad more weight and get more stability where you need it (your trunk and torso).
