In January of this year 2020, I deadlifted 530lb for a new personal record. My last post here mentioned deadlifted 495lb for two singles, and although that was a great feat of strength, my hips were felt a bit awful for months afterwards. And it took me a long time to realize the cause of the hip pain, and I believe it was from doing heavy deadlifts without a belt. I wasn't using the belt until like 470lb+ and more recently I started wearing the belt at 405lb+, and even more recently at 315lb+.
A belt is a safe piece of gear, but it does limit mobility, and breathing is a bit different. I think I wanted to strengthen my core, and I was under the impression a core that can withstand heavy deadlifts is a stronger core than one that requires a belt. But even though it didn't feel like I needed a belt with heavy weight, and there wasn't really immediate pain, there was a longer term numbness that settled in, which thankfully is gone right now, but it did last for months.
I was very happy with my 530lb lift. It was never really a goal. I just knew I had untapped strength in me on deadlifts, and after hitting 530lb, my plan was to slow down on deadlifting, and not do anything near 500lb for some time. I wanted to focus on bench pressing more, and the more focused you are on one given lift, all of the other lifts will suffer. So during my post 530lb pull, the months afterwards I made incredible progress on bench pressing. Prior to that I was getting chest pain from benching heavy, and to remedy that, I increased my total reps as well as doing 20 reps per set - including with heavy weights. My best was 255lb for 12 reps, 2 sets. It was on a decline bench, and I've since moved so I no longer have a decline bench.
I'll update more on what I've been doing hopefully in the next few days.
