6.1 Identifying Points of Performance Across the Foundational Movements

What a Point of Performance Is

Domain 4 — Training — is the largest domain on the CCFT exam at 34 items and 24 percent of the test, and its first task is to "identify points of performance." A point of performance is a specific, observable criterion that must be present for a repetition to be considered correct. It is deliberately short, deliberately visual, and deliberately checkable in real time.

This is what makes it a coaching tool rather than a description. "That squat looked bad" is an impression. "Your heels came up and your lumbar curve was lost below parallel" is two points of performance, and each one has a correction attached to it.

Points of Performance vs Movement Standards

These are frequently confused and are tested as a distinction.

A rep can meet the standard and still violate points of performance — a deadlift finished with a rounded back at full extension counts on a leaderboard and is a coaching emergency in a class.

The Points That Recur Everywhere

Learn the shared points first, because they cover most of what you will correct in a class:

1. Heels stay down. Force transmits through the whole foot; a rising heel shifts load forward and usually indicates ankle mobility, stance, or balance issues.
2. Lumbar curve is maintained. The natural arch is preserved throughout. This is the single highest-priority point in any loaded movement.
3. The midline is stabilised. Braced trunk, ribs down, active abdominals, so force transmits rather than leaks.
4. Knees track in line with the toes. No collapse inward (valgus), no excessive outward drift.
5. Full extension of hips and knees at the finish. Complete the movement; incomplete extension is both a lost rep and a lost stimulus.
6. Active shoulders overhead. Ears visible, shoulders pushed up into the bar, so the joint is supported by structure rather than by tissue.
7. The bar path is efficient. Close to the body in pulls; straight line over the middle of the foot in presses.

Movement-Specific Points

Air squat. Feet about shoulder width. Heels down. Lumbar curve maintained. Hips travel back and down and descend below the top of the knee. Knees track the toes. Finish at full hip and knee extension.

Front squat. All of the above, plus elbows kept high with the upper arms roughly parallel to the floor, and the torso as upright as the athlete's structure allows.

Overhead squat. All of the above, plus the bar held over the middle of the foot with active shoulders and locked elbows, and the armpits pointing forward.

Shoulder press. Feet roughly hip width. Full grip, hands just outside the shoulders, elbows slightly in front of the bar. Midline braced, no leaning back. The bar travels in a straight vertical line, which requires the head to move out of the way. Finish with the bar over the middle of the body and active shoulders.

Push press. As above, plus a dip that is vertical with the torso upright, a dip depth of roughly a quarter squat, and drive through the heels — the arms do not begin pressing until the legs have finished extending.

Push jerk. As above, plus a second dip to receive the bar overhead, and full hip and knee extension before the redirection downward.

Deadlift. Feet about hip width, hands just outside the legs. The bar starts over the middle of the foot and stays in contact with the legs. Lumbar curve maintained from set-up to lockout. Shoulders slightly ahead of the bar at the start. Hips and shoulders rise at the same rate. Heels down. Finish at full hip and knee extension.

Sumo deadlift high pull. Wide stance, hands inside the legs, same spinal and heel requirements, hips and legs open before the arms pull, elbows travel high and outside, bar finishes under the chin.

Medicine-ball clean. Deadlift set-up with the ball, full extension of hips and knees before the pull under, fast elbows, and receiving the ball in a full front squat.

Using the List on the Floor

The practical value of a fixed list is scanning speed. Rather than watching one athlete comprehensively and the rest not at all, scan the whole class against one point at a time:

• Pass one: heels. Look only at feet across the room.
• Pass two: lumbar curve. Look only at spines.
• Pass three: depth and extension.

This is faster and catches more than trying to see everything at once, and it produces group-level information — if six of twelve athletes have rising heels, that is a class-wide correction and probably a warm-up or setup problem, not six individual coaching conversations.

Priority Order

When several points are violated at once, correct in this order: spinal position, then joint safety (knee tracking, shoulder position), then completion (extension, depth), then efficiency (bar path, rhythm). Safety before scoring, scoring before style — a rule that resolves most of the triage decisions a coach faces in a busy class.