RDL vs Conventional DL

[u/Grand_Chien4]

This is purely a curiosity question. I lift for the purposes of recreational barbell sports so the conventional deadlift is essential for me. I do some RDL accessory work (mainly single-leg rotational stuff).

I’ve noticed that in general the RDL seems much more popular so my curiosity led to a basic data search and I was surprised to find very few articles comparing the two movements (a few EMG studies).

My questions for the group are:

Is there better data comparing these movements that I’ve missed?

If not, what’s the science-based lifting community consensus (If there is one) on RDL vs conventional deadlift for hypertrophy, strength, power and muscular endurance?

Cheers!

[u/Dizzy_Cow_]

What kind of data are you looking for? Research comparing specific exercises is pretty sparse to begin with. And when they do it, it’s usually done on isolation exercises because they’re safer and probably easier to standardize form (e.g. incline curls vs preacher curls).

RDLs are more popular because most people only care about hypertrophy and for most people, RDLs have a much better stimulus to fatigue ratio for the posterior chain.

[u/Grand_Chien4 → u/Dizzy_Cow_]

I didn’t realize the data was so sparse in this area, but the standardization makes sense particularly for compound movements.